The Lapsed Fan: Dave Meltzer on WrestleMania 15

As part of The Lapsed Fan's 30-week WrestleMania journey, the Wrestling Observer's Dave Meltzer weighed in with his recollections of each event. Here, Meltzer discusses WrestleMania 15 in 1999.
Follow The Lapsed Fan on Twitter @thelapsedfan

[@toxictootiesocksone2300]

having been a lifelong WWF fan I was well pleased in 2001 when the WWF finally won the war with wcw if only I had known what was going to happen.....

[@kamfisher1714]

Cope

[@MattSingh1]

*That's what you get for being a WWF/E fanboy. The death of WCW was/is one of the worst things to ever happen to wrestling.*

[@RetepAdam]

I've enjoyed all of these, but this one in particular was great.

[@KillaPej]

Big fan of these podcast

[@WCWThunderRosa]

Road Dogg and Billy Gunn switching belt feuds in the buildup to this Mania still bothers me

[@mikeypitt6451]

wwfwrestlingfan4ever me too that was just so random and dumb just came totally out of left field obviously just a Russo swerve for the sake of a swerve

[@Martin-vz6mj]

First thing I think of for this PPV. They should have just stayed a tag team anyway

[@zlinedavid]

Road Dogg fit great as the hardcore champ and Gunn getting the IC title would have been logical. Which of course meant The Archbishop Of Talentbury wrote the storylines the opposite way.

[@kamfisher1714]

Get over it smark

[@joeygana8864]

Was at this WRESTLEMANIA

[@119Agent]

I'm happy to see Dave acknowledge Memphis as using the "Mr. McMahon" character prior to the WWF. I hate it when people who aren't familiar with territory wrestling in the 80's and earlier.

[@Coolquip43]

well that was in the mid 90s but i agree with your sentiment

[@ericanthony4630]

meltz makes a good & obvious point w the brawl for all thing. Vince wasnt going to knowingly make a wwe guy(vs an OUTSIDER) look that piss poor unless it helped put over another.(wwe guy)

[@davidfrederick3375]

Im more disturbed that it took 15 years to place WrestleMania in Philadelphia. And not in the old Spectrum (site of sell outs shows are years just like MSG) which should have been the site for #2 if not part of the 3 city split.

[@bassclay100]

def man i was there for 15 thank god i liked wwe at the time but going to ac 2 years in a row totally not needed.

[@jhot2477]

i just watched it again yesterday and it pains me that philly hosted one of the worst wrestlmanias, but i noticed something, the crowd, it was fucking comatose, i blame the crowd partially, because the show/wrestlers feed off that energy, it's human nature, there's no fucking reason to why a wrestlemania crowd should be so dead from the jump and throughout the whole show

[@blueblur2329]

@@jhot2477 What do you expect it's Philly. Philly so mean they booed Santa Claus!

[@joeygana8864]

No, The Higher Power was suppose to be Christopher Daniels, or Jake the Snake.

[@williamhild1793]

I had heard Christopher Daniels as well. Any idea how/why that fell through?

[@azapro911]

With hindsight, perhaps the most important aspect of WrestleMania 15 was Triple H's heel turn. That's the moment where the transition into The Game began. PS: In case anyone's wondering, that part about '99 being the first year WCW lost the 12 month ratings war IS correct; in '98 Nitro averaged 4.43 to Raw's 4.35, though it was obvious by the end of the year that the WWF had overtaken their product.

[@Sam1c9797]

Yet they talked about zero matches on the show :/

[@markmenning1804]

Good thing AEW does the show on a different day

[@markmenning1804]

People already saw Andre the Giant so The Big Show wasn't such a big deal anymore

[@mikeabel7577]

WCW botched the big show. They claimed he was Andre's son and had him hump Hogan with the Ye-Tay!

[@theidlewildblue]

How bad was WCW when WWE could put on two shoddy Wrestlemanias(this one and WM16) in a row and know WCW couldn't do a damn thing to affect their business. Sigh

[@dglesterhardunkichud4017]

Three reasons: STONE COLD....STONE COLD.....STONE COLD!

[@sportsaholic4life750]

theidlewildblue very true WM 15 was a disaster imo, minus Austin vs rock, one of the worst manias ever imo, and 16 was pretty bad too, it wasn't 15 bad but still pretty lackluster..

[@theidlewildblue]

i know lol, if only wcw had its shit together...

[@Sam1c9797]

Austin wan't at wrestlemania 16

[@GorditoCrunch343]

@@Sam1c9797 He was at Wrestlemania Axxess and fans were expecting him to make an experience at the PPV itself. Of course they saved him for Backlash which made that an even better show than WM itself.

[@SlickMoneyXL]

Who lives on a farm? 5:22

[@erickennedy4480]

Big Show came along now, you could book him like they did Lesner. Big Show would not touch Austin or the taker for about 2 to 3 years. Not even wrestle the Rock either. Should introduce Big Show as Vince bodyguard than Hunters let him learned WWF style instead thrown him in their. Just my option.

[@blueblur2329]

That's because now they don't feel any threat from another company.

[@rockaustin5130]

Poor WCW.

[@hawk494edward]

+ROCK AUSTIN If they had been managed properly, they would still be around.

[@blueblur2329]

@@hawk494edward Yep. The WWF may have had Austin and Rock but WCW had Goldberg Hogan and Sting. They had more talent at one point than the WWF but dropped the ball due to bad management.

[@irieite9666]

I don't know if Dave is sticking up for J.R or if he just "don't know shit about boxing" but I find it very hard to believe WWF didn't know Bart Gunn was going to get knocked spark out. Butterbean was reining and defending IBA Super Heavyweight champion with over 40 pro wins and just one loss. In the other corner you have a guy whose greatest victory was against who? Bob Holly or Godfather? Lol. Butterbean was not a fake boxer. He was a gimmick boxer I admit, he was "king of the 1 rounder" or something. But he was a hell of a gimmick boxer. So like I said, either the J.R./WWF revenge theory is correct or else WWF were just totally delusional about Bart Gunns ability.

[@medes5597]

Irie Ite but he's not wrong in saying Butterbean was a gimmick and a joke among legitimate fighters. Bart Gunn had legitimate victories in Golden Gloves tournaments, including against future legit boxers.

[@blueblur2329]

Bruce Prichard says that the trainers changed Bart Gunn's style so he fought Butterbean with a completely different style than what he used to win the Brawl for All. He then went on to say that if he didn't change his style he may have had a better shot

[@BigBoshV]

No mention of the entire card being full of swerves and it being Russo's swansong...