Mad Dog

I blocked Bryan Alvarez out because I wouldn't have read it if I thought he was writing any of it. I tend to like Reynolds though. Like I said, it was fun despite my disagreements with their focuses and the inaccuracies.

Didn't Road Dogg try just holding onto the bottom rope for as long as possible in the 2000 or 2001 Rumble?

I've been reading the Death of WCW book written by RD Reynolds. I've enjoyed it for the most part but I really disagree with how he approached it. He seems to blow a lot of things out of proportion in some instances while completely ignoring other instances that were worse. He also really should've researched his timelines better as he was off by months at certain points for events. I also found several inaccuracies throughout.

Ricky Steamboat's family man gimmick really feels forced and out of date for this show. It makes him feel kind of lame more than a guy to get behind. The announcers are really trying to sell the Road Warriors as heels but the fans just aren't buying it. I don't really see what they're trying to accomplish here. The Warriors act exactly the same as they did as faces. The fans loved the Warriors for being a couple of brutal ass-kickers. They're still a couple of brutal ass-kickers.

Watching old NWA shows. No one does the bodyslam where they fold the arm behind the opponents back and then slam them right onto the arm.

The NOAH situation is more like steroids in baseball. The media and the fans know it's there and that their favorite promotion has Yakuza ties. But the second it comes to light, they all freak out anyway and shun whoever the wrongdoer is. It's that weird kind of dynamic going on over there. It could drive away what little fan base they have left.

Pride was dead within months of their Yakuza connections being revealed.

Pro Wrestling NOAH revealed Yakuza ties a couple of days ago. Safe to say that's probably game over for them.

I think it's an insult to Jericho to even mention Edge in the same sentence. Jericho was a good worker and he had a talent for drawing heat. Really, how the fuck cares what you do in the ring if you can draw heat like Chris Jericho could. How many guys could stay as over as he could while getting actively shit on by the booking during some of the WWE years.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtKLGyLO38M

If you go back and watch the Malenko/Jericho match from Slamboree in 98, it's kind of amazing to see how hot the crowd was for that match. It's kind of amazing to see Malenko that over considering he was a vacuum of charisma.

That was the point though. Fake Undertaker was there to draw out the real Undertaker and then to lose to the real Undertaker. If you read the Observer, though, the plan at one point was for Fake Undertaker to stick around for a while, but they wound up changing course at some point. Either that, or somebody was giving Dave bad info. Really, WWE's track record with fake anything (Fake Undertaker, Fake Kane, Fake Razor Ramon, Fake Diesel, etc) is incredibly poor. Fake never works well. This one is more of a funny one but the Black Scorpion on the first SMW broadcast. They spent the whole show talking about him and then he jobbed in his first and only match.

I do like Gilbert's inring work. He takes a really good beating. That Windham match was fun mostly because he just took a massive beating and his comeback was really good until Flair got involved.

That was the point though. Fake Undertaker was there to draw out the real Undertaker and then to lose to the real Undertaker.

Most of the WCW guys that came into the WWE in the 2000s. Scott Steiner and Goldberg being the chief examples. They kind of did it to Jericho a little when he showed off. If you look back, they really botched the first 3-4 months of his initial run. Tazz sort of did too. Diamond Dallas Page, motivational speaker. Berlyn in WCW.

I've seen some of his 88 run through AWA TV when they'd venture down to Dallas. I kind of thought it was boring personally but AWA TV made everything seem boring by then. I really just don't like how he approaches matches as a face.

I started my 1989 watching about a week ago. Watching 1/21 right now. Michael Hayes vs. Assassin #2 was stunningly watchable. I was dreading that match because of how boring face Hayes can be boring as hell but it really surprised me by being a solid outing. Windham/Gilbert the week before pissed me off. They ran in for the DQ right as the match was starting to get really good. Eddie Gilbert seems horribly mis-cast as a face. He's okay but really doesn't seem comfortable. I like how the Midnight Express are still the Midnight Express despite being faces so far. They seem like the same guys from a year earlier. They're still bad boys, they just get cheered now. I hate when guys go face and immediately start groveling. That might change though.

I think there was kind of sort of a Hennig/Goldberg mini-feud. I would've thrown Saturn at him again but this was okay with me. The Battle Royal wasn't meaningless as he got revenge on the Giant for choke slamming him on an episode of Nitro earlier that month. I don't think the WCW Title ever got defended at World War III. They had him mowing down challengers on an almost weekly basis. He probably had more televised title defenses in his six month reign than just about any other WCW Champion.

Wasn't his Smackdown run largely considered a total failure?

Chip wrestled for SMW briefly and also worked for the USWA and WWC mostly as the White Knight and U.S. Male. His other ring names are Curtis Thompson, Archangel, the White Knight and U.S. Male.

I thought Mongo's matches were better than they had any right to be. His match with Jarrett was good from what I remember and his match with Hennig was pretty solid too. He also seemed to "get" being a Horsemen. I think he fit in better with the Horsemen than Malenko did and I think if HHH had ever been a Horsemen that he wouldn't have fit in as well as Mongo did.

Honestly, I think Warrior was a better promo too. I know it's in fashion to mock his promos but rewatching 1990, his promos are weird and you have to follow them but you understand what he's talking about and he gets the point across. And at least they're fun, HHH puts you to sleep.

I'd still rather watch Brody stiff the shit out of jobbers than anything HHH did.

Nord showed up in late 97 and had a sizable winning streak on the B shows. They did a Worldwide match with him vs. Goldberg where they were hyping both guys as having big winning streaks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7fcpPR4bFA I still find Booker T and Goldust in 7-11 to be funny 10 years later. Booker T's reactions are gold here.