The Thread Killer

I agree. I have no issue with Jim Cornette taking shots at people's lack of ability when it comes to Professional Wrestling. In fact, that's one of things that he does that I find entertaining. However, I don't see the need to take shots at a person's physical appearance. It's not productive, it's just mean spirited. Much like Cornette, the last time I saw Dana Brooke my first reaction was one of total surprise, as in "what the hell happened to her?" I used to find Dana Brooke quite attractive. I don't know why she felt the need to do that herself. I find it really sad that women in Pro Wrestling, the entertainment business, and in society at large feel the need to mutilate themselves to make themselves into what they consider (or what they think others consider) more "attractive." But she seemed determined to do it, for whatever reason. And when Cornette did make that mean spirited joke, she probably just should have ignored him or let somebody who is a bit more quick witted come to her defense. On his podcast, Cornette has gone to great lengths to eviscerate WWE and AEW for things they do...but he always does it with the caveat of "they shouldn't do that for this reason" or "they should have done this instead, it makes more sense." This past week, he complained that Jake Roberts is cutting promos as Lance Archer's manager that are doing a better job of getting heat on himself, and getting himself over than they are helping Lance Archer. He talked about his time managing Yokozuna, and the art of cutting a promo for a monster that gets them over. Little things like insisting that the camera focus on the talent during the promo, not the manager, so there is no confusion who is supposed to be getting over. He then cut a promo off the top of his head, that he says he would have done to promote Lance Archer in his feud against Cody. And of course, it was pretty much better than any promo I've heard by anybody recently. But that was the point...although it was venomous, it was still constructive. There was a point to it. Picking on somebody like Dana Brooke is just pointless. There's no reason for it.

I hope this comment isn't directed at me, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the definition of sycophant is one who somebody who attempts to gain an advantage or curry favor by flattering an influential person, or by praising a person in a position of authority. Since Jim Cornette has no idea who I am, nor does he have any authority or influence in my life and could not possibly confer any favor upon me, I am obviously not a sycophant. I have referred to Cornette's so-called "Cult of Cornette" on Twitter as sycophants, because many of them fall all over themselves complimenting him and tagging him, clearly hoping for a response and his attention and approval. I have never done that, and I never would. I think it's sad and pathetic. I couldn't care less what Jim Cornette would think of me. I'd say that conservatively, I agree with Jim Cornette about 75% of the time. Having said that, I find a number of his opinions to be illogical, simplistic and outdated. His opinions on Becky Lynch's pregnancy are the latest example. There have been other ideas of his that I have strongly disagreed with in the past, and I'm very sure there will be many more in the future. However, I am still a Jim Cornette fan. I would go so far as to consider myself a Jim Cornette apologist. I am not one of those people who, upon being presented with a viewpoint they disagree with from a particular individual, has to therefore automatically discount or invalidate every other opinion that individual has. People are complex. It's possible to agree with a person's opinion on one particular issue, and strongly disagree with them about another. I myself don't consider myself a Jim Cornette fan because I loved the Midnight Express. I am a fan because I happen to agree with a large number of Jim Cornette's opinions about Professional Wrestling. I also find him entertaining and funny. I also do not consider Jim Cornette "toxic." I'm not even sure what that term really means, when it is used to describe a person. I'm reasonably certain you can't die of poisoning from listening to Jim Cornette's podcast. I know the term "toxic" has risen in popularity in the past few years, seemingly in conjunction with so-called "cancel culture." I find that entire line of thinking to be putrid. Unless an individual is openly espousing or promoting violence or discrimination against a disadvantaged individual or group and can bring somebody to harm, I don't believe in the practice of attempting to silence them, just because you disagree. I've said it countless times, but it bears repeating. I am strongly hold to the "sticks and stones" philosophy. Opinions cannot harm me. Hurt feelings are not a reason to attempt to silence somebody. There are a great deal of people who have a public platform, with whom I disagree. If I find that I disagree with so many of their opinions that I don't even enjoy listening to them talk anymore, then I stop listening to them talk. The bottom line is, Jim Cornette's comments about Becky Lynch might have been antiquated and bordered on misogyny, but by gawd...he's right about Kenny Omega.

