Jingus

And when he was replacing Bob Backlund, well, like I said, right place right time. Backlund's mat-based, old-school, kinda corny style had mostly been played out by the end of his reign. Listening to the crowd in his 80's matches, you can often hear him getting booed in a most Cena-like manner (either that, or they've got the canned heat machine turned on). Hogan was a perfect fit for a new, flashier era of wrestling in the insubstantial 80s: big, strong, charismatic, goofy, someone who you didn't have to take seriously in order to enjoy. A lot like Arnold's heroes in movies around the same time, actually. Also, Hogan didn't keep harping about how wrestling was REAL DAMMIT and his athletic background (hah) and other kayfabious stuff like Backlund and his contemporaries did in previous years. He did everything but wave the steroid needle in your face while calling his next match. I think the people enjoyed finally having someone who subtly indicated that wrestling was indeed fake, and that it was okay.

I've always thought that Hogan was the biggest recipient of fortuitous timing in wrestling history. The right guy in the right place during the right era. A Hogan type guy certainly could get over today, Rock was basically Bollea for the new millineum and Cena/Batista have been pushed in much the same way, but I don't think they'd have near the success that 80s Hulkamania did.

Sek = psychic. (Well, close enough anyway.)

Did you just describe Sid... or Batista?

When that happened, I dropped the remote, stared at the tv for a few seconds... and then surrendered to the endless waves of maniacal, hyenical, Joker-like laughter that just never stopped. GOD that was entertaining. Somehow it seems less offensive when it's about Vince himself than when it was Katie Vick or Al Wilson or Paul Bearer or Tim White.

"Because I'm twice the man you are, and I have half the brain you do!" -Sid ::incredulous laughter:: -Hall & Nash

That's why I said "sorta", but c'mon, same software, same color scheme, and that's where most of us originally met. And also, is joking about technically considered a hate crime?

Yeah, I worked a show with him a year or two back, he's completely recovered from the leg injury and, well, still looks like Sid.

If I had to say it in one sentence: Keller seems like he still wants to actually be part of the wrestling business someday, while Meltzer seems to think he's above it. Also... in the year two thousand and fuckin' seven, someone still LIKES Russo?!

At this point, I just hope that Shane gets disgusted, splits from the WWE, forms his own superior company, and eventually puts his sister out of business.

I could recommend a few Wildside and Texas matches where Hernandez fucks a bunch of stuff up and injures people. But as for good, no. He really never did anything that even remotely impressed me until his LAX run. Yeah, I noticed that too. I heard about this match being hyped to the fuckin' moon, and when I finally saw it, it's like, "uh, that's all?". I'm sure it came off much better live with all the plot twists and such, but ROH booking often seems like Gabe is trying to copy great bookers of the past rather than being a great booker himself. I did like that at least they didn't slavishly follow the one Wargames formula with the heels winning the coin toss. Welcome to the strangest commentary team in da biz. Tenay was the guy they brought in for the luchadore and cruiserweight matches in WCW, because unlike Schiavone he'd actually watched a fucking foreign wrestling show before and actually knew that particular move was NOT a sidewalk slam. Since he was stuck in the political snakepit of WCW, with color commentators like Dusty, Madden, Zybysco, and Drunk Apathetic Heenan constantly yelling in his ear and insulting him, he developed a no-heat commentary style where he never really interacted that much with the other announcers, as much as possible. So, here's TNA, and in the beginning there were two announcers: Tenay and Ed Ferrera. Ferrera was decent, a nice enough guy when he wasn't mocking Jim Ross's bells palsy, but he tended to try to put himself over too much and was generally too Russoesque in his manner (he didn't last very long). So the Jarretts decided they needed another color guy, a hype man if you will. Well, one of them was watching ShopAtHome one night, and saw Don West on there, shilling baseball cards at ear-splitting volume. The rest is history. West knows next to nothing about the history or more subtle intracacies of the business, but he delivers sheer enthusiasm in ludicrous quantities. During one six-man SATs match where Red got his ass kicked for twenty minutes straight, West actually stood on top of the announce desk and led the crowd in a "Go Red Go!" chant. Some are amused by his ridiculous energy, some like gordi are just annoyed by it. Anyone else continuing with these match reviews?

I saw Orton have a perfectly fine match at an indy show seven years ago. I also saw him have a painfully boring chinlock-fest just a couple months ago. He really does go back and forth between sucking and not, kind of one of those Carlito "how much do I care tonight?" types.

Holy shit, an actual TSM-sorta-spinoff that's dedicated to... wrestling? I think I might shed a tear. I didn't even know about NMB closing, the only way I could get online for the longest time was hiking down to the local library and fighting with homeless people for computer time, so other than keeping an eye on the Pit I never got to waste my days posting away like I so love to do. So... they're pushing Mark Henry again. Um, didn't they spend the better part of a decade making him do the stupidest shit possible, trying to make him quit, since they signed him to that huge 10-year contract before realizing that he was a crappy wrestler? Why the hell did they resign him? Also, you know that saying "you could take that match anywhere in the world"? That could really be applied to the ten minutes of awesome that was Yang/Kendrick/London vs. Noble/Daivari/Chavo tonight. Whether it occured in Madison Square Garden, or Mid-South Coliseum, or ECW Arena, or Korakuen Hall, or the National Guard armory right down the road, that energetic little sprint would've gotten over anywhere. When Daivari is by far the worst wrestler out of six guys (and he's really not bad), you know you're in for a good match.

Considering the treatment that wrestling usually gets from the mainstream media, I'd give this article five stars, even though it is a blatant Wrestlecrap ripoff. The writer's obviously a fan, maybe even a smark, which helps a lot.

...hey, you might be onto something there. I never thought about it, but it is kinda weird that the WWE specified exactly how long his suspension was for, while never mentioning what he did. A drug infraction would explain that nicely. But there have been a whole bunch of internet reports saying that it had something to do with Orton's treatment of the divas.

Man, that is something I'm tired of, hearing Orton's behavior excused just because he was doing it towards "no-talent bimbos". So what? They're still human beings, and deserve to be treated as such. It's not their fault for accepting a high-profile job with a comfy paycheck regardless of their skills; it's the company's fault for being dumb enough to hire them in the first place. If Orton wants to call women "cunts" to their faces, he should start with Linda McMahon, who is more at fault for the clueless chick parade than any of the chicks themselves.

Good call, Cunny. Kanyon is wrong when he claims he's the only openly gay athlete; hell, he's not even the only openly gay American pro wrestler. He's just the only one who has announced it with such fanfare and tried to use his sexuality to reverse-blackmail a company into hiring him. I don't really like TNA, never have (too much up-close exposure to what they were really like here in Nashville), but they're in the right here. Especially with Spike to worry about: somehow I doubt "the first network for men" would be terribly open-minded about such things.

How many different times have we heard about Orton being an asshole to the divas? He's a legitimate danger to the company. Sometimes wrestlers act like they live in a different world, above the laws that govern the rest of humanity. But the WWE can still be slapped with a massive sexual harassment lawsuit just like any other corporation.

Trish has been around so long that lots of people tend to kinda forget about her or just take her for granted. It's not until she turns in a match like she did at Mania that lots of people sit up and take notice again. And even though she's been doing this horribly demanding job for seven years now, she still looks fiiiiiine.