5 Defunct Wrestling Promotions That Could Have Been Big

If there's one thing that the wrestling world has never been short of, it's wrestling promotions. Whether it be the glory days of territories, wrestling's highest peak during The Monday Night Wars featuring WWE, WCW and ECW in between or even in recent years with Impact Wrestling, Ring of Honor and the upstart All Elite Wrestling on its way, fans have often been spoiled for choice.

And while a company like All Elite Wrestling has so much buzz and hype before they have even presented their debut show, it is not always that easy for a new company to debut to much fanfare. Even if they have the talent, financial backers and even TV deals in place, sometimes everything can fall through in a matter of weeks.

There have been a few ambitious promoters to rise up over the years and present their own wrestling organizations in an attempt to fill the void left from WCW and ECW following their demise and today, we will be looking at the top five now-defunct wrestling promotions that could have been big.

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#5 Global Force Wrestling: 2014-?

This one is actually cheating just a little, because Global Force Wrestling is still active as Global Force Entertainment, but has not presented any wrestling shows in quite some time.

Things didn't really go according to plan for TNA founder Jeff Jarrett when Total Nonstop Action lost so much money during it's first few months in existence that led to him selling up most of his ownership to Panda Energy.

It eventually got to the point where Jarrett himself would depart from the company in 2014. The news of his sudden and shocking departure from his own founding company would soon be followed by the news of he and wife Karen Jarrett founding a new wrestling company, Global Force Wrestling.

It seemed like there was potential at the beginning for GFW as they ran live events featuring talent like Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson, who were with the Bullet Club at the time, as well as Bobby Roode, Scott Steiner, Nick Aldis, KUSHIDA, Cody Rhodes and of course Jarrett himself, among others. Jeff Jarrett said that they had sixteen one-hour shows filmed in Las Vegas between July and October in 2015, that he was shopping around different networks.

GFW had an invasion angle with Impact Wrestling in 2015, which ran for a few months. Plans were announced in 2016 for GFW and Impact Wrestling to have a merger, but those plans fell through when Jarrett departed from Impact once again. GFW has since co-produced several events with FITEtv, although they are not fully fledged Global Force Wrestling events. It is not impossible for GFW to resume plans of becoming an active wrestling company again, but with Jeff Jarrett now back with WWE as a producer, it seems unlikely for the foreseeable future.

#4 Xtreme Pro Wrestling: 1999 - 2013

Xtreme Pro Wrestling was founded in the summer of 1999 by Rob Zicari. He would also share ownership with Tom Byron. From 2001 until 2003, XPW ran a locally televised TV show which aired 127 episodes. From here, they would struggle to find networks and would only hold occasional shows. To be honest, XPW wasn't great, but that doesn't mean that they could have been big. In fact, if it had a bigger budget and had people backstage who actually knew how to run a wrestling company, they could have taken over where ECW left off.

XPW was strictly a hardcore wrestling company and had several former ECW stars perform for them, including Shane Douglas, who helped out backstage, as well as Sabu, The Sandman, Jerry Lynn, Terry Funk, Justin Credible, Chris Candido, Raven, The Public Enemy, The Gangstas, and more. The voice of ECW Joey Styles even had a brief spell their. Following their wrestling show cancellation in 2003, they had some revival special shows in 2008, 2009 and 2011. They officially ceased trading two years after their final show, in 2013.

#3 Pro-Pain Pro Wrestling - 3PW: 2002 - 2005

Pro-Pain Pro Wrestling, or 3PW as it was also known, was founded by the legendary ''Pretty Boy'' Larry Sharpe in February 2002 and owned by former WWE and ECW star 'The Blue Meanie' Brian Heffron and his ex longtime girlfriend Jasmin St. Claire. Former ECW owner Todd Gordon also had some stake in the company.

They ran their early shows in the original ECW arena, before finding a permanent home in The Electric Factory venue in Philadelphia, until they ceased operations. The company always had an ECW vibe to it, naturally, and unlike XPW, their shows generally received a positive response. It also seems like WWE had no issues with the company operating, as they never interfered with any of Jerry Lawler's bookings with them and even allowed contracted talent like Al Snow and Steven Richards to make appearances for them.