I'm usually the first one to defend Jim Cornette when fans of so-called "modern" Pro Wrestling or the AEW Twitter Brigade get easily and repeatedly offended by his opinions. Not this time. I heard this episode of The Jim Cornette Experience and yeah...he's pretty much out to lunch on the issue of Becky Lynch's pregnancy. He seems totally baffled by the fact that a woman would want to have a child when she's 33 years old, just because she also happens to be in a top spot in WWE. Cornette's analogy that Lynch choosing to get pregnant at this point in her career is the equivalent of Steve Austin deliberately breaking his own leg at the height of his run, is just flat out ignorant. His further statements that Vince McMahon should put a pregnancy clause in the contracts of his female talents, and his claims that this is the reason female wrestling was never heavily featured during the territory days are just...antiquated. I know Cornette actually respects Becky Lynch's work, he has been quite complimentary toward her in the past. And I know his underlying point is that he thinks she should make as much money from Vince McMahon and WWE while she can, and then walk away and focus on her family. But he just can't seem to grasp that maybe, just maybe there are things in life more important than being a WWE Superstar, or even filthy rich. If Becky Lynch chose to have this baby and walk away from the business forever, nobody will ever be able to take away what she accomplished. For a guy who loves to trumpet how much he is "pro choice" and that he supports women's reproductive rights, he sure doesn't seem to respect Becky Lynch's choice to focus on her family and walk away from her career, for now at least. If nothing else, one major indicator that Cornette was way off base here is the fact that Brian Last stayed pretty much silent during Cornette's entire rant. When Brian Last gets quiet and doesn't encourage Jim's insanity, it's usually a good sign he thinks Cornette has gone too far. Now if you want to make the argument that Becky Lynch choosing to have a child with Seth Rollins is stupid...I'm all in on that argument. If this child is really the genetic offspring of Seth Rollins, I anticipate that during the delivery, the newborn will only sell the slap on the backside for two seconds, and then totally forget about it. The child will then execute an unnecessary and superfluous triple somersault, and accidentally injure the doctor. And then cut a promo complaining that nobody appreciates him.

So tonight at 6:05 PM, they’re showing that 90 minute episode which was supposed to air right before the pay-per-view. At the conclusion of the episode, there’s supposed to be an announcement about the NWA by Billy Corgan. I hope it’s about their plans to start taping again, and not bad news.

I remember @C.S. mentioning in another thread that he saw an interview with Al Snow somewhere in which Snow also said that James Storm can be prone to sulking when he is asked to lose a match. I can't help but wonder if this reputation precedes him and might not be part of the reason he never caught on anywhere else. He had that extra short stay in NXT, and that was it. So far, they have done the "Eric Joins TNA" episode on September 30, and then TNA Lockdown 2010 on April 13, TNA Debuts on Monday Night on May 4, and this coming week will be TNA Sacrifice 2010. So that should be good. I'm glad you're enjoying it.

That whole Jim Cornette/Shane Douglas story has always fascinated me. @Superstar Sleeze if you haven't Cornette's side of that story you can see a video clip of it here. According to Cornette, they actually ended up shooting that match twice. I've never understood why (assuming Cornette's version of the story is true) Douglas would have gone to Jim Herd to complain about the angle, when the whole point of it was to help promote Shane Douglas and the Dynamic Dudes. The whole "I'm not selling that Memphis shit" line cracks me up for some reason. I also agree that Shane Douglas is an excellent interview. Much like @El-P you can count me in as a Shane Douglas fan. He is obviously highly intelligent and very well spoken. His Kayfabe Commentary shoot interviews are always excellent and he even has a 3+ hour interview on YouTube with that Hannibal guy (who I generally can't stand) that is also really good. I think one of the things that always worked against Shane Douglas and kept him from being more successful in Pro Wrestling is that he tended to be his own worst enemy and made some bad political decisions. IIRC, Mick Foley alluded to that in his first book. Douglas seemed to have the knack for rubbing important people the wrong way, no matter where he worked...aside from ECW of course. I tried listening to Shane's "Triple Threat Podcast" for a while, but it's pretty bad. His co-hosts are the guys from the "Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling" and the show seemed to mostly be them talking and interviewing Shane over the phone. Last I heard the show, he wasn't even using Skype to record (like everybody else seems to) and as a result the audio quality was awful.

