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I could see WWE making a similar request regarding Hogan in the '80s. Of course, he had a lot of stroke then too.

That seems to be the consensus opinion. Maybe if he had put over someone not named John Cena or Randy Orton over in the last couple of years, then I'd believe he wasn't still protecting his spot.

I'm sure the media would be supportive of any Premiership footballer who came out, but I'm not sure that rival fans would be so supportive. The majority maybe, but you only need a few idiots in every crowd to make a player's life miserable. Justin Fashanu ring a bell? From Wikipedia: I know that was 20 years ago, but one can understand why there hasn't been another Premiership footballer to come out since then.

And in turn this has led to them pushing a lot of guys with less "it" than Trip, because we wouldn't want Trip to get overshadowed now would we? Such as Lashley, Kozlov, Sheamus, Drew McIntyre, Ted DiBiase and Cody Rhodes.

Well, here in the UK (MJH - you're British too right?) we have civil partnerships and mainstream politicians don't demonize gay people for political reasons, so we're much further ahead on gay rights issues than America. Even here, it can be difficult for people to come out to their parents. What if your parents are staunchly relgious and believe that homosexuality is a grave sin?

Not particularly grouchy, hateful or vile for JR, but still reads oddly:

"The people in this country including the media have really got behind this thing with support like I've NEVER EVER seen anywhere".

If the Internet was around 20 years ago, would we be saying the same thing about Bret Hart?

According to Madden in the piece above: "Kanyon wasn’t out when he was in WCW, but everybody knew, and I never once saw him victimized by homophobia." Now that could be Mark bullshitting, or perhaps Mark has exceptional gaydar. But if "everyone knew" in WCW, it's pretty hard for Lagana *later* in the WWF to not have known. I was trying to be diplomatic by not throwing the liar tag around. But yeah, Lagana's assertion that he didn't realize he was secretly gay is pretty laughable as well. I don't think Mark is bullshitting when he says "everybody knew" in WCW; I'm sure a lot of jerks in the WCW locker room liked to rib him about his repressed sexuality. I'm sure even Lagana wasn’t privy to reasons for his firing from WWE too.

Hmm, you'd think Dave would know whether this story was on the up and up or not. It does fit with how WWE works backstage. Remember the Ken Anderson firing. Remember the story about Vader being told he'd be fired if he ever worked so stiff again in early 1996 by a top star (can't recall whether this was Shawn or Taker).

Even if the censors weren't there, it wouldn't have been a wise strategy. It's better to differentiate your product, than copy what's working for the other side.

Yeah, tomk's right. It's not really a tolerant environment if people feel the need to bash gay people to fit in. Dave Meltzer pussyfooting around the Boy George angle was disappointing too. The Lagana quote was pretty disgusting. I mean come on. Even if we're willing to accept that Lagana didn't realize at the time Kanyon was secretly gay, it was blatantly a demeaning angle "to show him up and fuck with him". There's no question about that. Speaking of incidents that are obviously not homophobic whatsoever, is it just me or did Dave Meltzer still fail to mention Flair's yelling at Orlando Jordan's partner for his behaviour at a bar leaving him shaken up in this week's Observer? I mean I can understand Dave not wanting to break the news of this embarrassing incident, but once the news has been broken he should discuss it in his newsletter.

Hmm, maybe I jumped the gun a bit with my "Lance Storm needs to realize that TNA's reckless stupidity is no match for WWE's shady callous nature" blog post on Cageside Seats.

You forget the part about Dustin Runnels killing the Goldust gimmick just four months earlier in a worked shoot angle, where he blamed Vince McMahon for losing his father and wife, which was completely forgotten about within a fortnight, and eventually becoming this religious do-gooder, in a role where it was hard to decipher whether he was a babyface (given that he was still largely booked against heels), tweener or heel (given that the gimmick was obviously mocking religion). But it was all just to set up the nonsensical surprise of Dustin returning to the gimmick that destroyed his marriage before Val even stuck his oar in. Boy, the midcard storylines that Russo and Ferrara had free reign in 98/99 were such a mess. Thankfully for them, no-one in WCW paid attention to that.

I doubt Dave would have used the extra space to write about Steve Williams, Ditch. He'd probably use the space to preview UFC 112 and more news tidbits. As Jonathan Snowden indicated in another thread, he'd already lost interest in the piece two months ago. We're very unlikely to get it now, so I wouldn't hold your hopes up.

One thing to remember is that once you've suffered one concussion, it's very easy to suffer another one soon after if you don't take enough time off to recover.

Obviously someone didn't want him to blab about it publicly. I'd usually blame Dave being sworn to secrecy by Dana White, but it sounds more like something WWE would have liked kept under the carpet. This is nothing new, Dave's sat on other major stories (IIRC, the most obvious example being UFC's Machiavellian attempts to control their fighters like refusing to give their agents/managers backstage passes any longer, pressuring them to sign lifetime rights to their name and likeness to use in video games, etc) and as soon as they broke had exclusive details that nobody else had.

Vince McMahon seeking to get UFC banned in key European countries

From Wade Keller's Impact review: Nice to see such classy script writing from the "reformed" born again Christian, Vince Russo!

Problem is I don't think Bret or the company was ready to turn him heel by the summer of '95.

When was Dunn first mentioned in the Observer? It dates back probably even earlier than the early 00s, because Jim Cornette blew up at Dunn and made fun of his teeth at a creative team meeting all the way back in the summer of 1997. Did the other prominent idiot of the time (Russo) get all the heat then?

Being bipolar + concussions + drugs (alcohol, pills and roids) + politics (Be good, but not too good) + ritual humiliation (Boy George angle) + wrestling obsession (desperately angling for a job with WWE/TNA in an erratic manner that was bound to fail) is a bad combination.

Also, establishing the Hell In A Cell gimmick and inspiring Mick Foley's bumps from the cage, which helped make it the most profitable gimmick match of the last decade.

Has Dave ever attended a WrestleMania? I'm sure he's never attended one outside California.

He hasn't wrestled for 6 years, 7 come next Mania. A big star's first match back in years tends to generate some buzz and draw some PPV buys you might not have otherwise garnered (see Bret this year). Given his local ties to the area, Goldberg wrestling on the show would generate WWE some positive local publicity. Any opponent you give him would be a fresh match. So to me, it seems like a good idea for a hook for next year's Mania. It's not like the company has many marquee matches left that haven't been seen plenty of times before and it's unlikely that by next year they will create a new generation of red hot stars that will be able to carry the show on their own.