cm funk

I don't think the problem was the setting, it was that Lynch and Frost became more and more hands off and the show became too bloated. Bloated with characters, bloated with sideplots and bloated with episodes. Season 2 was 3 times as long as season 1 and it lost focus. There's still a lot to like about it IMO, it just isn't the same show. I think there was a good tight season there if cut down to 10-12 eps with less sideplots.

Nobody wanted to see HHH beat Brock @ WM. What they're doing now is salvaging the investment in Brock

I agree 100% with the last two posts

Yes, because it happens time and time again in wrestling. There's also different ways to value success than sheer money drawn. Paul Heyman taking a tiny Northeast indy and turning it into what it became was a success story. How many bookers in the modern era have grown a company the way he did, and at a time when most promotions were dying?

It's definitely meant for fans first from what I can tell (haven't seen it yet) but I assume the film makers want to shop it around to various festivals where the people seeing it and judging it will not be wrestling fans. If it gets any sort of acclaim or awards it will find a wider audience. Beyond the Mat is a perfect example of that, or even Wrestling with Shadows which was shown on cable tv (AMC? I can't remember, but I taped it off tv) many times. I have no idea if it's good enough to go beyond the hardcore wrestling fan audience, but I assume they'll at least try

Bookers aren't always picked based on thinking they'll draw the most money though. Maybe they should be, but I don't think that's the case. Why was Stephanie McMahon given the head writer position? Why has she kept the job so long? Boss' daughter. Why did Vince Russo get a million chances in TNA despite never proving he could draw money for them in any capacity? Jarrett's friend and had the wool pulled over Dixies eyes. Why did Cary Silkin hire Gabe Sapolsky for his super indy vanity promotion? Because he was a mark for the fact he'd been Paul Heyman's assistant. I don't even think the original goal of ROH was to draw money, it was to put on cool shows, and weren't they bleeding so much money over the years that Silkin finally got rid of Gabe out of desperation?

Is Thriller the greatest album of all-time? It's sold the most records Money generated is a shallow way of thinking about art, and wrestling is absolutely art Who is the the most profitable booker is definitely not the same thing as who is the greatest. One is objectively based on data, the other is subjective and speculative. If your personal critera for greatest is money drawn that's fine, but not everyone will look at things that way

*edit wrong thread

As a casual MMA fan, what was the context of the word "boy" between Chael and and Jones? I doubt that Sonnen has a racist bone in his body, and everything I saw with them looked like a half lame work. I mean really. This is stupid. Maybe they tried to press a couple buttons for a fight that had little heat, but who cares? Nobody went to or bought that fight to see the white beat the black If we want to question racisms in UFC wait til we see a real aryan step up to challenge a black champ. GSP would become the hero of the Aryan Nation if he challenged Silvan. It would be insane. Probably half why he doesn't want to do it

Is that bad because he had a heart attack or because he insinuated he punched out a woman? Or did a young Paul E. Dangerously break his heart?

Konnan would have been a good signing at one point. He proved he could get over to the US audience in WCW and would have fit right in during the attitude era. He would have worked later than that brought in to do stuff with Rey and Eddie. Work with a lower card male in a special attraction gimmick program (I'd think a Chris Candido/Jamie Noble type who's small and can work and do comedy would be good in that spot)? Build up a Gail Kim type "barbie doll" type opponent, since that got over more than almost anything TNA has done? Bring back Trish Stratus for a Legend v. Monster WM program? I thought of those 3 things in less than 10 seconds. It's not hard to think of angles that would have worked with Kong. Would WWE have done those things and done them well? Probably not, but that doesn't make Kong a bad signing, it means their creative vision is the pits

I also think losing their network TV spot for SD really killed whatever access they had to the Latino American market, a demo that was already in decline, so there probably isn't the same sense of urgency to exploit that potential audience. Del Rio's face push comes off like a halfhearted and halfassed attempt because someone decided without Rey and Cara around they needed to have a latino face

Kharma got over instantly, I don't see how anyone can argue signing her was a bad idea. Cara's work within the confines of the WWE style was starting to improve IMO during his time teaming with Mysterio, but the guy just can't seem to stay healthy. There's nothing inherently bad or wrong about WWE signing one of the biggest stars/draws in Mexico, a market they did very well in at times over the past decade. Haven't seen recent #'s but I know for a time they had the highest rated wrestling in the country as well as drawing big houses on their annual tour. I get the sense that business there has declined quite a bit with the devaluation of the peso, drug violence, AAA/CMLL improving, as well as Mysterio slowing down. The struggles Cara would eventually have were predicted by practically everyone before he started on tv, and he compounded them with attitude/stubborness, but that doesn't mean it wasn't worth taking a shot with him. He did get over, and he did sell masks, but with injuries/wellness he's never been able to build momentum. What surprises me is that they don't seem to be looking at more Mexican wrestlers, guys who are bigger, work a style more conducive to WWE, are willing to learn or already speak English etc. etc. With AAA looking to break into the US market you'd think they'd try and poach a few key guys just to hurt them

I just want to note that in that discussion of racism in the UFC fanbase Meltzer did note that the skinhead/biker set is there to some degree, just that he doesn't see it at the shows he goes to and that it's not to the degree that you can paint the UFC fanbase with a racist brush. The whole thing was in response to some articles or comments he saw that suggested inherent racism exists against Jon Jones and that's why he isn't loved by the fanbase, which is completely absurd. He did go completely off the rails when discussing the topic, but his central point was fine.