Tim Storm was the guest on Sean Mooney's podcast this week, and obviously there is plenty of NWA talk. Great episode. And as we discussed earlier in this thread, the interview Tim Storm does with Sean Mooney pretty much confirms that Storm is the most sincere, nicest guy in the history of Professional Wrestling.

Overproduced is the perfect word for...whatever the hell that was. That looked like a giant steaming pile of ridiculous shite to me. Besides, even if that was good...it doesn't matter. This is WWE. One minute you're in NXT with a big entrance and starting to build momentum, the next you're on RAW, teaming with Ricochet and losing to The New Day while they dance around as they throw pancakes. There is zero reason to get excited about anything in WWE, or to get behind any new act. It's pretty much a given at this point that WWE will screw it up. Especially if the fans actually get behind it.

I know this is a late bump, but The Revival...sorry "The Revolt" were guests on Chris Jericho's podcast yesterday and talked about their reasons for asking for their release from WWE. From the sound of it, they left for exactly the reasons @C.S. mentions above, because the Tag Team Division on the so-called "Main Roster" is treated as a joke and an afterthought. They seemed to feel that they were never really used properly after they were called up from NXT. They were also able to confirm that those ridiculous sketches of new gimmicks for them that leaked online a while back were actually legitimate. They shared a really funny story about how Vince pitched the idea to them and their reaction. I respect those guys a lot after listening to this interview. They grew up loving old school, southern style, JCP era Tag Team Wrestling. That's what they wanted to do, and in NXT they were allowed to do it. It's absolutely a fair point that they were obviously being incredibly naive (or they just weren't paying attention) when they thought they'd be allowed to continue to be presented as a serious Tag Team on Raw or Smackdown. But as soon as they decided that they were never going to be able to achieve what they wanted in WWE, they respectfully asked for their release, in private. They claim (and based on the recent Brodie Lee interview, I believe them) that they were offered a ton of money to stay, but this isn't about the money for them...it's about being allowed to work the way they want to work. I also respect how loyal they are to each other. From the sounds of things, they're pretty clearly going to end up in AEW but I think they may try and get permission to work for other companies as well, be it the NWA, ROH, Impact or New Japan. They sound really excited about the prospect of working with all sorts of different teams. I look forward to this whole pandemic ending and seeing where they end up.

I also enjoyed the Herb Abrams episode. It obviously wasn't as dark in tone as the Benoit, Snuka and Bravo episodes, but that's not a bad thing. (Or even the New Jack episode, come to think about it.) There wasn't a whole lot of meat on the bone in terms of how complicated the story was, but it's also true that your average fan would probably never have heard of Herb Abrams or the UWF. I considered myself a fairly well informed fan and I only first learned about the story in Mick Foley's first book. It's one of those stories where on one hand, it's tragic because somebody died, but on the other hand the image of a guy coked out of his mind, naked except for a pair of cowboy boots, oiled up and running around smashing up his own office with a baseball bat...that's just entertaining, I'm sorry.

That is not an accurate statement. Eric Bischoff takes the blame and the responsibility for many of the things that went wrong with WCW on several episodes of this podcast. There are a ton of examples of him admitting fault. Bischoff has stated on more than one occasion that he allowed the top level talent in WCW to have way too much say in their own creative, and that he didn't pay close enough attention to creative in general. He has said that he didn't have any confidence in his own creative abilities or ideas, so he deferred to other people. He admits that WCW overexposed the nWo and rode that angle too long. He admits to waiting too long to cycle fresh talent into the main event scene. He takes the blame for a lot of the crap matches and angles that he and Conrad have reviewed. He is especially remorseful for how he handled the conflict with Ric Flair. He has also stated more than once that he should have dealt with Scott Hall and his substance abuse problems a lot differently. Hell, over and above all that...he recently did a "members only" podcast with Conrad Thompson where he discussed his recent ill fated tenure with WWE. Bischoff shoulders the majority of the blame for that fiasco as well. Hell, not only does he admit that he washed out in WWE due to his inability work within their system and give Vince what he wanted...he even admits he took the job for the money, and even talks about all the mistakes he made professionally and financially that forced him to have to accept the WWE job in the first place. You've made it pretty clear in this thread that you're not an Eric Bischoff fan, and that's fine. I can understand why somebody wouldn't be. But your claim he never accepts fault for his mistakes is just not true.

