Hart didnt get buried by WCW, bishoff strictly wanted him to be "the guy" to headline WCW thunder which launched in 98. But a stiff kick to the head by goldberg caused a severe concussion which caused Hart to retire early.
As much as WCW messed up, Harts career being shortlived wasnt their doing.
You are kidding right?
WCW absolutely fucked up the handling of, at the time of the screwjob, a red hot talent.
And Starcade 1999 concussion was a full YEAR after his WCW debut. The concussion had nothing to do with him not being the top guy on Thunder. Thunder was a poorly mismanaged show to begin with. They diluted the talent appearances so badly instead of trying to keep certain guys on one show.
Hart should have been moved into a feud with the top guys, not Ric Flair. A debut as a "Special guest referee" at Starcade was also horribly done. Not only did they fuck up the "Bischoff has a piece of steel in his shoe(it flew out into the crowd as Bret Watched and loled wondering if he should improvise), but the whole idea of him coming out to help Sting because of a "Fast count" which was the slowest count ever seen was also comical.
There were a million ways they could have gone after the fans finally got the Sting vs Hogan Payoff(Or in this case, they got fleeced from their payoff lol), but they basically did nothing with him.
I am not sure at the time it was possible to play Hart as a Babyface given how brutally he had been thrashing America for the past year, but given the screwjob sympathy? I admit they had a slight chance at it.
They should have reformed the Canadian Stable. If not as the Hart Foundation, as something else. Benoit would have been a good replacement for Owen(Since Vince refused to let him go), and they had numerous other Canadian talent.
Even they did not know what to do. They usually flew by the seat of their pants, as opposed to how the WWE mapped out storylines Months in advance. Bret turned Heel and back to face and to heel again multiple times in single episodes. It was a clusterfuck. Every match he was in was decided by interference or DQ. Complete non-psychology. Which was (Psychology) Bret's strength.
Someone else already mentioned this, but his KO of Goldberg with the steel plate WAS the best thing he did in WCW.
Overall, Bret was a huge politic guy in WWF. He routinely tried changing finishes to make himself go over more and really only cared about how he was portrayed.
Its not surprising people he did that too tried to keep him down in WCW. That and Bret himself said he did not try to fight for himself in WCW. He pretty much said after the screwjob "Nobody will ever accuse me of taking myself too seriously again". In his own book he said that