I like Dave's "voice" as a writer. Sure, he could use an editor to clean up typos and messy paragraphs from time to time, but the occasional sloppiness is part of his charm IMO. It's not like he's incapable of writing a "professional" article or story, there's tons of great bios and history articles he's written that show that, but with the sheer amount of content he produces I don't think he really has the time to sit down and rewrite most of his work several times before he puts it out. If he was working for something like Sports Illustrated where he was only committed to one or two articles a month, or a brief page space every week, I'm sure he'd meet the established journalistic standards. I take his WON writing as stream of consciousness for the most part, and I enjoy reading it.

Austin was a scholarship college football player at D1 North Texas. After college he was doing some sort of manual labor job (can't remember exactly what) and would go to matches at the Sportatorium with his friends. Somebody spotted him there and suggested he try wrestling. He wasn't exactly a lifelong fan who dreamed of being a wrestler, he fell into it the way a lot of guys did in the 70's/80's.

Foley seems like a prime candidate for DDP yoga

The simple solution to this is farming out trainees. They sign an ex-wrestler/football player/powerlifter they view as a blue chip prospect, train him in Florida for a year or so, then send him to work in Japan or Mexico or around the indy circuit. Bring him back to FCW to polish him up for TV, then promote him. It's basically what they're doing now by scouring the indies for talent, but it gives them the added advantage of picking and choosing talent from the very beginning. Of course it would require working relationships with promotions in Japan, Mexico and the indies, which is something they used to do and I never understood why they got away from it. I've read that one reason why Japanese promotions were bringing in less foreigners than they used to is with the business down over there they couldn't afford to. Why wouldn't a second tier Japanese promotion like NOAH or DDT jump at the opportunity to have guys that WWE is paying for come over and work for them? And quid pro quo have some of their young guys come over and get experience in the states? WWE certainly has the resources and connections to make something like this work. I remember several years ago they had the plan to open worldwide developmental offices. One in Canada, on the UK, one in Europe, one in Mexico etc. I think they gave up on it when they realized just how much work logistically and how much investment it would take to get it off the ground, but to me it seems like a worthwhile investment for the longterm health of the company and the business. And I've always thought they needed a network of regional indy promotions serving as developmental stations, like they had for a brief time in the early 00's. As far as MMA draining from the talent pool, I'm sure it does. But, I also don't think every young amateur wrestler necessarily wants to fight for a living when the odds of making big money in UFC are very slim. A lot of well established names in UFC live fight to fight and hustle for sponsorships just to pay for the expenses of living the life of a professional fighter. Guys fight hurt because they can't afford not to. Training camps are expensive. If WWE was more aggressive in recruiting by selling the potential upside of being a WWE superstar vs. an MMA fighter they might poach more guys who otherwise would enter MMA.

I grew up in Mass, which was obviously WWF territory. We had cable from about 87 on, but didn't even get TBS until some time in the mid 90's when whatever the local cable company was was bought out by Adelphia. We did get USA, and oddly enough TNT starting in the early 90's, but not TBS until probably 95/96. I've always found that really strange. We never got WGN either, and those were two of the big "superstations" of the day. WWF programming was all I had access to until I think 93 when the local NBC affiliate started carrying Worldwide. It aired at 1 or 1:30 AM on Friday Nights after Wrestling Challenge. I never saw Worldwide pre-Disney tapings so it was sometime after that. I was able to watch older NWA/WCW PPV tapes starting in maybe 92/93 when I found a video store that had almost the entire back catalogue, as well as being familiar with the wrestlers/storylines from Apter mags. I caught the odd bit of WCW programming in 91-92 when visiting my grandparents too.

I'd say Rock is really stretching the definition of Canadian. His father was Canadian but he was born in the US and grew up predominately in the US Jericho at least grew up in Canada (was only born in NY because it was hockey season and his dad played for the Rangers), got his start in the business in Canada, and self identifies as a Canadian. I think he counts.

http://wrestlingclassics.com/.ubb/ultimate...ic;f=1;t=101446 I saw that show exactly one time, in I think 1994, when I was spending a few weeks during the summer with relatives in Rhode Island. They had one of those old antenna TVs that would pull in about 5 channels, maybe a couple more if you were persistent enough or depending on the weather/time of day, and this WWF show I'd never seen before popped up on a local UHF on a Saturday afternoon. I only caught the last 15 minutes or so which mostly consisted of local promos for upcoming house shows, and I never saw it air anywhere else again. Even then I got the sense that it was the lowest rung of local WWF tv. I assume it mostly just aired on small north east/new england stations to promote house shows.

Are you sure about that? It was Shawn "losing his smile" that necessitated the Final Four match being for the title in the first place. It was originally going to be for the Mania title shot coming off the disputed Rumble finish. My understanding is that Shawn was to hold the belt into Mania, Bret would win the 4 way, and Shawn would drop the belt to Bret. When Shawn walked out or faked a knee injury or was legit injured depending what you want to believe, that's when they went in the direction they did. I was always curious what they would have done with Austin at WM if he wasn't working Bret. My guess is he would have done something with Pillman who was due to return around that time, though it probably would have been a backstage brawl rather than a proper match.

Yes. I heard that. He must have been a troubled soul. I do find it strange that Dave had a tongue-in-cheek way of saying that Reid had no business being in the wrestling business, but he sort of went back to a kneejerk Flair apologia by saying it's the only thing Ric knows; but I found Dave's assertion to be a little odd in that, as counterintuitive as it seems, I'd imagine that Reid, in his struggles against heroin, would have a safe haven in the wrestling business given that heroin is one of the those few drugs that doesn't seem to be abused. Heroin may not be the drug of choice in the wrestling business, but if you're already into that before you even get started in wrestling it would be a super easy habit to pick back up. Heroin is the strongest painkiller.

ok, let me go watch hundreds of hours of wrestling and scour the internet for statistics to back up Sting's WON HOF case brb

I've done it before, I don't care enough to do it again. I'm not Dylan Waco who spends hours wasting time analyzing shit that nobody cares about