The Thread Killer

You ain’t kidding brother. I went to those house shows every three weeks, and everybody knew damn well that not only was there no chance of Hogan losing at a house show, quite honestly there was no chance of him losing at all.

But Dave Meltzer reported it so it must be true.

I actually sat through all three hours of Raw this week. I have not done that in literally years. I thought it was pretty decent although I don’t think anybody could make a three hour weekly pro wrestling show that would not seem way too long. But there was some decent wrestling, and I quite liked the video package they did to build up the US Title and how they made the qualifying Triple Threat matches seem important. I still can’t stomach the quick cut camera angles. But as I said earlier in this thread, I think there is bound to be some basic improvements visible right away simply because Vince is not there over producing everything and forgetting what he booked last week. But I remain convinced that nothing major is going to change as long as Bruce Prichard and Kevin Dunn are there. Just guessing, but I am giving it around 90 days before major things start to become obvious. If the product has not had significant changes by Survivor Series let’s say, then I’d say it’s a safe bet there just aren’t going to be any.

I have this picture in my mind of you as a child, as an adult brings you a Stretch Armstrong toy, which you contemptuously hurl aside with an expression of disgust on your face, whilst shouting: “Don’t bring me this capitalist American toy! I want something new, and original!” And the young El-P remains unsatisfied until years later, when he finally gets his first Lucha Underground playset. For the record, I did have a Stretch Armstrong toy. It was amusing for about half a day, until the novelty of having a stretchy rubber action figure wore off. Plus, mine split open eventually and some strange red goo began to leak out. Which one of my very strange little friends ate, because he thought it looked like strawberry jam.

After seeing the end results, I am really happy I did not buy the Flair show. I was considering it, mostly for the undercard but then I found out later that they cut most of those matches really short.

Apparently Trips and Stephanie have unbanned the words “wrestling” and “wrestler.” What a time to be alive.

Via 411: The Wrestling Observer Newsletter reports that Ric Flair’s Last Match was a huge success, business-wise, and was one of the most successful independent events in recent history. The show had an attendance of 6,800 fans with a gate of $448,502. That’s the second-largest independent gate in North America, just behind All In’s 10,541 paid and $458,525 gate. It had between 20,000 and 25,000 streaming PPV buys and around 4,200 TV cable buys. Of those who bought WWE Summerslam, only 2.07% also bought this show.

I believe the official rankings when it comes to Armstrongs should be: 1) Bullet Bob 2) Brad 3) Steve 4) Brian 5) Scott Unless we count Stretch Armstrong as a member of the family, in which case I rank him under Bob but above everybody else. (Not sure @El-P will get that joke. Did you guys have Stretch Armstrong in Europe when you were a kid?)

I agree with you. Interestingly enough, I once saw an interview with Billy Gun years ago where he essentially said the same thing you did. He claimed that he came to a realization at one point that being a single wrestler just wasn’t his thing, and that he was never going to make it big as a solo act, and he ended up being OK with that because he really enjoyed being in tag teams.

Well, he did uh…get rowdy and…uh…move some things?

My complaint is not so much about Christian Cage being on TV. I think he has been great in this role. My complaint is seeing a Christian Cage/Matt Hardy match on television in 2022. I don’t care what the rationale is I think it’s unnecessary, especially when Matt Hardy can barely move. And I agree with the sentiment that this only really works if in the end, Jungle Boy goes over clean and comes out of this on the other side as a stronger performer, ready for a bigger push. If he just ends up exactly where he was when this whole thing started, then this was just a pointless angle. I think it’s time to pull the trigger with him. Christian certainly will not lose any face or credibility by losing a match or two at this stage in his career.

Yeah and he’s continued to degrade from there. The constant sniping at AEW and Tony Khan is just embarrassing. Say what you want about Jim Cornette, but he craps on AEW because he legitimately doesn’t like it. Brian James is acting like a child, as you said. It’s like when you read something cringeworthy that somebody wrote, and you are almost embarrassed on their behalf for not having the self-awareness to realize that they are making themselves look like a fool. I would have thought that his publicly supporting that weird orange coloured conspiracy theorist referee who got fired from NXT was his low point…but, nope.

