The disrupters and entertainers have arrived - how the WCW Monday Nitro playbook is shaping sports next chapter

March 1997. Spring break. Panama City. The destination for every college student in the 90s to spend the most popular time of the year as a student. Partying, letting off steam and having fun. A limited time though, to pack in that fun before finals. If you’re a wrestling fan, why not go to a wrestling show? But for the masses, surely wrestling wasn’t the go-to thing, right? Right?! March 10th, 1997, that’s exactly what happened, as college kids filled outdoor nightclub Club La Vela, in prime Spring Break hotspot Panama City Florida, for an episode of WCW Monday Nitro.  

But why? What was it about a wrestling show, that made young adolescents want to spend their time there? It all started when WCW made the bold move to compete with the WWF (now WWE) on Monday Nights head-to-head, leading to the infamous Monday Night Wars. WWF was the juggernaut and industry leader, WCW’s task was to instead of being better than the WWF, but to be different.

So, from here, WCW decided to create a product geared to attracting people who don’t typically watch wrestling. Wrestling has always had a stigma. Seen as low brow, anyone flicking through channels would keep going, and dismiss it entirely. And if they were at a local arena, they would opt for other forms of entertainment, from cinemas, sports games, recreation and much more.  WCW decided to take the product to places people already were. You like going to the beach?  You don’t like wrestling, but have heard of Hulk Hogan? Well, we will set up a ring on a beach and have Hogan wrestle. That was the key, there are many alternative forms of current sports. Soccer is a global game, but beach soccer is unknown. People aren’t going to watch beach soccer, just because it’s soccer. People want to see the biggest names, and the biggest brands. The Champions League with all its big stars will never take place on a beach. But WCW was able to have a ppv with all it’s big stars, on a beach. Bringing people who don’t usually watch wrestling, but have heard of mainstream stars like Ric Flair, Macho Man Randy Savage and Hulk Hogan, to watch the show and then convert them into regular tv viewers. 

WCW Bash at the Beach was able to attract many people to Huntington Beach, unlike Beach Soccer pictured below. Because WCW took the main stars of the sport itself to the beach. Meanwhile, other sports and entertainment properties like the Champions League are unable to. Can Disrupter Sports break the mould like WCW did?

As great as beach soccer is, the biggest stars and tournaments of soccer, only take place in stadiums

The same applied with having an episode of WCW Monday Nitro in a venue, where college students are accustomed to attending during Spring Break. Now you hear there’s going to be a floating ring in the middle of the pool? And Hulk (at this point Hollywood Hogan) Hogan and hugely popular basketball star Dennis Rodman are both going to be there? They were sold, and thus packed the venue. With sports stadiums today focusing on being multi-purpose hubs, WCW Monday Nitro in 1997 really tapped into that at Club La Vela. Having a short 8-10pm show, in a party hub where unlike a baseball or a football game that could last several hours, you can attend a short 2-hour show of sports and entertainment – while ending early enough to still party into the early hours.

WCW at the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in 1997

WCW also took their shows to events like the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, where attendees were allowed (and encouraged) to attend the event while sitting on their motorcycle. Consumers didn’t have to adjust their location or behavioural patterns for the event. The event is happening right at the rally, and you don’t need to put your motorcycle away. You literally just ride to ringside.

Today the NFL has done the same with animated alt-casts. When the Jacksonville Jaguars took on the Atlanta Falcons in a London game, they teamed up with Disney to create a real-time animated rendered broadcast, of Toy Story toys playing the exact same game as seen in the actual broadcast. Every play, every call, all done by your favourite Toy Story character. Since then, many leagues have adopted animated Alt-Casts. With young children enjoying Nickelodeon, The Simpsons and many more animated live re-enactments of sports games.

Because sports leagues noticed, what WCW noticed in 1996. You may not be able to attract the audience to your current product. But if you bring big stars to an event, where you are already at – where you don’t have to change your behaviours, you still get to immerse yourself in the Sturgis motorcycle experience – while watching WCW - that’s how you bridge the gap. It’s a very tough ask to get a child to shift from Toy Story, to a 3-hour NFL game. So, you make Toy Story the NFL Game. Merely placing a ring in the Dakota hills at the Sturgis Rally won’t get people from the rally to come. But making the Sturgis Rally the wrestling event - did.