Of all the shows running during the pandemic, AEW is definitely doing the best job by using their talent in the stands to show some sort of reaction. I also like the fact that the AEW talent are acting differently and acknowledging that circumstances are different in promos and in the way they enter the ring. The WWE/NXT guys acting the exact same way in empty arenas as they always do, with the gesturing and the theatrics and the catchphrases, it just makes them look even dumber than they normally look. And that's saying something. It's just goofy and stupid. And WWE was already going way too far with all the stupid wannabe movie dialogue in the ring during matches when there were fans around. Now that you have to hear everything the performers are saying to each other...it's cringeworthy. It's like really bad community theatre. Without crowds (even WWE crowds) to react off, Pro Wrestling just comes across as odd. When comparing the so-called "Wednesday Night War" one of the areas I thought AEW had it all over NXT was in the crowds and crowd reaction. AEW crowds are usually rabid, and their reactions really added to the overall feeling and aura of the show. The opening moments of Dynamite reminded me of Raw or Nitro in the 90's in a good way. Enthusiasm and excitement. Hell, the NWA was drawing a whopping 250 fans to their TV tapings at the GPB studios, but those fans were LOUD. You need that. But even there, I didn't think that model was going to work long term. I don't think doing a show in front of the exact same crowd every week is ever a good idea for Professional Wrestling. TNA proved that with the Nashville "Asylum" shows and then later in the Orlando "Impact Zone." When you get the same fans every week, it gets harder and harder to get them to react. I found that NXT fans at Full Sail were getting less vocal and less enthusiastic as time went by. Of course, they might just have been reacting (or not reacting) to the quality of the Pro Wrestling they were seeing. Like I said, I have tried to watch Pro Wrestling during this whole thing, I have. There's just something about empty arena Pro Wrestling that doesn't appeal to me. I don't think it's a performance that lends itself to being done in front of an empty building. This whole situation has proved how integral a part of the show fans really are. It's not the same without the crowds, I just can't get into it. Granted, part of that might be the absurdity of watching guys pretend to fight in spandex, while meanwhile hundreds of people are dying every day. I don't know. But then again, I seem to be able to take my brain off the hook when I watch Survivor, and not think about the pandemic for a little while. Either way, I just can't get into the empty arena stuff. And based on the ratings for WWE and AEW, I am obviously not the only person who feels this way. The big question is how many fans will come back, when they're eventually able to.

If nothing else, the TNA shows are interesting because they dispel some of the fallacies surrounding Bischoff's time in TNA. Pretty much everybody online when he went there were making cracks about how he failed to move the needle on the management side, and used his time in TNA as further proof of his ineffectiveness as a Pro Wrestling executive. Eric Bischoff has long maintained that he wasn't involved in TNA management, but during these shows he has gone into detail about the fact that they literally didn't want him there, and the feeling was mutual. He claims he has a contract which not only proves he wasn't in management, but that said contract was actually his idea and written up by his lawyer. @SomethingSavage mentioned it earlier in this thread, but Bischoff has reiterated that in TNA, he basically became the "Jimmy Hart" of the deal. If you wanted Hogan, you had to take Bischoff...and that was at Hogan's insistence, apparently.

Yeah, ten grand is what a guy like Tony Khan leaves for a lunch tip, honestly. That’s such a nothing fine in the big picture.

First the Maryland State Athletic Commission robs Lex Luger of the NWA World Heavyweight Championship at The 88 Bash, and now this.

I agree. I haven’t watched a full show since the pandemic started. I got two matches in to WrestleMania before I tapped out. I tried watching NXT, AEW and 205 Live more than once since this mess happened but it just isn’t the same. It feels weird. I’ll probably start watching again when (or if) they start running shows in front of crowds again, but until then? Pass.

