Mick Foley Won His First WWE Championship 17 Years Ago...And Yes It Did Put A Lot of Butts In Seats!

January 4th, 1999 witnessed one of the most historic days in professional wrestling history when there was a mass exodus of viewers that switched over from WCW Nirto to watch Mankind win the title from The Rock on Raw. In reality, Mankind actually won the belt from The Rock on December 29, 1998 (Raw was pre-taped).

Trying to take advantage of the fact that Monday Night Raw was recorded and Nitro was live, WCW commentator Tony Schiavone was instructed to give the result of WWE's main event away before it happened on television. He uttered the infamous words: “Ugh, that'll put a lot of butts in the seats"... In an instant, 375,000 homes (with a total of 600,000 viewers) switch from Nitro to Raw...making it one of the biggest promotional blunders of all time.