The company would have a tremendous roster mixed with both legends, like Dusty Rhodes, Curt Henning, Bam Bam Bigelow, Sabu, Terry Funk, The Sandman, Raven, X Pac, Abdullah The Butcher, and others, as well as up and comers like AJ Styles, Abyss, Ron Killings, CM Punk and others. Serious financial problems arose in late 2004, which saw Todd Gordon resign.

When Jasmin St. Claire was replaced as CEO and stopped receiving checks, she put her portion of ownership on eBay for one day at $180,000. The Blue Meanie attempted to find the company funding but was unable to and they held their final show on June 18, 2005.

#2 Xcitement Wrestling Federation: 2001 - 2011

The Xcitement Wrestling Federation debuted in 2001. American entrepreneur and business executive Kevin Harrington pitched the idea of the company and would soon be joined in this venture by Jimmy Hart, Greg Valentine and 'nasty Boy' Brian Knobbs. Hulk Hogan once stated in 2001 that he was to be involved in a new wrestling company in a big way, and although he never had a deal with the XWF, many believed this was the company he had talked about.

The initial XWF tapings were conducted in November 2001 at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida in the soundstage that used to be the home for the WCW Worldwide Wrestling tapings, and would eventually serve as the home of TNA Wrestling, being better known as 'The Impact Zone'. The XWF would mostly feature superstars who WWE were not interested in at the time, such as Vampiro, Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles, Roddy Piper, Marc Mero, Sable, Low Ki, Kid Kash, Juventud Guerrera, the Road Warriors, Hacksaw Jim Duggan and more.

'Mr. Perfect' Curt Henning was planned on being the company's flagship performer, but he was snagged up by WWE in early 2002. Tony Schiavone and Jerry Lawler provided commentary, Bobby Heenan was a manager and 'Mean' Gene Okerlund was an interviewer. The XWF also received celebrity endorsement from Willie Nelson, Alice Cooper and Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley of KISS. They failed to find a television network and most stars would find work in WWE, TNA and elsewhere.

They haven't held any wrestling shows since 2002, although relaunches and business talks would happen in 2004, 2008 and 2009, but nothing ever materialized. The XWF is most notable for Hulk Hogan wrestling a once off match with Curt Henning, which was later released on a WWE Hulk Hogan DVD in 2006.

#1 World Wrestling All-Stars: 2001 - 2003

Much like the XWF, the World Wrestling All-Stars was created to try take over where WCW left off. The WWA was founded by promoter Andrew McManus. There was no TV deals in place at any time, so the company would run in similar fashion that TNA Wrestling did at first, a pay-per-view only format, although no where near as frequent. The company would tour Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and all over the UK, and aired all pay-per-views in America.

The company was able to lure in almost every big name in the business who wasn't working for WWE, including Jeff Jarrett, Scott Steiner, Eddie Guerrero, Jerry Lynn, Buff Bagwell, Road Dogg, Brian Lawler and others. Their early days would also see Bret Hart and Sid Vicious serve as WWA commissionaire. They also made initial deals with other big names to appear also, such as Randy Savage, Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and Chyna, but all those deals fell through.

While the WWA spent their big bucks on these big players, things like their quality and production values suffered for it. Jeremy Borash appeared as both announcer (with Jerry Lawler at first) and booker, although his was under allegedly influenced by Vince Russo at the time. Jeff Jarrett became the company's flagship performer, and traded title reigns with Scott Steiner and newcomer Nathan Jones.

The WWA could have been the next big thing for sure, but they were plagued by too many problems. Sting made his wrestling comeback for the WWA in 2002 and was joined by former partner Lex Luger. Sting was well received but Luger refused to compete in matches longer than 5 minutes, causing issues with the company.

There were other big problems to, including production values became worse, wrestlers would cancel their appearances but would still be advertised, and the company was made to look even more minor league when they would try elect cheap pops by claiming things like Nathan Jones was from Dublin, Ireland, while performing their.

When WWA Champion Scott Steiner re-signed with WWE, he was supposed to be replaced on a WWA tour with then WWE star The Godfather, but it never happened and WWA failed to appeal WWE's decision, making the WWA look even worse.

Jeff Jarrett defeated Sting on the final WWA show in May 2003, to unify the NWA and WWA Championships. Amazingly, after 14 years of inactivity, promoter Wade Brewer purchased the rights to the company from McManus in 2017, bu nothing has happened since.