The Final WCW Nitro Review | Wrestling With Wregret 

DDP: I'm gonna take it to a whole new level. WWE: I'm gonna end this man's entire career.

Booker T being a double champion at the end of WCW's existence is an interesting parallel to ECW being that when they went out of business Rhyno became both ECW World & TV champion at their last PPV.

While the Invasion ended up being an awful storyline, the moment when Shane announced that he bought WCW gives me goosebumps. Vinces face is priceless too.

And the name on the contract does say Zane. However, the contract reads Brian Zane.

What starts in a mall in Minnesota and ends on a beach in Florida? WCW Nitro

15:35...Tony went Savage mode on his last day on the job 😅😅😅

I remember various WCW wrestlers saying in shoots that they weren't sure that the WWF bought WCW until Shane Mcmahon walked in the back on the final Nitro.

Well, it's still a Classic Review.

Now I think it would've been better if Sting was revealed to be the mysterious attacker of the Magnificent Seven. If they just had that small detail and revealed it was Sting, his return on the Final Nitro would make more sense, especially with him fighting Ric Flair.

That wrestlmania 17 jersey is sooooo dope

The WCW stars were supposed to get involved in Wrestlemania X-7 but that didn't happen. And they have one man to thank for that: Shawn Stasiak.

Shane wanted to buy the UFC and he got this shitty angle.

This video is for those of you who thought the perfect thumbnail didn't exist...

Oh, so that's why Bischoff's podcast is called 83 Weeks.

"Spot, Spot, Spot, no time to sell..." That pretty much sums up wrestling in 2021.

And then the slow crawl of WWE becoming lazy began. It took nearly a decade to get there, but they did it. This is why monopolies or companies trying to buy everything is not a good thing.

This episode of Nitro was accidentally the first I saw. I had only just got into wrestling and had no idea what WCW even was. For me it made me a massive fan of wrestling because it seemed like anything could happen, I even liked the Invasion, because I had no idea what I was missing.

the kiss of death of the wrestling golden age

Ending with Sting and Flair is poetic, in a way. Almost prophetic

In reference to the Pop Buff Bagwell gets when Vince says his name, Buff is unexplainable to the modern audience. He was prob the most popular non world champion they had and honestly had a ton of name recognition outside of wrestling at the time. In other words, Buff truly was the stuff (from about 1998 to 2001)

I still wonder what an invasion could have been like without egos involved and bigger wcw names. Would’ve truly been cool seeing sting and taker at that time.. and goldberg/Austin and so on.

That electric chair spot looks like Manami Toyota’s ocean cyclone suplex.

I know we love to joke about that "a number we can only dream of today" stuff, but Nitro was really doing 1.8 in late 2000. A 1.8 rating in 2000 is like a .03 rating today.

"The Play of the Day/Overdrive/Shit Move." Lol! That move sucks so bad.

Man, I remember that night well. I watched RAW and only switched briefly to Nitro during the breaks. I remember feeling so triumphant that WCW was defeated since I was a total WWF mark at the time... little did I know it would be a long downward slide from there...

I look at the end of WCW a little differently than I did back then. Growing up, in my house, WWF was wrestling, we didn't have a bias against WCW or anything, it's just that we had easier access to watch WWF with the syndicated weekend shows (Shoutgun/Jakked/Metal) and then Smackdown, heck the only reason I knew anything about WCW was because of WCW/nwo: Revenge on N64. I didn't get a real appreciation for the company and what we as fans loss until years later and especially now because of the Network, Brian's reviews, and me doing my own wrestling reviews. But because of this past year with so many companies having to close down and a lot of folks, including some family, being laid off, I feel bad for the non-wrestling folks who weren't able to get another gig easily. The camera crew, lighting, make-up, marketing, the people who we don't see on tv or know their names, yet played a role in the success in the company and didn't have a fall back plan of going to WWF or starting up a wrestling company and had to go back into the rough job market. I know we always think of the wrestlers in these situations, but I think we all need to spare a thought for the unnamed and unsung folks who took an L when WCW closed down.

Honestly? As a WWF kid during the Attitude Era, watching Vince essentially wipe his ass with WCW during the final episode of Nitro was actually pretty badass. In retrospect we all know it was bad for the industry as a whole, but as a kid at the time I loved watching my preferred wrestling promotion kill their competition.

Always amazing to me that the final Nitro segment was the true sign that Wrestling in the US would never be the same since the start of the segment is Vince standing on a rampway as Paul Heyman talks. I mean you have the main booker of ECW talking as the owner of WWF as it was then be on a WCW segment.

