Starrcade (1997)
The 1997 Starrcade was the 15th annual Starrcade professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by World Championship Wrestling (WCW). It was held on December 28, 1997, at the MCI Center in Washington, D.C. The matches revolved around the ongoing storyline between WCW and the New World Order (nWo) organization. The main event was between Hollywood Hogan and Sting for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship, with Hogan representing the nWo and Sting representing WCW. The match culminated a year-long buildup of their feud. The match ended in controversy over the referee's pinfall count, and their feud continued after the event surrounding this. Other matches included Larry Zbyszko and Eric Bischoff for the control of ''WCW Monday Nitro'', and Curt Hennig and Diamond Dallas Page for the WCW United States Heavyweight Championship. Starrcade became the highest-grossing pay-per-view in WCW history. Despite its success, the event was seen by critics and journalists as t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hulk Hogan
Terry Eugene Bollea (; born August 11, 1953), better known by his ring name Hulk Hogan, is an American retired professional wrestler. He is widely regarded as the most recognized wrestling star worldwide and the most popular wrestler of the 1980s, as well as one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time. Hogan began his professional wrestling career in 1977, but gained worldwide recognition after signing for World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) in 1983. There, his persona as a heroic all-American helped usher in the 1980s professional wrestling boom, where he headlined eight of the first nine editions of WWF's flagship annual event, WrestleMania. During his initial run, he won the WWF Championship five times, with his first reign being the second-longest in the championship's history. He is the first wrestler to win consecutive Royal Rumble matches, winning in 1990 and 1991. His match with Andre the Giant on WWF The Main Event on February 5, 1988, still hold ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Card (sports)
In sports, a card lists the matches taking place in a title match combat-sport event. Cards include a main event match and the undercard listing the rest of the matches. The undercard may be divided into a midcard and a lower card, according to the perceived importance of the matches. Promoters schedule matches to occur in ascending order of importance. Division Undercard The undercard, or preliminary matches (sometimes preliminary card), consists of preliminary bouts that occur before the headline or "main event" of a particular boxing, professional wrestling, horse racing, or other sports event. Typically, promoters intend the undercard to provide fans with an opportunity to see up-and-coming fighters or fighters not so well known and popular as their counterparts in the main event. The undercard also ensures that if the main event ends quickly fans will still feel that they received sufficient value for the price of their admission. In boxing, undercard matches usually ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Heel (professional Wrestling)
In professional wrestling, a heel (also known as a ''rudo'' in '' lucha libre'') is a wrestler who portrays a villain, "bad guy", or "rulebreaker", and acts as an antagonist to the faces, who are the heroic protagonist or "good guy" characters. Not everything a heel wrestler does must be villainous: heels need only to be booed or jeered by the audience to be effective characters, although most truly successful heels embrace other aspects of their devious personalities, such as cheating to win or using foreign objects. "The role of a heel is to get 'heat,' which means spurring the crowd to obstreperous hatred, and generally involves cheating and pretty much any other manner of socially unacceptable behavior that will get the job done." To gain heat (with boos and jeers from the audience), heels are often portrayed as behaving in an immoral manner by breaking rules or otherwise taking advantage of their opponents outside the bounds of the standards of the match. Others do not (or ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Narrative Thread
A narrative thread, or plot thread (or, more ambiguously, a storyline), refers to particular elements and techniques of writing to center the story in the action or experience of characters rather than to relate a matter in a dry "all-knowing" sort of narration. Thus the narrative threads experienced by different but specific characters or sets of characters are those seen in the eyes of those characters that together form a plot element or subplot in the work of fiction. In this sense, each narrative thread is the narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether nonfictional (memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travel literature, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller (ge ... portion of a work that pertains to the world view of the participating characters cognizant of their piece of the whole, and they may be the villains, the protagonists, a supporting character, or a relatively di ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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ESPN
ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The company was founded in 1979 by Bill Rasmussen along with his son Scott Rasmussen and Ed Eagan. ESPN broadcasts primarily from studio facilities located in Bristol, Connecticut. The network also operates offices and auxiliary studios in Miami, New York City, Las Vegas, Seattle, Charlotte, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles. James Pitaro currently serves as chairman of ESPN, a position he has held since March 5, 2018, following the resignation of John Skipper on December 18, 2017. While ESPN is one of the most successful sports networks, there has been criticism of ESPN. This includes accusations of biased coverage, conflict of interest, and controversies with individual broadcasters and analysts. , ESPN reaches approximately 76 million te ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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WWE United States Championship
