Nitro's Debut

Right after the territory era ended the WWE had the opportunity to run unopposed where they were the biggest game in town. Now I know that the WCW was still in business, but the company was having far too many problems to be looked at as a serious competitor to Vince in the early 1990's. However, once things started to around and the perception of the company started changing a momentum swing was upon us in wrestling and no that swing didn't that happen with NWO like most would think. In reality the momentum started changing in September 1995 when the green light was given for the start of WCW Monday Nitro. 

From the start of the show Eric Bischoff wanted to figure out how to be different then what Vince had on his show. The first thing he thought of was having the first Nitro at Mall of America which was something totally different and hasn't been done since then by any other promotion. One thing that some fans may remember from the first Nitro is Sting vs Ric Flair which headlined the last Nitro. A misconception is that it didn't headline the first one as Big Bubba Rogers & Hulk Hogan took that distinction with the "Total Package" returning post match. 

Overall this show was nothing special and other than the Lex Luger shocker nothing really worthwhile happened on the broadcast. The one thing that did change because of this event though was that the WWE wasn't unopposed anymore and actually had competition again for the first time in around a decade. Looking at this event it is crazy think how one simple event could lead to the whole wrestling business turning on it's head within less then year of the show's debut. This my friends was where the "War" began!!