R. D. Reynolds - The Death of WCW: WrestleCrap and Figure Four Weekly Present . . .

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Formerly a Nitro girl, the lovely Stacy Keibler (with her 42 legs) was one of the few reasons fans tuned in during WCWs dying days.

Rey Mysterio Jr., shown left in his traditional, colorful luchador outfit, was dubbed unmarketable by Eric Bischoff, who made him take his mask off. Strangely, Bischoff did little to market the newly unmasked Rey Mysterio Jr. (who looked to be around 12 years old), either.

Sting was arguably the companys top draw, and led WCW to their largest buy rate ever at Starrcade 97. Thanks largely to Hulk Hogan, that match turned out to be the beginning of the end for both Stings career and WCW as a whole.

Scott Hall led the nWo invasion of WCW, and was a hell of a charismatic wrestler to boot. Eventually, though, his personal demons caught up with him. WCW, in their infinite wisdom, decided to book him as a drunk a part that Hall played to perfection.

Look at this man. Would you say something that might piss him off? Neither would anyone in WCW, which ironically led to the biggest push of Scott Steiners career.

The Nitro girls would open telecasts dancing and energizing the fans. That was fine. Later, bookers would decide that certain girls needed to wrestle and have storyline miscarriages. That was not fine.

A major star for WCW during its waning years, Diamond Dallas Page couldnt wait to be part of WCWs invasion of the WWF. His joy would be short-lived, thanks to some of the most horrific booking the wrestling business had ever seen.

Lex Lugers jump to WCW on the inaugural Nitro telecast was one of those shocking events that record numbers of fans tuned in for.

Ladies and gentlemen, Kevin Nash: the man who helped book WCW into oblivion. But gosh darn it, he was funny doing it.

Dubbed a vanilla midget by booker Kevin Nash, Chris Benoit was shunted to the background of the WCW hierarchy despite being one of the greatest technical wrestlers of all time.

One of WCWs very few homegrown talents, Bill Goldberg was the promotions best chance for a bright future. Those in charge, however, made sure to undermine his popularity, until eventually he was just another guy fans wouldnt pay to see.

WCW spent around $3 million per year to obtain the services of Bret The Hitman Hart, the hottest free agent in wrestling at one time. They then proceeded to do absolutely nothing with him.

Awesome on the microphone and in the ring, Chris Jericho was proclaimed too small to main-event. When he left for the WWF, he almost immediately became one of their biggest stars. You might be noticing a trend.

Despite claims of Tony Schiavone and Eric Bischoff, Mick Foley (shown here in his Cactus Jack persona) most definitely put asses in seats; unfortunately, he did so for WCWs competition. After being fired by Bischoff, Foley went to the WWF and became one of their biggest stars as Mankind.

Seeing him as nothing more than a mid-carder, Eric Bischoff released Steve Austin, who then moved to the World Wrestling Federation and became the biggest grossing wrestler of all time. Oops.

Whoooo! Nature Boy Ric Flair was the man most fans viewed as the very embodiment of WCW. Due to petty jealousies of those in charge, however, his career was continually undermined, causing irreparable damage to the promotion.

Ted called me up and said, Hey, Vince, guess what? Im in the rasslin business now!

Vince McMahon, Owner, World Wrestling Federation

While many believed World Championship Wrestling could never die and were stunned in 2001 when it actually did, an even larger group believed the company probably should have died countless times before then, since it had consistently lost so much money. The misconception that WCW was a huge money-loser in its formative years should be dispelled right off the bat. In truth, WCW lost around $6 million per year in the first five years of its existence not a horrible figure at all, considering what they were giving Turner: four hours of excellent ratings every single week of the year. Some within the Turner organization squawked at the losses, but Ted Turner himself didnt. In fact, Turner was such a cheerleader for the company that when a board of directors suggested shutting WCW down in 1992, he told them that wrestling built the Superstation, and as long as he was in charge, it would always have a home there. He also told them never to bring the idea up again. They didnt.