Perusing some of “Road Dogg” Brian James recent interviews and social media activity and it struck me: who would have ever guessed that the pilled up, drugged out, perpetually stoned, jealous, bitter version of Road Dogg would end up being more likeable than his new, clean and sober persona? Most people who have serious drug issues and come out the other side, end up having to go through a period of serious self examination, introspection and ultimately you would think…self improvement. Having gone through something like this, I would have thought it is impossible to end up getting through it without being at least somewhat more self-aware. Not the D-O-Double-G. It seems like every time the man opens his mouth, something stupid comes out. There’s no way around it, really. The man is clearly an asshole.

Not too mention…AEW has no need for guys like Matt Hardy and Christian taking up valuable TV time anymore. At least, not in a match. I don’t think anybody needs to see guys who got famous in another organization 20 years ago. I appreciate that in a sense, their presence in this match and angle are meant to put over the younger, future superstar in Jungle Boy. This is not a major problem though, I don’t think. Overall, Tony Khan is starting to do a much better job pushing younger talent. Hook, Hobbs, Starks, Wardlow, The Gunn Club, The Acclaimed, these guys are the future of AEW. Give me way more Darby, please. Hell, they are even pushing Garcia and Wheeler, two guys I can’t see as future Main Event guys for a couple of reasons. But I’m down with that, as we say on the streets. Out with the old, in with the new. Oh yeah, and FTR needs to be on TV every week. If we have to see The Best Friends every damn week, then we sure as hell should be seeing FTR.

I thought the Eddie Gilbert episode was great. Even though it was yet another Attitude Era rehash, I actually didn’t mind the episode on Foley’s legendary sit down interview with JR as Mankind, and the subsequent face turn, transformation into Dude Love and KOTR 97. Tomorrow is Beach Blast 92, which is a match I’ve always loved. It’s like a one match compilation of all Foley’s early career sickest bumps and craziest spots.

Yeah, I went into watching that match with an open mind but poor old Matt really needs to hang it up, or at the very least stop trying to wrestle like it’s 20 years ago. It’s legitimately sad watching him walk down the aisle and climb into the ring. You can tell that his neck, back, and probably his hips and knees are shot.

What’s the story on Madison Rayne? I am unfamiliar with her.

27% is one hell of a big bump in the ratings, no matter how you look at it.

That’s all true. Cornette was never in favour of this spectacle at any point I ever heard. The talking points going around suggesting that Cornette would somehow be in support of this fiasco and especially that he might show up to it, are pretty hysterical. Aside from the fact that Cornette would never support this mess, he’s made it loud and clear that he’s essentially retired from any and all public appearances. That hasn’t stopped people from chortling about how he’d obviously have loved the idea of this match, or that he must have been shunned because he didn’t show up for it. Put everything else aside. This event was promoted by Conrad Thompson. Jim Cornette is partners with Brian Last, who has discussed at great length how he will never work with Conrad Thompson (he fired John Arezzi for asking to work with Thompson.) Cornette supporting this event was never going to happen.

Why does he keep doing that ridiculously contrived forced laugh? This is terrible. I thought he was bad enough the last time I saw him, but that was Shakespeare compared to this

I have not watched any WWE product in literally years, but I am stuck somewhere with nothing to do for a while, so I thought I would check out Raw. What the hell is wrong with Seth Rollins? He is acting like a combination of a community theatre reject and somebody with a traumatic brain injury. This promo is terrible.

If you do that, it will be interesting for me because I was at the majority of those shows. There was a long stretch there during the 1980s where I did not miss a show at Maple Leaf Gardens. I saw Hogan fight Savage, very early in Savage’s WWF run, long before they feuded. I also saw him fight Kamala, Killer Khan and Bad News Brown. If I recall correctly (and I might not) the fight against Bad News Brown was right before the first Summerslam.

Doesn’t surprise me. Chioda works for Conrad’s company already.

Wheeler Yuta sounds like a little kid when he talks, but that segment was pretty funny. And honestly, I really hope Yuta wins. I’d rather see him fight Moxley again over Jericho. If Danielson is going to elevate Garcia, why can’t Jericho elevate Yuta?

If they are leading up to Wardlow vs. Satnam Singh I don’t think I want to see that. I don’t think anybody wants to see that. And I am devastated that we missed out on seeing Leon Ruffin vs. Marko Stunt. Dream match. LOL at the mafia jokes directed at Cole Karter. Moriarty vs. Sydal…now we’re talking.