15 Days That Changed Wrestling Forever (11)

11. Raw Vs Nitro: The Monday Night Wars Begin, September 4th 1995

On Setember 4th 1995, WCW’s flagship show Nitro went up against WWF Raw on Monday nights. It was the start of a brutal competition between Bischoff and McMahon for wrestling supremacy, in which both nearly went out of business … with one of them eventually being killed off in 2001.
The six year war started with WWF superstar Lex Luger showing up on Nitro as the newest WCW employee, a mark of the way this war was to be fought. McMahon would lose more of his big name stars to Turner, unable to compete with the big corporate chequebook down in Atlanta. Creatively Bischoff had the edge too. The two companies traded audience share early on, but WCW was the clear industry leader by late 1995.
In 96, Bischoff really twisted the knife. He captured former WWF Champion Kevin Nash and Scott Hall. The creative idea that Bischoff had was to form a new faction of Hogan, Hall and Nash. The story was that they had come in from the WWF to take over the WCW, going into business for themselves as the New World Order. It was compelling storytelling and the Hogan heel turn was genius. WCW ratings started to trounce the WWF and the emergence of Bill Goldberg in the WCW Power Plant was another boon to Bischoff’s hopes of killing his competition. Eric believed it was just a matter of time until his superior creative and financial clout put Vince out of a job.
McMahon was despairing. Money was drying up. The WWF came close to going out of business on a few occasions from 95 to 97. Something needed to happen.