The WWE United States Championship is a professional wrestling Professional wrestling championship#Location-specific championships, championship promoted by the United States, American professional wrestling promotion, promotion WWE, currently defended on the Raw (WWE brand), Raw WWE brand extension, brand division. It is one of two secondary championships for WWE's main roster, along with the WWE Intercontinental Championship on SmackDown (WWE brand), SmackDown. The current champion is Austin Theory, who is in his second reign. The championship was established on January 1, 1975, as the version of the NWA United States Heavyweight Championship that was defended in Jim Crockett Promotions, and later assumed by World Championship Wrestling (WCW), which eventually seceded from the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA). Harley Race was the inaugural champion. After WCW was purchased by the then-World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in 2001, the then-WCW United States Championship was defended ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Diamond Dallas Page
Dallas Page (born Page Joseph Falkinburg Jr., April 5, 1956), better known by his ring name Diamond Dallas Page (often stylized as DDP), is an American actor and retired Professional wrestling, professional wrestler. In the course of his wrestling career Page has wrestled for mainstream wrestling promotions World Championship Wrestling (WCW), the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE), Impact Wrestling, Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA), and All Elite Wrestling (AEW). Page first broke into the wrestling business in 1988, as a manager in the American Wrestling Association, where he worked for nine months before signing with WCW in 1991. There, he continued as a manager until late 1991, when he became a wrestler. Over a decade in WCW, Falkinburg became a three-time WCW World Heavyweight Championship, WCW World Heavyweight Champion, two-time WWE United States Championship, WCW United States Heavyweight Champion, four-time WCW World Tag Team Championship, WCW World Tag Team C ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Curt Hennig
Curtis Michael Hennig (March 28, 1958 – February 10, 2003) was an American professional wrestler. He performed under his real name for promotions including the American Wrestling Association (AWA), the World Wrestling Federation (WWF; now WWE), World Championship Wrestling (WCW), and NWA Total Nonstop Action, also using the ring name Mr. Perfect in the WWF/E. Hennig was the son of wrestler Larry "The Axe" Hennig and the father of wrestler Curtis Axel. Hennig debuted in 1980 and won multiple championships in both Pacific Northwest Wrestling (PNW) and the AWA during the decade. He gained particular attention when he defeated Nick Bockwinkel for the AWA World Heavyweight Championship in 1987, with his 373-day reign being the seventh-longest in history. Hennig moved to the WWF thereafter, where he feuded with Hulk Hogan over the WWF Championship, and won the WWF Intercontinental Heavyweight Championship twice, becoming the longest-reigning titleholder of the 1990s. In addition t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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WCW Monday Nitro
''WCW Monday Nitro'', also known as ''WCW Nitro'' or simply ''Nitro'', is an American professional wrestling television program that was produced by World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and broadcast weekly every Monday night on TNT in the United States from September 4, 1995 to March 26, 2001. Created by Eric Bischoff and Ted Turner, the show's premiere was notable for sparking a period of television known as the "Monday Night Wars". For the entirety of the show's run, ''Nitro'' went head-to-head in the ratings with the WWE, World Wrestling Federation's (WWF; now WWE) ''WWE Raw, Monday Night Raw''. Although comparable to ''Raw'' in popularity from the beginning, ''Nitro'' began to dominate in ratings, based largely on the strength of the New World Order (professional wrestling), New World Order (nWo), a rebellious group of wrestlers that wanted to take over WCW. Beginning in June 1996, ''Nitro'' beat ''Raw'' in the ratings for 83 consecutive weeks, forcing WWF owner Vince McMah ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Eric Bischoff
Eric Aaron Bischoff (born May 27, 1955) is an American television producer, professional wrestling booker, and performer. He is best known for serving as Executive Producer and later Senior Vice President of World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and subsequently, the on-screen General Manager of WWE's Raw brand. Bischoff has also worked with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) where he served as Executive Producer of ''Impact Wrestling''. He was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2021. With an amateur background in martial arts, Bischoff also sporadically performed as an in-ring competitor, becoming a one-time WCW Hardcore Champion and headlining the 1998 Road Wild pay-per-view event, teaming with "Hollywood" Hulk Hogan against Diamond Dallas Page and Jay Leno. He wrote an autobiography, titled ''Controversy Creates Cash'', which was released in 2006 under WWE Books, and a second book, titled ''Grateful'', which was released in 2022. Professional wrestling career American ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Larry Zbyszko
Lawrence Whistler (born December 5, 1951), better known by the ring name Larry Zbyszko, is an American retired professional wrestler. He is perhaps best known for his feud with his mentor, Bruno Sammartino, during the early 1980s as well as his work as a wrestler and color commentator for World Championship Wrestling. Among other accolades, he is a two-time world champion having twice held the AWA World Heavyweight Championship. Zbyszko was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame on March 28, 2015 by Sammartino. Professional wrestling career World Wide Wrestling Federation / World Wrestling Federation (1971–1981) Whistler trained under Bruno Sammartino after cutting his collegiate wrestling career at Penn State University short. He debuted in 1973 as the babyface "Larry Zbyszko", with his name a tribute to 1920s Polish American wrestler Stanislaus Zbyszko. He initially wrestled in the Pittsburgh area in 1972, appearing on the local wrestling program '' Studio Wrestling'', be ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |