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In professional wrestling, the term Black Saturday refers to Saturday, July 14, 1984, the day when Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Federation took over the time slot on Superstation WTBS that had been home to Georgia Championship Wrestling (GCW) and its flagship weekly program, ''World Championship Wrestling'', for 12 years. McMahon's purchase led to a longstanding rivalry between himself and WTBS owner Ted Turner, who later bought GCW's successor Jim Crockett Promotions and formed his own company under the World Championship Wrestling name. ==Background== Georgia Championship Wrestling's first weekly television series had premiered on then-WTCG in 1972 when station owner Ted Turner purchased the rights to air the program from station WQXI. From that date, GCW's program aired for two hours (from 6-8 PM and later from 6:05 to 8:05 following the introduction of TBS' "Turner Time" in 1981) every Saturday night. In 1976, GCW became the first National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) territory to earn a national cable television contract as the soon-to-be-renamed Superstation WTBS began to be carried by various cable and satellite providers nationwide. In 1982, Georgia Championship Wrestling renamed its weekly program ''World Championship Wrestling'', a name the entire promotion would grow to be identified by. Jack Brisco and Gerald Brisco had major stakes in the organization while Ole Anderson was head booker and was basically in charge of operations. GCW's program was hosted by NWA announcer Gordon Solie, who also hosted programs for various other NWA affiliated promotions at the time (such as NWA Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling). ''World Championship Wrestling'' was a program featuring the "rasslin'" style of wrestling, that emphasized a more athletic product and put less emphasis on cartoonish gimmicks. In 1983, WWF owner Vince McMahon, who promoted the cartoonish gimmicks that GCW fans were not traditionally supportive of and who several years earlier had begun to expand his promotion nationwide, took control of the other major cable television contract at the time when he purchased Southwest Championship Wrestling's Sunday morning USA Network time slot for his ''All American Wrestling'' program. The following year, in addition to the cable contract and his nationally syndicated offerings (''WWF Championship Wrestling'' and ''WWF All-Star Wrestling''), McMahon expanded further by premiering ''Tuesday Night Titans'' on USA. Later in 1984, McMahon decided that, as part of his continued expansion, the WWF needed a second national cable outlet for its weekly programming. The only other national cable deal available at the moment was the one GCW had with WTBS; if McMahon was able to acquire the timeslot belonging to GCW. he would control all nationally-televised professional wrestling in the United States. As such, he approached Turner with an offer to buy the Saturday night GCW time slot, only to have Turner refuse his offer almost immediately. McMahon was undeterred, however, and tried to find another way of securing the slot for the WWF. He found that method shortly after his rejection by Turner. While GCW's programming had a loyal fan base and was fairly popular, things were not as great for the promotion behind the scenes. The source of the problem was Ole Anderson, who had begun to alienate his fellow owners with his booking and operation of the company. Seeing this turmoil, McMahon approached the Brisco brothers and Jim Barnett, the fourth owner of the company, and discussed a potential sale. All three men agreed to sell their stakes in GCW to McMahon, which gave the WWF the controlling stake in GCW and gave McMahon access to the Saturday night timeslot. The last ''World Championship Wrestling'' program under GCW control aired on July 7, 1984. The July 14 program opened with show co-host Freddie Miller (Gordon Solie was absent for reasons never made clear; he either resigned in protest or was terminated following the purchase, as were many other people involved with the production) introducing McMahon and welcoming the WWF to TBS. McMahon promised the GCW fans who were tuned in that they would enjoy his new program just as much. However, unlike ''World Championship Wrestling'', which had been a weekly show from the TBS studios in Atlanta, the WWF's TBS show at first consisted solely of highlights from the WWF's USA and syndicated programming, as well as house show clips from Madison Square Garden, Boston Garden, and most of the other major arenas it did business in. This was in direct violation of a promise McMahon had made at the time of the purchase to provide original programming for TBS, including having shows taped at the TBS studios. Eventually, the WWF would have in-studio squash matches on the show on an infrequent basis. During this time, the show was co-hosted by Miller and Gorilla Monsoon, with Monsoon serving as the play-by-play announcer and Miller serving as the ring announcer. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Black Saturday (professional wrestling)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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