I may be setting the all time PWO record here for quoting a post, since @SomethingSavage and @El-P made some of those statements above almost a year and a half ago...but there's actually a reason for it, I swear. I'm not one of those guys who goes around bumping old threads for no reason. As is well evidenced by even skimming this thread, I used to be an unabashed 83 Weeks fanboy. For quite a while it was my favorite podcast, hands down. There was the run of shows 83 Weeks had from November - December 2018 where every show was pretty much a home run, both entertaining and informative. The shows after that were still pretty good, but my interest began to wane for a couple of reasons. I found the format to be getting a bit "samey" but moreover I started to go off Pro Wrestling podcasts altogether, I was just getting burnt out as a listener. The main reason I quit listening altogether though, is because Eric went back to work for WWE in October 2019. One of the reasons I liked 83 Weeks is because Bischoff was pretty much out of the business and wasn't all that worried about burning any bridges. When he went back to WWE, I knew that Eric Bischoff was way too political a person to say anything even remotely controversial (and by association revealing) while he was working for Vince McMahon. I knew he wasn't going to bite the hand that was now feeding him, he wouldn't want to gloat about his success beating his new boss in the ratings, and he certainly wasn't going to criticize WWE now. Plus, I figured he'd be too busy working to seriously devote any creative energy to his podcast. After Bischoff crashed and burned with WWE this past winter (or as he and Conrad liked to joke, lasted "83 Days") I gave the show a couple of weeks to let the dust settle, and then I started to check it out periodically again. The show pretty quickly returned to it's tried and true formula, reviewing old WCW shows, doing watch-alongs of WCW shows or the odd "deep dive" on a particular talent. Like a lot of people, (and like the post quoted above) I had always hoped Bischoff would change things up a bit and discuss his time in TNA. He had always claimed that he wouldn't discuss TNA for two reasons. Firstly, he still had friends there and he didn't want to bury the company...but also he had ongoing litigation against Dixie Carter and Panda Energy and it's never a good idea to publicly discuss somebody you're in the process of suing, because that can be brought as evidence into the lawsuit. I suspected the lawsuit must have been settled because they finally discussed TNA in late September with the episode "Eric Joins TNA." Also, I don't think there is anybody left working in Impact Wrestling that Eric worked with, or he's back to not caring if he burns bridges, because 83 Weeks has finally started to cover Eric Biscoff's time in TNA. Or maybe Conrad is running out of old WCW shows and talent to talk about. Either way, on April 13 they covered TNA Lockdown 2010. This is the first TNA show they have covered, and it was a blast. Great episode. Eric is definitely in total NFLTG mode. He just buries the hell out of a lot of stuff in TNA, and goes on an extended rant about the six sided ring. Conrad even comments that he is more used to the careful, thoughtful, political Eric Bischoff and he really enjoys salty, pissed off, don't give a fuck Eric Bischoff. I found that episode to be a lot of fun, a change of pace episode but a return to form for the podcast overall. This week, they covered the period when TNA went head to head with WWE on Monday Nights. Once again, it has been a refreshing change of pace and I am really enjoying it. 83 Weeks seems to be recharged, and it is shooting back up to the top of my Pro Wrestling podcast list. I have to be honest, I don't listen to Bruce Prichard anymore. I find Arn engaging but a little dry and too diplomatic at times (plus I hate the "AMA" format) and JR can have good weeks...but his saltiness and defensive rants at strawmen can get a little old after a while. I am really happy that 83 Weeks seems to be having a bit of a resurgence. If you are one of the fans who used to like this show but quit, or if you wanted to hear him talk about his time in TNA and were disappointed that he didn't, I'd check the April 13 and May 4 episodes out, you may enjoy them.

Oh yeah you’re right. Even Prichard admits that was supposed to be Flair but the deal fell through at the 11th hour.

I saw an interview with Flair where he claimed he came close to signing with Vince a couple of times during the WWF’s 80’s boom. I don’t know the dates but I think Vince definitely tried to get Flair a few times and made it pretty clear the WWF door was open whenever Flair wanted to come. I have heard Flair say several times that he regrets not going to the WWF much earlier than he did and that he wishes he had taken advantage of one of those earlier opportunities. The thing is at the time I think Flair was perfectly happy staying with the NWA when the NWA was actually a functioning organization and then later when the territories died and the NWA was basically JCP. My impression was always that it wasn’t until JCP sold to Turner that Flair had any interest in jumping ship, more for creative reasons than anything.

Completely agree. "Dark Side of the Podcast" is pretty much becoming a must listen every week for me. They are always able to add a lot of extra info and insight into the filming of the shows. This week I found the stuff about how hard they tried to get Rick Martel very interesting, for example. I don't really dislike Conrad anyhow, but he is much more "businesslike" when he hosts this show.

