Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
Imagine if you will…you’re ready to turn on Monday Night Raw and without warning Dixie Carter appears on your screen announcing that TNA wrestling has taken over the WWE’s time slot. Instead of seeing your favorite WWE superstars like Daniel Bryan, John Cena, The Wyatt Family, etc…you were now getting wrestlers like Ethan Carter III, Magnus, Eric Young and the Menagerie. The show you were accustomed to watching for years was replaced with a different style or brand that you just weren’t anticipating.
That…in a nutshell…is what took place on July 14th, 1984..synonymously known as “Black Saturday.” Instead of fans getting ready to watch WWE…they were getting ready to watch GCW (Georgia Championship Wrestling) on WTBS. Instead of seeing athletic, more reality based pro wrasslin’…they got the over the top cartoon world of Vince McMahon’s WWF. It happened without warning….nobody viewing at home had any clue what was going to happen.
Vince was in the middle of his national expansion and decided to have two cable networks airing WWF programming….expanding his products exposure. He did so by buying out the Brisco brothers and Jim Barnett who were all stockholders of GCW. With Vince having control over GCW, he forced Ted Turner’s hand to air his WWF programming on TBS. An agreement was hashed out between Turner and McMahon and the show went on the air. Before doing so however, many of the GCW roster and employees were fired. Others, including Ole Anderson and Gordon Solie were rumored to have quit in protest.
When the show aired…in place of actual competitive wrestling matches were pre-taped squash matches from various house shows. Gone were Dusty Rhodes, Tommy Rich, Jimmy Valiant…replaced by the likes of Big John Studd, The Iron Sheik and George the Animal Steele.
Not only was it a ratings disaster…it also started a firestorm from fans who wrote to Ted Turner and the WTBS offices complaining about the unannounced switch in programming. Ted Turner was not at all happy about the way Vince McMahon had essentially strong armed himself onto his cable station and broke promises to Turner by not having live matches at the studios. So Turner pushed back and allotted TV time to other wrestling promotions. Ted Turner was able to break the TV deal and kick off WWF programming after Jim Crockett paid Vince a sum of 1 million dollars for his slot.
August 4th, 1984….Championship Wrestling from Georgia returned without even an acknowledgement of the WWF’s appearance the last 3 weeks.
The Fallout of Black Saturday
There are rumors that the GCW booker Ole Anderson was so upset over Vince McMahon’s purchase of GCW…he burned and destroyed many of GCW’s video library in protest.
Vince McMahon and Ted Turner developed a mutual hatred and rivalry with one another over the failure of their TV deal. A rivalry that spilled over for years and in some ways….was the catalyst for the Monday Night Wars a decade later.