Twenty Years Ago This Week: WCW Plans Ahead . . . Too Far Ahead [Worldwide – April 13th, 1996]

For years, one of the hallmarks of WCW Monday Nitro was how they handled Raw’s taped shows. Week after week, Eric Bischoff mocked the WWF as he unveiled up to three week old match results from his competitor.

The irony was that WCW would tape their Pro and Worldwide shows months in advance at that time. In reality, this was never terribly obvious to the casual fan. WCW would often have champions-to-be come out with titles before they won them. However, WCW would be caught with their pants down so to speak on the April 13th, 1996 episode of Worldwide.

It was on this show that current WCW champion Ric Flair would defend his title against Randy Savage . . . a pretty monumental main event for the syndicated classic.

However, things would get fishy from there.

First, we go backstage to see Flair’s valets Woman and Elizabeth decide to grab some lunch instead of being in Ric’s corner. That’s strange, but understandable I suppose. Savage is nuts.

Next, we see Ric Flair make his entrance with Jimmy Hart with no sign of the title . . . I’m sure it’s just underneath his robe.

Then, the camera cuts away to a Macho Man vanity card on the Universal Studios big screen and quickly cuts back to see Savage pressing the flesh of the ringsiders.

And at the 2:00 mark of the video . . . UH OHHHHH!

We see Savage wearing the WCW Title belt. And at about 2:10, we see him raising the prize for all to see while the camera awkwardly pans out to the fans for eleven seconds.

The cherry on top of the pre-match ceremonies was barely being able to make out “Macho Man” on the name plate when Nick Patrick displayed the belt to signify it being a title match.

As if that was not enough, Brian Pillman (several weeks after making his last live WCW appearance) ran in causing a DQ. With Hulk Hogan later coming for the save, it created a rare exchange between Hogan and Pillman. All that was missing was Jesse Ventura on the call, but I guess they weren’t taping THAT far in advance.

According to the WCW 1996 page on Graham Cawthon’s History of WWE site, WCW held Worldwide tapings from February 1st – 4th. It was on February 11th at SuperBrawl VI when Flair would win the WCW Championship from Savage.

Thankfully, Vince Jr let this slide and it would take twenty years for this WCW taping blunder to be exposed.