WCW Main Event

Infobox Television
show_name = WCW Main Event


creator = Jim Crockett Promotions / World Championship Wrestling
caption = WCW Main Event logo
format = Professional Wrestling
picture_format = 480i (SDTV)
camera = Multicamera setup
runtime = 60 minutes per episode
starring = See World Championship Wrestling alumni
country = USA
network = TBS
first_aired = 1988
last_aired = 1998
num_episodes =
website =
tv_com_id =
imdb_id = |

"WCW Main Event" was a televised wrestling program of World Championship Wrestling that aired from 1988 to 1998. For most of its run, it was the promotion's secondary show and aired on Sunday evenings on TBS.

The show originally aired in 1988 as "NWA Main Event". It was created shortly after Ted Turner bought Jim Crockett Promotions from Jim Crockett, Jr..

History

Jim Crockett Promotions's "NWA World Championship Wrestling", along with its predecessor ("Georgia Championship Wrestling"), were Saturday night mainstays on TBS for almost 30 years. Throughout much of the 1970s and 1980s, these two Saturday night wrestling programs were also complimented with a Sunday night wrestling program titled "". The Sunday editions were mostly presented as a magazine format, featuring sit-down interviews with wrestlers and footage from other GCW and JCP television programming. In later years, airings of the Sunday edition became more infrequent, as these airings were frequently pre-empted by TBS' coverage of the Atlanta Braves and the Atlanta Hawks.

In early 1988, Ted Turner asked Jim Crockett, Jr. to create a new Sunday evening wrestling show featuring exclusive "main event caliber" matches. In 1988, "NWA Main Event" made its debut. The debut episode featured a main event match pitting Ric Flair against Sting for Flair's NWA World Heavyweight Championship. The show proved to be an instant ratings success. Due to surmounting losses, Crockett was forced to sell JCP in November 1988 to Turner, who renamed the organization World Championship Wrestling.

The WCW gauntlet

In 1989, Turner also added a Saturday morning wrestling show called "NWA Power Hour". With three wrestling shows on TBS, WCW execs decided to create a unique feature called "Running the Gauntlet", which would have a select wrestler compete on all three TBS wrestling shows on a particular weekend, with the objective of winning all three of their matches (including singles and tag matches). Any wrestler who successfully ran the gauntlet won (kayfabe) $15,000. If a wrestler failed to win any one of their matches, their three scheduled opponents in their failing effort (including a loss or a draw) would split the $15,000. The Gauntlet format was eventually dropped in 1990/91. Only two wrestlers (The Steiner Brothers) managed to successfully run the gauntlet.

Pre-PPV shows

In the mid-1990s, "WCW Main Event" would be used as a live show that aired before WCW pay-per-view events. These special episodes would be used not only to promote the pay-per-view, but also to have special matches (which at any other time would be considered dark matches) prior to the pay-per-view. Only a few episodes of "WCW Main Event" originated live in an outdoor environment: the episodes prior to WCW Road Wild (in Sturgis, South Dakota) and the episode prior to the 1995 Bash at the Beach (from Huntington Beach, California).

Later years and the end

In September 1996, TBS moved "WCW Main Event" to Saturday mornings and moved "WCW Pro" to Sunday afternoons (and to an 5:05-6 p.m.(ET/PT) time slot). Starting around 1997, "WCW Main Event" was re-tooled as a recap show with some "exclusive" matches. In 1998, the show was cancelled.