I remember seeing Vince McMahon on Nitro. I was shocked. Couldn't believe that WCW was gone.

I feel like it's perfect that the first and last Nitro were in a non-traditional venues as the first episode was in the Mall of America

Awww yes the week that mainstream wrestling started to die😅😅😅

So the mystery attacker scenario. I think this would’ve been a perfect Segway to have Sting return

It's sad that I watched the final episode of Nitro, but the only things I remember from it was the Booker- Steiner, Sting and Flair and the Shane coming to the ring to announce he bought WCW

Tbs in the 80s: Mama's Family reruns -wrestling-Moma's Family reruns.

I can't believe that this was 2 decades ago. It was quite a time to be a wrestling fan

Feel there could be more Classic Episode Reviews, for instance: - Nitro from 1998 where Goldberg beats Hogan - Jan 4th 1999 Raw and Nitro - the first WWE draft - the episode of Raw where Batista turns on Triple H - Raw 1000

Schiavone looks freaking depressed in that opening.

I really loved this 2001 wcw Series Brian you did a excellent job of reviewing the shows and going though this saga

No one can deny that Shane announcing that he bought WCW is still one of the most iconic moments in wrestling history, despite the invasion storyline being disappointing.

If ROH’s first ever show is ever a suggestion, Brian should review it

Flair was probably just talking about NWA in his promo.

4:50 I always thought the mystery attacker was Nash, DDP and Sting and that was what we were building up to when Bischoff invited all former champs to the Night of Champions and they were all gonna help Booker take down Steiner. Then again, there was the part you forgot to mention that Shane Douglas had incriminating footage of Rick that he was planning to reveal the following week, and they had a match on Night of Champions which was scrapped since Shane walked out. Back then I assumed it was WWF stars that did it to show they were in charge and they specifically attacked the members of Mag7 since they were once part of WWF and Vince instructed them to attack them to get back, and the part where he fires Double J and bad mouthed Luger, Animal and Goldust kinda made younger me believe that was so. Looking back they should've went along with it, like maybe Vince could reveal that he sent his goons to specifically remind them he is in charge of WCW and to send a message to Flair, Jarrett, Luger, the Steiner Bros and Animal they are "FIRED"! 5:55 Missing was the dark match which had Jason Jett take on Mark Jindrak. It was once posted on youtube after that it cut to Vince opening Nitro, looked like it was taken on a home camera. 10:55 I never understood why Jung Dragons never got an entrance. You also forgot to mention on the previous Thunder they had to beat AJ Styles and Air Paris to qualify to participate in this match. 19:37 I always thought he said TN-End. Like putting some salt into the wounds. 24:55 Another final blow to WCW was the racial discrimination lawsuit the previous year. That didn't help them and them putting the title on Booker, Stevie on commentary and Cat as commissioner wasn't good enough damage control. And say what you will about Mike Graham but he was right, Turner was terrified of lawsuits, and this was something Turner wanted to stay away from especially since they were rebranding in this period. 25:43 Can we at least blame him for the cancellation of Freakazoid? Or what happened to WB? Even if we shouldn't blame him entirely for WCW and WB, there's no denying he wasn't that good. And I believe the blame should also go to AOL because during the merger when AOL/Time Warner sold WCW due to the money they were losing which was $67 million in 2000, that is nothing compared to AOL/TW losing $98 billion in 2002. Turns out investing in dial-up wasn't the best idea. And will you review the 3/26/2001 edition of Raw? Saving it for the 20th anniversary?

4:11 - Compounding that was something I remember reading in _The Death Of WCW,_ that some of the boys had been worked so much over the years by the booking staff that they apparently thought rumors of the company's closure was likewise, just a big work - until they stopped getting paid.

Seeing Shane McMahon's name in a Nitro name card was so surreal!

BAGWELL!? That Flair promo is one of my favorites in wrestling history.

The sad thing is, we were all laughing about how bad WCW was from '99 leading up to this point. Little did we know, at the time, that we needed WCW to exist to stop wrestling from degenerating into the state it's now in, and has been in for the past 15 years or so.

Ric’s body language says it all.

I remember being a freshmen at college, watching the final Nitro in my dorm room, flipping channels in utter disbelief. As Brian said, I still get chills thinking about.

I still remember this night, I only watched sting vs flair and then Shane came out and the rest was history

awesome. some weekly shows are more important than the ppvs, and this is def one of them.

I remember when it happend, i was about 11 at the time and i was into Wrestling for over a year by that point. Me and my brother (who is 10 years older then me and who pretty much was on board since the late 80s) would watch both WCW Nitro and WWF Raw. In Germany, Nitro aired on Tuesday afternoon, while Raw aired on Thursday evening, so it was very easy for us to catchup on both shows. My parents didn't had any internet at that time, as Internet was still on the rise and was still a very unique item to have, especially here in Germany. So, i actually heard of the buy out by the time i saw Vince on that tuesday afternoon. And although i was much more into WWF at the time, i still knew how shocking this deal was, as my brother showed me alot of old tapes, not just from 96-97, but also older stuff from the late 80s and early 90s. It was really the end of an era and as my brother predicted, pro wrestling would never be the same afterwards.

The streak is over the streak overzane finally does a tv show episode review

That moment with Shane still gives me goosebumps. Good memories.

Time stamps: - Mr. McMahon opens Nitro: 5:54 - Ric Flair promo: 7:01 - Title vs. Title Match for the WCW United States and World Heavyweight Titles: Booker T vs. Scott Steiner: 8:16 - Triple Threat Tag Team Match to determine the #1 contenders for the WCW Cruiserweight Tag Team Titles: The Jung Dragons vs. 3 Count vs. Rey Mysterio, Jr. & Kidman: 10:52 - WCW Cruiserweight Title Match: Chavo Guerrero, Jr. vs. 'Sugar' Shane Helms: 12:03 - WCW Tag Team Title Match: Team Canada vs. Chuck Palumbo & Sean O'Haire: 13:21 - Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Shawn Stasiak: 14:20 - WCW Cruiserweight Tag Team Title Match: Rey Mysterio, Jr. & Kidman vs. 'Primetime' Elix Skipper & Kid Romeo: 16:08 - Final Nitro Match: Ric Flair vs. Sting: 17:41 - Nitro/RAW Simulcast: 19:29 - Shane buys WCW: 20:32 - Final Thoughts: 22:34 - Final Grade: 25:48

I remember watching both the WCW and the WWF broadcast of this night. It was like watching a funeral and a celebration at the same time.

It was the end of the greatest era of wrestling that fans will NEVER see again.

I'm genuinely surprised that Brian didn't even mention how Vince Fired Jeff Jarrett on this date (yes it was Raw not Nitro but it's still important) as Double J would go on to create one of the most influential and divisive promotions in modern Wrestling: TNA later Impact Wrestling

Forward 18 years later in a executive board meeting. " I think we can use a wrestling program, right?! I mean we had one before" 😂😂

I'd like to see a review of the Nitro/RAW featuring the Finger Poke of Doom and the Mankind title win.

2 things: 1 - The flyer for the Final Nitro had a neat little thing regarding its timeslot. It read "4pm - ?" .....6pm lol. 2 - If anyone hasn't already, check out Tri.Moon's WCW version of the WWF's Lonely Road Of Faith package, chronically the entire history of WCW spanning from its JCP and NWA days to what it became in 2001. We still miss you, Tri.Moon.

The WCW invasion was one of the biggest missed opportunities. Hey that would be a good list

I was watching Nitro when this happened, because I was a WCW guy. and I really don't believe it is anything I will ever forget.

Jamie Kellner deserves all the ire he's gotten. He didn't just cancel WCW, he killed Animaniacs and Pinky and the Brain too.

Question is Sting vs Ric Flair actually Stings best wwe match.

According to Buff Bagwell, they had no clue prior to arriving at the location. He said that he saw the WWE trucks when they first pulled up, and asked around until someone told him. He said that Shane pulled everyone in for a meeting right before the show began and told them all. Buff said that he told them that some of them would have jobs, and some wouldn't. He said that they were all ready to get it over with.

Man just seeing Vince and shane mcmahon on wcw television back then was so surreal.

Couldn’t believe this show when it happened, one of biggest moments in wrestling ever

Give Vince credit he might hated WCW but at least he tried to make WCW a third brand show the day that WCW died he asked who do you wanna see in WWF the people cheered for Bagwell and Booker T but that backfired

Pour one out for ECW bruh 😟

Sadly I missed this historic moment. I wasn't a one brand zombie slave like so many today, I loved WWF, WCW & ECW. To me wrestling is best when there are multiple mainstream options. So when both WCW & ECW were on life support & it was becoming clear that WWF was going to be the only big league in town I began to sour on pro wrestling. Instead of hate watching I chose to stop watching it all around the Fall of 2000 & didn't start watching again until January 2002. The Monday Night Wars were truly one of the Golden Eras & when AEW came along to become another viable alternative it should be applauded because trust me, pro wrestling is better with mainstream competition

That ring and filming setup makes me miss WCW's willing to take chances and be creative. There were a lot of misses, but there were also some cool moments, too.