Whenever I see him interviewed, no matter the setting or context, Jacques Rougeau always comes across as eminently unlikable.

On Arn Anderson's podcast last week, they talked about The Revival. The Revival have told anybody who listened in the past that they patterned themselves after Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard. Arn has always been very gracious about this and has stated in the past on his podcast that he thinks The Revival are better than he and Tully were. Arn speaks very highly of their work and their work ethic. He has talked about agenting a series of House Show matches between The Revival and Robert Roode and Chad Gable that were apparently given lots of time and were tearing the house down. Arn has claimed that he advocated for these two teams working against each other to Vince. Anyhow, after The Revival were released, Conrad Thompson asked Arn what he thought about it. Arn said he was very happy for them, and had known the day before it was announced that the release was coming because they had told him. Conrad Thompson then said something very interesting. He said that everybody was just automatically assuming that The Revival would end up in AEW, and that they probably would...but he also wouldn't be surprised if they also worked in the NWA. Last night, Dave Lagana tweeted a question to the fans, asking if they could see any team past or present in the Crockett Cup (once it is rescheduled) which team would they choose? Dash Wilder tweeted back to Dave Lagana "FTR." Lagana replied with a Joey from Friends "How you doin?" gif. Obviously this doesn't mean anything, but at the very least proves that on a periphery level The Revival and the NWA are on each other's radar. If The Revival actually did show up in the NWA, even part time...I just might have a joygasm.

I know in the bigger picture it's inconsequential and irrelevant to the episode, but I had a similar reaction when I saw Irv Muchnick. Dude, you're going to be on national TV. If you don't have a pair of glasses that aren't basically being held together with adhesive tape, then maybe don't wear the glasses for the interview? He looked like a character from Revenge of the Nerds.

That story about Corino's injury, Cornette's subsequent meltdown and quitting ROH is one of those Pro Wrestling stories that sound too unbelievable to be true, but it's been verified by several people who were there. The sad thing is, (if you believe Cornette) that wasn't even the first time that something major happened during a Ring Of Honor show that required management intervention, only for everybody to find out all the office staff had left early and the wrestlers were basically on their own. Cornette claims he had gone out of pocket on several occasions in ROH after Sinclair took over, because people needed to be paid and there was nobody there to pay them. Not to mention the kicker, which was that show had been taped in a hockey area where they discovered that the building staff were refusing to turn on the heat out of fear that it would melt the ice under the arena floor, so the arena was literally freezing and the fans and wrestlers all had to keep their winter coats on during the whole show.

