Al

How many acquisitions came out of this? I can only think of the Powers of Pain off the top of my head. Bossman, too, but I think you posed earlier that by this point he was already waiting to come in, but couldn't yet due to a no-compete clause. I had the same thought. The Bushwackers debuted in late-December but that probably doesn't count. Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard made it in early October. So it appears the Powers of Pain are the only ones around of that time period.

Given the $25,000 price tag, it has to be WWE's Ashley. Bix gave a weblink elsewhere, and most top-name porn stars aren't even clearing 10k. Would this LV model manage that high a price somehow? I doubt it.

Let me clarify something on this. Dimaggio made on on the third ballot actually. He started receiving votes his first offseason after retirement. Of the players on the 1953 ballot (Dimaggio's first), 40 of them eventually reached the Hall of Fame. It wasn't that voters considered Dimaggio unworthy. It was that the ballot was too crowded. It's a small point, irrelevant really, but it's often used.

Re: The Hogan/lat story. It seems conceivable to me that the injury COULD have occurred during an early Hogan/Andre match in 1980/81. Hogan did slam Andre in early bouts, so Hogan would only have the date wrong in his story.

He's not saying that list of wrestlers is equal to Ole, he's saying they are better candidates, some clearly and some marginal.

There is also no test yet for HGH.

WWF @ Montreal, Quebec - Forum - August 4, 1989 Tim Horner defeated Richard Charland (sub. for Greg Valentine) Dino Bravo pinned Jim Neidhart The Bushwhackers defeated the Powers of Pain via count-out Barry Windham defeated Paul Roma The Ultimate Warrior pinned Andre the Giant in under 1 minute Dusty Rhodes defeated the Big Bossman via disqualification Shawn Michaels & Marty Jannetty defeated Jacques & Raymond Rougeau in a 60-minute Marathon Match, 3-2 in overtime; fall #1: the Rougeaus won; fall #2: the Rougeaus won; fall #3: the Rockers won at the 48 minute mark; fall #4: the Rockers won at the 57 minute mark; fall #5: the Rockers won when Michaels reversed an inside cradle by Raymond, putting Jannetty

Prism was a premium channel as well, locally. They aired Phillies games and I think otherwise stuck to movies. As khawk noted, it benefit the cable channels who were new entities and needed programming.

Reading Dames' recap on TSM, he indicates that Flair namedropped Benoit along with the rest of the Horsemen. If he said Benoit's name on its own, that's one thing. If he drops Benoit's name in the same sentence as Anderson, Blanchard, Windham, Malenko, etc., does that put things in a different light? That they are cheering the Horsemen despite Benoit, which I would well expect.

In all fairness to amateur wrestlers, Those are the only quotes from Jason Robbins, and they are both perfectly reasonable responses to give to a reporter. The problem here isn't the amateur wrestlers, it's a sports columnist writing an opinion column and adding some obligatory quotes.

Except that he has NEVER appeared in WWE. Not even for an old timer's battle royal like Lou Thesz. Was The Sheik ever in WWWF? They put him in, I think as much for the Sabu/RVD connection as anything. If he was there it's not like he was a guy who built his reputation there. Oh, hi everyone from DVDVR. A lot of rather familiar faces here. Mainly I just lurk here and look over the old WO 1980's recap posts so far. Yeah, Sheik feuded with Bruno Sammartino in the 1960s, and if I'm not mistaken they used Sheik to turn Gorilla Monsoon face. Sheik got himself banned from MSG during the Sammartino feud.

KCook, I really think you overestimate how the average casual fan views WWE. People will certainly get together and split the cost, as a friend and I have done for two PPVs in the last year. Get two people and it's $35, three and it's about $22, and so on. And considering this is Wrestlemania, there seems to be a large contingent of semi-hardcore fans who make this the one PPV they order annually. On the price itself, WWE does a lot of silly things, but as a corporate company their pricing is usually spot on. They've surely had marketing do some studies and develop a price point. They are not just picking a high price out of thin air, they've done research. And frankly, if people are paying for HD TVs, extra for high definition programming, Blu-Ray players, higher priced Blu-Ray disks, etc., they will probably pay a little more for Wrestlemania.

Dougherty sounds like an actor making fun of wrestling announcers on SNL. It's embarrassing.

True. Abby's just a real odd choice for the aforementioned reason, plus they have Terry Funk sitting right around if they need. I'm not certain how your average WWE fan would take to seeing guys inducted whose work is 50% Japan.

Agreed with John. Online wrestling discussion declined after WCW died, simply because there was then a lack of real consistent wrestling news and rumors.

Except that he has NEVER appeared in WWE. Not even for an old timer's battle royal like Lou Thesz.

I think one year WWE should induct 5-10 guys like Lou Thesz, Gorgeous George etc. without ceremony. No point to having one, just a few written words. It'd be a nice gesture and makes things a little more complete. Toots Mondt would fit in the category as well.

I think World Class, Lothario wrestled there all the time, and Ladd appeared there at least as manager of the Wild Samoans.

Randy Savage is the other obvious omission at this point. The Rock hasn't wrestled now in four years either.

I agree with the sentiment. I think one thing WWE has done is create an environment where the name "WWE" itself is bigger than any individual star on the card. They can stomach the loss of virtually 95% of the individual wrestlers (not at once of course, but you get the idea). Even a Randy Orton going to TNA probably wouldn't make a bit of difference in the long run. Guys sticking around like those three are nothing new. Look how long Bruiser and Crusher lasted in the AWA. The short turnaround time of the main eventers of the attitude era such as Rock and Austin were due to two things, the high impact style and the heavy financial rewards and turnaround. That era is the exception, rather than the rule. Most big stars of the 1950s-80s such as Lou Thesz, Buddy Rogers, Bruno Sammartino, Terry Funk, Dory Funk, Dusty Rhodes, etc. wrestled WELL past their primes.

I wonder though why they didn't attempt to run something at Shea Stadium that year. Hogan/opponent, Slaughter/Sheik, Adonis and Murdoch defending the belts, Andre appearing, etc. It could have been a great card.

November 19, 1994 # Ron Simmons & Too Cold Scorpio beat Shane Douglas & Brian Pillman when Simmons pinned Douglas. From Prowrestlinghistory.com. Did you mean to say they teamed in a match?

From a business standpoint I agree, but from the vantage point of actually having their big matchup, it would have been so much better to have that match in 1984 just because Andre was still somewhat mobile in the ring. But they waited, and it was probably the smartest thing that they ever did. In fairness, they had the matchup was Andre was even more mobile in 1980 and it was awful.

With Shea Stadium shows in 1972, 1976 and 1980, it would have made a lot of sense to try it again in 1984. Amazing that Meltzer pretty much nailed the storyline, though good for WWF that they held it off for three years.

Because both were close with Paul E and it was after they were fired from WCW? Anderson and Eaton? Both were fully employed by WCW at the time.