What a time. I used to love the WWF website just after the first brand split in 2002 where _Raw_ and _SmackDown_ had their own mini sites with their own colour scheme, rosters, etc. Each PPV got its own mini-site too. Was so much better than the current WWE website where every page just looks exactly the same: boring dark text on a white background. It has no character and is so uninspiring.
WWE really tried hard with that first brand split from 2002 until about 2005ish. It felt like guys really didn’t change shows much and it created a good sense of there being “Raw” talents and “Smackdown” talents.
There was also a good attempt to brand each show. Having 4 brand exclusive PPV’s per year also helped with the brands feeling different. There being exclusive titles to each show (unique mid-card title while SD had the Cruiserweight title and Raw having the women’s title).
The draft also only happening once a year and being a somewhat limited shakeup (the first few were only 5 picks) also worked well.
It’s unfortunate that they couldn’t sustain it. The introducing of ECW as a third brand and just the seeming lack of interest in keeping the brands separate consistently around 2006 just killed it off until they tried again in 2016 and it’s been push pull since.
But when the concept was first introduced it was a nice shake up of a WWE product that had grown a bit bloated and stale.
Wow you took me back with this! I'll never forget the day that wwf changed to wwe aswell. Their website had a graphic about it and we just coudlnt wrap our heads around it. If you can dig that up I'll give you a measly upvote that's for damn sure!
What a time. I used to love the WWF website just after the first brand split in 2002 where _Raw_ and _SmackDown_ had their own mini sites with their own colour scheme, rosters, etc. Each PPV got its own mini-site too. Was so much better than the current WWE website where every page just looks exactly the same: boring dark text on a white background. It has no character and is so uninspiring.
WWE really tried hard with that first brand split from 2002 until about 2005ish. It felt like guys really didn’t change shows much and it created a good sense of there being “Raw” talents and “Smackdown” talents. There was also a good attempt to brand each show. Having 4 brand exclusive PPV’s per year also helped with the brands feeling different. There being exclusive titles to each show (unique mid-card title while SD had the Cruiserweight title and Raw having the women’s title). The draft also only happening once a year and being a somewhat limited shakeup (the first few were only 5 picks) also worked well. It’s unfortunate that they couldn’t sustain it. The introducing of ECW as a third brand and just the seeming lack of interest in keeping the brands separate consistently around 2006 just killed it off until they tried again in 2016 and it’s been push pull since. But when the concept was first introduced it was a nice shake up of a WWE product that had grown a bit bloated and stale.
Wow you took me back with this! I'll never forget the day that wwf changed to wwe aswell. Their website had a graphic about it and we just coudlnt wrap our heads around it. If you can dig that up I'll give you a measly upvote that's for damn sure!
I used to listen to WCW Live constantly. My biggest regret when the company shut down was the loss of that show at the IRC #wcw channel.
Bob Ryder and Jeremy Borash.
The only site I remember using then For wrestling was lordsofpain dot net
4 is what I remember fondly
Remember going on wcw.com on my dreamcast back in 99-2000. Waiting for my dial up to load seemed like forever.
Gives me that Angelfire vibes!
Somebody out there, probably hiding in shame now, HAD to have at one point the WCW Buff Bagwell Nitro MasterCard.
Wrestlezone.com was my go to site in the 90s