I couldn't agree with you more. The whole "Jim Cornette ruined ROH" talking point is just flat out false. Jim Cornette was (and still is) close personal friends with Cary Silkin. Silkin was hemorrhaging money running ROH and was seriously considering shutting the company down, because it wasn't financially viable anymore and was going to personally bankrupt him. After Cornette got fired from TNA (thanks to Vince Russo, by the way) Cornette agreed to try and help Silkin recoup his losses and avoid going bankrupt. Cornette personally wrote up a detailed business proposal for Sinclair Broadcasting. He proposed making radical changes to ROH, including establishing a home arena and wrestling school, he basically used the same business model he and Danny Davis had proposed to WWE when they first established OVW. He knew it would work because OVW was functional and self-sustaining aside from the money WWE was investing. ROH would operate primarily out of this new location, where they could also have their own television production equipment and studio. He submitted the proposal to Sinclair hoping to get them to invest in the company. They liked Cornette's proposal so much they bought ROH. Cornette basically brokered that deal and saved Silkin from going broke and shutting down ROH. I honestly believe if it wasn't for Cornette ROH wouldn't even exist right now. When Sinclair hired Cornette, they didn't hire him to be in charge of creative. They hired him to produce TV and basically be the liaison between Sinclair and ROH. Hunter Johnson was in charge of creative. Cornette had a lot of input and say in what happened creatively, but at the end of the day the main force behind ROH creative was Johnson. Cornette really likes Hunter Johnson but he has openly stated that he didn't agree with a lot of the creative decisions Johnson made. His decisions regarding talent have also taken a lot of criticism, some of it is absolutely justified but a lot of it is unwarranted. Both Kevin Steen and Sami Zayn have claimed that Jim Cornette didn't like them so he wouldn't book them in ROH, and that isn't true. Cornette has repeatedly stated that he had three issues with Kevin Steen. Firstly, he wanted Steen to lose 30 pounds and get in better shape. Secondly he wanted Steen to stop taking so many insane bumps and high risks because he thought it was overdoing it, and desensitizing the fans...not to mention putting himself at unnecessary risk for injury. Cornette was always maintained that Steen was an excellent worker, but he was "doing too much." Finally, Cornette claims Steen was basically a pain in the ass backstage and wanted to book his own angles and only work with his friends. Cornette wanted Steen to stop arguing with creative all the time, and do what he was asked. Steen wouldn't do any of those things, so Cornette stopped using him. As far as "El Generico?" Jim Cornette had two really unreasonable requests for him, both of which Generico refused to do. Cornette wanted him to unmask, and stop being silent. He wanted him to cut promos, because in Cornette's words "the kid could talk his ass off." As soon as Steen and Generico got hired by WWE and had some success, a lot of ROH fans (and Steen himself) took that as some sort of vindication and tried to rub it in Cornette's face, claiming he had missed the boat or been wrong about them. Cornette pointed out that it was he who had been vindicated, since WWE had made Steen get in better shape, tone down the pointless high risk stuff and he was damn sure not booking his own angles. Meanwhile, Generico had unmasked and started cutting promos. Cornette claims that if they had been willing to do that in ROH, he wouldn't have stopped using them. The whole Young Bucks deal has also been driven into the ground, and a lot of the popular narrative about that situation is bullshit. Which makes sense, because a lot of the popular narrative about the Young Bucks comes from them. Cornette freely admits that he didn't think the Bucks were all that great. He says they don't look athletic enough, they don't sell enough and they're too reliant on doing spots. But he also admits they were popular with the ROH fans. The problem was that one of Cornette's main jobs was to keep costs at a minimum. The Bucks had to be flown in from California to work in ROH. They weren't local, and that was costing ROH a ton of money. Cornette would have kept using The Young Bucks if they had been closer, but they weren't so he didn't. Granted, he didn't lose any sleep over that decision because he really didn't see much in them, but he has repeatedly claimed that the main reason he stopped using them was due to travel costs. The Bucks got butthurt when Cornette stopped using them. Even their biggest fans have to admit The Young Bucks are notoriously thin-skinned and sensitive to any perceived slight or hint of criticism. So they started slagging him in interviews. Cornette slagged back. He ran into them at an indy show and made a joke about the fact they'd be better off working an angle because at least people believed in the heat they had with each other. The Bucks grabbed that and ran with it, telling anybody who would listen that Cornette didn't see anything in them and talked shit about them, but then wanted to work with them when he saw how popular they'd become. And now they have a book coming out, so I shudder at the commencement of fresh hostilities. You know The Bucks are going to eviscerate Cornette in their book and you know Cornette will respond in kind on his podcast. The main voice behind the whole "Cornette ruined ROH" mantra is Austin Aries. He's the one who has told anybody who would listen that Cornette ruined ROH and tried to turn it into "Smoky Mountain of Honor." And why? Because Cornette fired him. Austin Aries was the highest paid member of the ROH roster, but he wanted to stop wrestling and become a manager...and he apparently openly slagged the company every chance he got in the locker room, and encouraged dissension among the other wrestlers. Cornette and Hunter Johnson asked him to stop doing that, and Aries himself admits that his response was "you're not paying me enough to be quiet." So they fired him. Look, I'm not going to deny that Cornette has made some questionable decisions when it comes to talent. Hell, in ROH he basically wanted to focus a lot of the attention around Eddie Edwards, Davy Richards and Michael Elgin. Are they Main Event level guys, in my opinion? Edwards, not really. Richards, no. Elgin, you've got to be fucking kidding me. Cornette is absolutely still stuck in the mindset from the 70's-80's where guys had to look a certain way to be big stars. A lot of his worst decisions have been based around that dated perception. If you watch the "Breaking Kayfabe" shoot interview Cornette did with Sean Oliver he goes into precise detail regarding what went wrong with ROH. @Big Pete is right, he basically ended up quitting because Sinclair bought the company based on his business proposal, and then proceeded to basically ignore 95% of the stuff Cornette recommended in that proposal. But bottom line is, you can't lay any of ROH's current day problems at the feet of Jim Cornette.