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That may be because he's been putting off hip replacement surgery for ages.

The quality of work during this period really goes to show what a good idea it was by Kip Frey to give a financial bonus to the wrestlers who had the best match on a show. It gave the youngsters an extra incentive to improve and helped ensure the veterans didn't rest on their laurels and get by on name value alone.

No, as Watts actually phased out the Dangerous Alliance when he became booker. Dusty Rhodes was the head booker from spring 1991 for just over a year. Checking the Torch archives Bill Watts took over in May 1992 after the Wrestle War PPV.

Over at Wrestling Classics Dave Meltzer confirmed that the story is indeed BS.

The thing is they've already got BG James, Christian, Jeff Jarrett, Billy Gunn, Konnan, Sting and Team 3D that casual fans are familiar with and another one isn't going to make much difference IMO unless he's a big enough star. If they had a two hour time slot and needed more stars to fill up the time then I could see him being more valuable, but they've already got too many wrestlers they want to push in the time available to them. The money spent on Steiner would be better spent on Goldberg, Jericho, Lesnar if he becomes available or a WWE star whose contract is up for renewal. Hell, spend it on Jim Cornette or Paul Heyman and you get a great TV performer and a great booker too.

If they're going to pay him Sting level money, he's not worth it, because he's not a difference maker. Most of the WCW audience is probably gone forever having found better things to watch on TV and if they were to return it wouldn't be because of Scott Steiner who wasn't pushed as a main eventer until the dying days of WCW. Moreover, Steiner was exposed as an immobile and clumsy shadow of his former self in his WWE run and his aura was damaged by feuding and teaming with bland career midcarder Test.

The Japan shows didn't sell out, I don't believe their forthcoming UK tour is sold out, domestic house shows, TV and PPVS aren't selling out regularly, the only place they are guaranteed a decent reception is Australia and South America however even there people got pissed when Hogan was promoted to appear but no showed last year. I think they'll take more swings through mainland Europe in the future because between oversaturating the markets and a poor product the interest internationally is also going down. What I meant when I said international business was international PPV business. Even for the worst B show PPVs they get at least an extra 70,000 buys that they didn't use to get a few years ago because of increased international PPV penetration. It gives the company a big safety net for poor domestic business. It is true that WWE isn't as hot in Europe as it once was and can't guarantee sell outs like they used to do, but it's always going to be a strong and highly profitable market for them. Europe was one of the few places the WWF always did good house show business in the mid 1990s, so I doubt house show attendance will tank to American levels even with oversaturation. The same goes for other foreign markets that don't have many wrestling alternatives.

Actually from a ratings and attendance stand point the last couple of months have been the best for the Raw brand in years despite the problems you mentioned. However, my gut feeling says that business will tumble again after WrestleMania like it does most years with them putting the title back on Hunter, even though the hardcore fans will be relieved that the title is off Cena, because I don't think they've got anything new to say with Hunter. He's got very few, if any, fresh matches on the horizon and Cena chasing Hunter for months on end doesn't seem very appealing to me. Meanwhile, Smackdown will do OK business at best until Batista returns. That said, international business will probably keep things ticking over for the company even if domestic business tanks again.

Gee, the wrestlers can't have any fun anymore, well not for a long time anyway. What this policy tells me is that they are 100% committed to it currently, but I'm sure that commitment will waver if business declines and they blame the decline in physiques. It's nice to be less cynical than most posters for a change.

New Japan is so far down the toilet that even if they built it up well I doubt it would draw. They only half filled Sumo Hall with their tag match, so I doubt a singles match would sell it out.

It's probably about drug testing, if not it'll probably be about roster cuts.

It would have made little difference if Hunter went over in their first PPV match like he did in Benoit's WWF debut match IMHO. And that's what would have happened.

My gut feeling says Hunter wins (because that has been the plan all along and there is no chance of it changing with the Cena rebellion by the male fans) AND his match goes on last (because its the biggest match on the card). I also think it is a big assumption that just because Rey is in the match now he'll win the title. I'm still sceptical that Vince would put the title on someone so small particularly at a WrestleMania and if he did that it would be in the main event.

He's still a pro wrestler in Meltzer's eyes. It does if you watch all the UFC, Pride and Hero's shows, have contacts within the MMA industry and have written about it ever since the sport started. Just because he's out to lunch on the whole pro wrestling is MMA issue doesn't mean everything he says about MMA is completely worthless.

Really Dusty at his peak was a bigger star than either Bret or Eddie were and was a top star for longer, its just that his peak was over 20 years ago and was for the opposition, so his role in wrestling history was forgotten about until he signed with the company again.