Seeing the Notification for this Video Vince is looking at Brian and is like "Who the Hell is this Guy?"

I was at this show and what a night it was! As a senior in high school and $10 unlimited beer (yellow mugs in the crowd) with no ID checks 🤣🤣

Its amazing to me that Nitro at its worst was drawing solidly more than RAW right now

Ah yes, the Nitro episode that came out the exact day I was born

Petition to get this series renamed to the Classic Wrestling Review. This review of the final nitro opens the doors for other historic episodes of wrestling

What he says about WCW at the end could be said about TNA/Impact Wrestling. They had a few bad years where they lost stars and believed in Hulk Hogan and a million heel factions. Even though "the petals are off the rose" for a lot of people Impact Wrestling has been solid lately but, nobody gives it a chance due to the past.

What Zane forgot to mention was how Nitro screwed up. I also remember flipping back and forth between Raw and Nitro when Vince was on screen and on TNN the telecast was perfect, but when you switched to WCW on TNT, the words didn't match with what Vince or Shane was saying. It was like a second off.

One last thing, I don't know if this is a shared opinion or not, but I honestly think if the roles were reversed, I think we'd be decrying how badly WCW botched the purchase of WWF and how guys like Austin and Rock were handled. I think it was inevitable that whoever won, WWF or WCW, would've gone on to piss of people with how an Invasion would've been booked. I also think a similar situation would've happened where the WWF guys would look and be booked a lot lower than the WCW guys, politics being what it is in wrestling. You think Hogan was going to put over Austin, Rock, HHH, or Angle (had things gone to 2000), no. Again, WWF deserves crap for how the Invasion was handled and how a lot of the WCW guys were booked after, but don't think WCW would've done any better had they came out on top.

IMO they should have waited until the Monday after Wrestlemania to officially announce on tv. It would have been able to possibly pack an arena with buzz of WWF guys showing up and made for a massive Wrestlemania Monday show. The invasion could have started and really given WCW a different future I think...

I laughed when he talked about turning back and forth between nitro and raw to make sure it was really happening cuz I remember doin the same thing.

Wait a minute. I thought Booker T was a five time, five time, five time, five time, five time WCW champion?!?!

The invasion had such a nice build to start. Two things ruined things outside of WWE’s control: the guaranteed deals allowing the biggest stars to just sit at home if they wanted and Shawn Stasiak blabbing to press about a Mania angle that ended up getting cancelled.

Imagine an alternate universe where WCW bought out the Federation

20 years now since WCW went under. Always wonder what would have happened if WCW survived

A day that set wrestling back 20 years.

People often complain that none of the big names came over during the invasion…but if you really think about it, it was smart of their part to wait because none of them would have felt that special if they all came in at once. Because coming in separately gave the fans breathing room and time to be like OMG! It’s Ric Flair! It’s the nWo! It’s Eric Bischoff! Exc.

Thanks for finishing off the dying days of WCW Brian 😀 it’s quite a history lesson 👍

WCW could have been saved up to the moment the show went off the air, given some time they could have made a somewhat of a comeback. Comeback as in not competing with Raw but comeback as in post some pretty decent numbers. Looking back now, I wish Bischoff would have just bought the IP to bring back at a better time and channel that would want them, but that's hindsight

The final nitro was the vince mcmahon show! Watch him as he watches TV. Watch him as he insults the program. Watch him as he leaves the room lol

That top rope sunset flip by Helms was gorgeous

Vince McMahon is the best heel of all time. Change my mind.

That turtle neck is iconic. He was by a pool, what was Shane thinking 😂😂😂

in comparison to the wwf, wcw's rating were bad. however, nitro and thunder were still the highest rated shows on the respective stations and in the cable top 10 and 20 every week.

Honestly the fact that Cole is still around botching calls with no one correcting him and he still has fans claiming he's had a Hall of Fame career just baffles me. Someone in management must really like him.

I find it interesting that this nitro wasn't the last wcw programming. There was a wcw worldwide i think it was called and parts of it are very hard to find

When WWE bought WCW, I didn't watch wrestling for five years, no joke I was so mad at Vince McMahon for doing that

This should have been a classic Who War It Better with you also reviewing that night's Raw.

Can't wait for more tv show reviews. Also the fact that the 2010 royal rumble was over 11 years ago and I was only 11 at the time, is really disturbing

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the end of Monday Night war and btw Brian it was March 26th 2001 not march 23rd.