>>11536073Picrel is a nice series of books despite the fed badding explaining the worst year and a half of WWF (95-96) and the best (96-97).
Austin gets hired because WCW was culling young talent in favor of WWF stalwarts. Vader is their big get, Austin/Foley were lobbied for by JR. With Macho/Hogan leaving and subsequently Nash and Hall, the Fed was on the ropes. They had tried their new gen push with middling results. Austin comes in with an anti-pop wrestling machine gimmick. His ECW Promos help land him the job, but Vince, fresh out of ideas beyond "you have a job but also wresltle" (Duke the dumpster, the goon etc) decides Austin needs a mic man. They give him DiBiase and it flounders. But the office can't afford to pin and stick bad gimmicks, so they source the wrestlers for something that can get over. That's where the stone cold gimmick comes from, creative bankruptcy in the office. In boom times Austin would not have been able to create his own gimmick so unrestrained. But in a down time needing new stars the reigns loosen and Austin gets over in a big way