Former WCW President Eric Bischoff, the architect behind the WCW disrupter playbook. Bischoff knew back then, not everyone is going to stick around for 2 hours, or watch shows weekly in the same old arena setting. He prioitised making longer shows feel shorter. As well as ensuring consumers did not get visual fatigue of seeing a genre taking place in the same setting. How can sports today ensure shows are the right length? And how can they move away from sports taking place in the same setting they have always done for decades - while still maintaining the same - star-power, revenue and audience?

A lot is made today about shorter attention spans. People are used to short form content, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram stories etc. One of the things WCW did during its 2 hour showt, was changing their commentary team each hour. This was to keep things fresh, with WCW President Eric Bischoff saying, it’s about making a 2-hour show feel like 45 minutes. It’s why they also would have a huge countdown to hour No.2. It built anticipation for the second hour, and made it feel like the audience was watching a new show. Rather than your typical sports broadcast, where it’s seen as two halves of the same game. Even if a wrestling match was ongoing when the countdown hit zero, there would be a huge pyro display to mark the start of hour 2. How can sports today maintain engagement at halfway points in a show? What can they learn from this? What can stop people tuning out after a half time show?

Eric Bischoff introduced the formula SARSA. Story, Anticipation, Reality, Suspense, Action. They were the guiding tenets for anything that was shown on WCW Monday Nitro.

The rise of disrupter sports from TGL Golf, Baller League and Kings League, Unrivalled Basketball show that the WCW Monday Nitro playbook still exists today. Having shorter form content that is easily digestible for younger and newer audiences, while taking a bold approach in presenting their specific genre in a new form. It’s something current leading wrestling companies such as WWE and AEW haven’t been able to do. And makes it no surprise, that when WCW went out out business in 2001, millions of WCW fans just stopped watching wrestling altogether - rather than watch another company in the genre. And is no surprise that wrestling's popularity has shrunk since the 90's. There isn't a disrupter and innovator like WCW anymore.

The Savannah Bananas have taken sport and entertainment in a completely different direction, akin to WCW in the 90's

Savannah Bananas are another example of taking a sporting formula, and modifying it for a new audience. The audience is there waiting, and only now the sports industry is seeing disrupters to it’s status quo.

The first ever WCW Monday Nitro took place from the Mall of America, with a Hulk Hogan themed Pasta restuarant opening. The key to any disrupter sport is buzz. WCW took a bold risk of letting everyone watch for free, to create the buzz - to bring in new consumers. They knew they couldn't be better than the WWE, but they needed to be different. The more they were different, the more they were perceived as better. Which led to them overtaking the WWE in the ratings for 83 consecutive weeks. Will the differentiation of Savannah Bananas baseball, inspire a new generation of baseball fans, to watching Banana Ball instead? They couldn't be better than MLB, but had to be different. Sometimes in the long run, just like with WCW - different ends up being better.

And with TKO, The Ring and Sela announcing a new boxing league, where they will have an entire fight card outdoors in Times Square New York, you can’t help but think someone will have looked at the pilot of WCW Monday Nitro at a Mall of America for inspiration. Sport in the future may not loo like what it does today, and while it is changing, viewers of WCW Monday Nitro in the 90's know just what that change looks like, when sport meets the intersection of entertainment.

WCW Monday Nitro would break up the show, with dance performances from the Nitro Girls. Unlike sports that would have cheerleaders on the side of the pitch, the Nitro girls were an integral part of maintaining the flow of the show. They would even partake in WCW sponsorship activation events with brands such as Starburst. WCW watch parties at college dorms were a cultural phenomenon so big, that the Nitro Girls would sometimes be based at select parties while the show was on the air, as WCW would make college crowds a part of the show.

WCW may be long gone, but as sports entertainment arrives in the world of sport – the Monday Nitro playbooks' widespread influence - is only just beginning to be felt.