Agreed. What makes it particularly impressive is that it was Bret's first match in two months and first non house show match since WrestleMania and there was no obvious signs of ring rust or fatigue in the match. The finishing run where they deulled submission holds was very unique for a WWF match, foreshadowing their "I Quit" match, and worked really well in the context of the story of the match. After Austin's new finisher failed him, what better idea than going back to his old finisher? The only problem was that WWF fans at the time had been conditioned to only react to patented submission moves like the Sharpshooter, so the last few minutes of the match perhaps could have gotten a better response. JR simply outclassed him on commentary, which is quite funny given that he was still playing subtle heel to Vince after the whole fake Razor and Diesel fiasco. He was much better at putting over the changing direction of the company from gimmicky sports entertainment ("Not a trash man, not a clown" about Bret) to a harder edged product empasising more athleticism and competition, though it was still very much a work in progress. He even managed to throw a subtle cheap shot at WCW in the process ("These men are still in their primes"). It's funny how one year later he would be alluding to how old Bret actually was in commentary. Yeah Bret was still getting a nice reaction, but not really enough to warrant his huge salary or lead people to believe he would turn around the company's fortunes as the top babyface. With that in mind, the darker days ahead aren't that surprising, especially as some fans were already starting to pop for Austin. You're right about why WCW were kicking their asses at the time. This was Bret's first match back on cable television in over 8 months and before the finish it came across as such a non-event. Not that the action was bad or anything, it just came across as a typical TV match. One thing I didn't like about the storyline was that I thought the reason why Davey Boy saved Bret, namely he's Bret's brother-in-law, seemed really weak to me considering they had one of the bloodiest matches in WWF history less than a year ago. Such an important angle should have been teased more in the week or so before the match, so it wasn't so confusing and feel less like it came out of nowhere. That just comes across as so childish to me - bitching about Bret starting it, as if that absolves him of all blame of all the things he did later on to screw with Bret. I thought the most interesting line was "Believe me he's no angel" before mumbling something about Vince killing him if he expounded on that. Well, he certainly expounded on that 6 months later. And who cares if he wasn't the perfect role model between the sheets so to speak as long as he treated the fans with respect and was classy in public? It is a work after all. Yeah, Vader wasn't treated as enough of a monster by Bret (though you could say that about much of Vader's WWF run) wrestling him like he would anyone else except doing a back suplex instead of a backbreaker, so the job didn't help Vader at all. If anything it made Bret look weak, losing for the second time in less than a month, even with the excuse of Austin's interference.

Bingo. I'd have less of a problem with this if TNA offered to pay them the money they would've lost had they missed the ROH show, but if they didn't do that and they still made the show they shouldn't be punished so harshly. I think they're being punished so harshly more out of a petty jealousy over their loyalty to ROH than to send a message to the rest of their lockerroom.

Yeah, because he's probably not having a bad enough day without having his chosen means of staying upbeat about a horrible situation mocked to his face. Well considering I'm not likely to ever meet him, he won't have it mocked to his face. He's also been known (before the tumor stuff) to go around telling people how gays are going to hell and all that wonderful anti-homosexual Bible stuff, so for him to say now he doesn't rub it in people's faces is kind of hypocritical on his part. I've always thought that if you preach homophobia in the name of religion then that's against the spirit of Christianity, which teaches tolerance and forgiveness not hatred, prejudice and bigotry. That said, I don't mind him preaching the gospel, because that's what Christians are told to do, spread the word of God. We are all free to ignore it if we wish. I do understand how it can be grating sometimes, but in this case, as he has got brain cancer, I think we should give him some slack.

Those people are just playing the exact same sort of games that I'm sure Rob Feinstein played when he promoted ROH. So for them the question of whether it is morally right doesn't come into the question, they?re just looking for revenge. Personally I feel he's a black mark on the industry and when he's no longer associated with it it'll be good riddance.

So instead Vince allows him to continue to fuck up the whole company, just so Vince's ego won't get bruised. Who says Vince McMahon isn't a genius?

Personally I think anyone would work for them again, even the Bruno Sammartino's and the Ultimate Warrior's, if Vince McMahon was willing to bow to their demands like he has done for Bret.

Nah, the big match they're building to is obviously Jarrett vs Sting. Either Christian is a transitional champion and he drops the title back to Jarrett before Sting returns or he'll be bigfooted by Jarrett with his title matches against the likes of Abyss or Monty Brown being given a lower billing than Jarrett's matches with Sting. Despite Christian winning, the story of the show really was all about Jarrett - how he was screwed by TNA management (Larry Zybysko) and Earl Hebner, a tease for his next big feud with Sting and another tease for his eventual feud with Monty Brown. If they were really going to build around Christian in the long term wouldn't they be teasing his next big feuds, not Jarrett's? Christian's win was a nice feel good moment, but this wasn't a change of direction or a dawn of a new era sadly.

I'm surprised this didn't happen earlier given all the injuries Shane has worked through since 1997.

I've always thought that story was bullshit - that the plan was always to do more than just 3 unprotected chairshots and that the real heat came from Rock not checking on him afterwards to make sure he was OK. Just like Foley's story that the Hell In The Cell bump through the cage at King Of The Ring '98 wasn't planned was BS.

I hazard to say a lot more than you'd think. Petty politics and backstabbing is rife in many large corporations, though it's probably more pronounced in WWE than most because the boss' daughter got promoted to such an important position so quickly. Cornette wouldn't do things Steph's way basically.