the Fingerpoke of Doom

The Fingerpoke of Doom is the common nickname for a pivotal storyline in American professional wrestling history that happened on January 4, 1999 on WCW Monday Nitro, the flagship show of World Championship Wrestling. The show took place at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. This show is considered by many as one of the pivotal broadcasts that led to the downfall of WCW.

Setup

In the storyline, champion Kevin Nash was scheduled to face Goldberg in a rematch for the WCW World Heavyweight Championship. Goldberg was undefeated until Nash beat him for the title, and this was going to be their anticipated rematch. However, Goldberg was arrested mid-show and accused of "aggravated stalking" by Miss Elizabeth (he was originally going to be accused of rape, but Goldberg refused to go along with that particular storyline). He was released when Elizabeth couldn't keep her story straight. Meanwhile, Hollywood Hulk Hogan returned to WCW after a hiatus and challenged Nash to a match, which Nash accepted.

Match

The match started with the two men circling each other. Hogan then poked Nash in the chest, and Nash quickly fell to the mat on his back (in the book The Death of WCW, RD Reynolds and Bryan Alvarez compared Nash's fall to "Getting hit in the chest with a shotgun"). Hogan then covered for a pin, and was declared the new WCW World Heavyweight Champion. After this occurred, Scott Hall (who accompanied Nash) and Scott Steiner (who accompanied Hogan) entered the ring and celebrated with Nash and Hogan to reform the nWo. After their actions, Goldberg ran out and cleaned house, only to be jumped by Lex Luger (who turned heel) and then beaten down by the nWo as the show ended.

Impact

After this episode, WCW's TV ratings steadily went down, only reaching a 5.0 rating or higher twice (it drew a 5.7 on February 8, 1999 because of a Westminster Dog Show-induced RAW pre-emption). In retrospect, many observers inside and outside the pro wrestling business noted that this storyline turned off numerous fans for several reasons:

• It devalued the WCW World Heavyweight Title by having Nash simply lie down and give it to Hogan with no effort.

• The nWo Wolfpac became the "elite" group, yet WCW continued to allow nWo Hollywood (which was dubbed the "B-Team") to exist despite the lack of fan support.

• By this time, WCW had developed a reputation for consistently putting heels over faces, no matter the circumstances. This incident reinforced that perception in the minds of many fans.

• At the time, Goldberg was a big face who many fans perceived as a threat to the nWo, was mercilessly and completely beaten down by the group. After the beating his back was spray-painted with the "nWo" logo. Many fans saw this as a sign that Goldberg was going to be buried and pushed onto the backburner for the newly-reformed (yet tiring) nWo.

• The event proved that the nWo Hollywood/Wolfpac split had been a swerve all along, and erased months of storylines to see the nWo once again unified.

• Vince McMahon once made a reference to the incident, commenting that the Hogan-Nash encounter deserved to be held at WrestleMania or Starrcade, which would make the company millions of dollars; instead, WCW management opted to book the match on Monday Nitro.

• This was also the night that WCW's arch-rival WWF would air a pre-taped match directly opposite Nitro on RAW in which Mick Foley (as Mankind) would win the WWF Championship from The Rock. Earlier that night, WCW found out about what was going to occur, and spoiled the results on their broadcast. On orders from Eric Bischoff, WCW announcer Tony Schiavone gave away the result of the match before it aired, saying "Mick Foley, who wrestled here as Cactus Jack a few years ago is going to win THEIR world title tonight!" and sarcastically added "That'll put a lot of butts in the seats." Within minutes, Nielsen ratings showed that several hundred thousand viewers switched channels from Nitro on TNT to RAW on the USA Network, many of whom wished to see a guaranteed title change and/or a title victory by the exceedingly popular Foley. After Mankind won the title, many fans then switched back to Nitro (which still had 5 minutes of air time left), suggesting that WCW had a show that the fans wanted to see, and could have emerged the victor that night had they not given away the RAW main event results. The final ratings for the night were 5.7 for RAW and 5.0 for Nitro. During the year following the incident, many WWF fans brought signs to the shows saying "Mick Foley put my ass in this seat."

• Also damaged was the credibility of the company itself, which did not present the match that had been advertised (a Goldberg vs. Kevin Nash rematch from Starrcade '98); in fact, several times throughout the night, the WCW announce team talked about how they had a "real main event." As well as what was perceived to be an underhanded way of selling out the arena for that night's telecast.

Legacy

When asked about the Fingerpoke incident, Kevin Nash once replied "If Hogan had given Goldberg the Fingerpoke of Doom, it would've killed him!" in reference to Goldberg's propensity to get himself injured doing routine things at that time. Nash has made fun of himself for the same thing as a result of a quadriceps tear he sustained on RAW in 2002 just from running.

References

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