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There must be a HOF thread buried somewhere on these boards that can be used. I found the Linda Thread... so someon else can dig for the HOF one. John

Our threshold of "great!" and "quality" and "non-dud" is pretty low. Kobashi-Bossman didn't make the 1993 set: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o57rfqqWUIE Dave gave it **. "Average" match, and he really crapped on Bossman: I just sat here watching it at work. Struck me as a watchable match. I looked up Dave's review *after* watching it, though recalled Dave thought it was a ** range match. I'm not as down on Bossman's performance as Dave was, and frankly think that Bossman has some cool shit down the stretch (forgot about the power bomb). Would that be a Raw/SD! non-dud? Quality, especially if one were a Kobashi or Bossman fan? We don't have to put over Rey by saying he's The Best on The Best TV Show of All-Time of The Best Period Of Wrestling TV of All-Time with the Least Crap of All-Time with More Great of All-Time Ever~! Pimping Kobashi's 1993 as the best year of TV that I've ever seen out of a wrestler doesn't need me to say: "Kobashi has a great match Bossman against too." It's a watchable match. I have a soft spot for Bossman, especially when he gets out of 100% of his safest formula and gives me a few "Hey, that's nifty" moments. So maybe that maks me biased and I find it more watchable than others. Of course there's the Taue-Bossman match from an earlier series that I would love to know what Taue Fans think about it. John

Rey Misterio Jr. I think there's another one as well, since I seem to recall one of the old cranky wrestlers who posted to Classics saying something similar. John

What a stupid thing to say. Just for reference, in case it wasn't clear: That was a (paraphrased) statement by some crank on WrestlingClassics more than a half decade ago. He wasn't without supporters who thought the say thing. So please credit it to WC cranks. I like Rey. Suspect I saw and liked him before all but one or two posters on this board, and certainly have defended him against cranks over the past two decades. John

Yeah... you kind of wish Bob had written a full book on his time there. John

"He's just a flippy floppy guy." -WrestlingClassics John

His reasons for doing them were a bit odd: Anyway, this is an interesting interview of Bob: http://nymag.com/daily/entertainment/2011/06/bob_mould.html John

Their problem is that Linda's name recognition is Negative. The last polls I saw had her doing much worse agaisnt the two likely nominees compared to several not-so-well known GOP candidates. The only way to change the negatives is to rebuild it. How? You got it, more cash. And no doubt she's going to be surrounded by a team of campaign opperatives who will be more than happy to soak her dry because it's big business. It's going to be too tempting not to drop a lot of cash. Simply getting back into the campaign a year later gives a clear indication of how badly she wants it. John

I'm not so sure. She spent around $30M to win the nomination, which flooded the state with name recogniton. She spend around another $20M after that, which was just Aug 10 - Nov 2. She blew threw it. Her opponent probably will fund raise if he stay in through the end. Simmons only spent $3,061,644. Then come the general, she's going to be buying media in a feeding frenzy. Blumenthal spent $8.7M, and since he won the nomination in a cake walk, most of that was in the General. Her opponent will likely spend more than that. Also, the DNC and DSCC will support this as one key seat they want to hold, funding it until the polls make clear that McMahon is too far back. Then we'll have Obama and the GOP Nominee buying left and right, along with every Citizens United astroturf entity coming out of the woodworks. It's going to be an expensive campaign. I wouldn't be surprised if she drops another $40M+. Though that might shrink if the Citizens money floods in epic levels. John

It would be interesting to see how Bruno was used to build / consolidate the WWWF mega territory. In other words, what it was before Bruno came along, how it as doing, and how it got firmed up. They were extremely succesful in MSG before Bruno, both with Buddy and Rocca before him. Washington had been a stronghold for years before Bruno. Philly? Rogers defenses that Hisa has listed: http://www.wrestling-titles.com/nwa/world/...atches1962.html 02/17 Philadelphia, PA Bearcat Wright 03/17 Philadelphia, PA (eve) Miguel Perez 05/19 Philadelphia, PA (eve) Edouard Carpentier 06/16 Philadelphia, PA Shohei Baba 09/14 Philadelphia, PA Edouard Carpentier 10/13 Philadelphia, PA Hans Schmidt That looks pretty firm like it's part of what would become the WWWF. There were far fewer defenses listed in 1961 for O'Connor and Rogers, whereas Buddy became a regular in 1962 on into 1963: 01/12 Philadelphia, PA Bobo Brazil 01/19 Philadelphia, PA Bobo Brazil Then Lou didn't defend the NWA Title there the whole of 1963. Boston, on the other hand, was it's own territory when the WWWF launched: http://www.legacyofwrestling.com/BostonTerritory.html Looks like it was a while before it became WWWF territory, and even then not very Bruno-centric until 1967. Bruno probably warrants a fair amount of credit for firming that up as a long term WWWF city. Pitt was similar to Philly: 07/07/61 Pittsburgh, PA Antonino Rocca 08/04/61 Pittsburgh, PA Reggie Lisowski 09/08/61 Pittsburgh, PA Reggie Lisowski 10/17/61 Pittsburgh, PA Johnny Valentine 11/06/61 Pittsburgh, PA Reggie Lisowski 02/05/62 Pittsburgh, PA Johnny Valentine 03/05/62 Pittsburgh, PA Reggie Lisowski 04/02/62 Pittsburgh, PA Bruno Sammartino 05/07/62 Pittsburgh, PA Art Thomas 07/02/62 Pittsburgh, PA Reggie Lisowski 08/10/62 Pittsburgh, PA Bobo Brazil 10/15/62 Pittsburgh, PA Edouard Carpentier 11/05/62 Pittsburgh, PA Bruno Sammartino O'Connor defenses in Pitt are pretty sparse. Of course Buddy's career is much more documented via record books than Pat's has been. Bruno deserves a lot of credit for being an anchor for a helluva long time, strong enough that he had that second run that did terrific business and didn't really have an end in sight if he wanted to hang on for several more years. Super impressive. But it does look like some of the other key cities were similar to MSG: they were getting a work out before Bruno got on top. Don't know if anyone has ever documented well the attendence in those cities. Anyway... I kind of go back to some of the points we bounced around in the Expansion Thread, and previously at WC. Expanding into the Mid West, taking what had been mediocre attempts to expand to the West the year before and lighting a fire under them, pretty much gobbling up the entire middle of the country other than Texas, and over time taking Florida... that's just epic huge stuff. People have often time tossed out alternative scenarios where someone other than Hogan could have anchored Vince's expansion, but I think most people who are totally objective about it probably reach the conclusion that there really wasn't anyone who could have matched and sustained things like Hogan. I probably would put Bruno #2 for longevity over Austin. The probably for Austin is the way the comment was originally phrased: World Title Reigns. It's not like Austin had one definative title reign during his hottest stretch. John

Time to fire this puppy up again: McMahon 'leaning strongly' toward Conn. Senate bid This has got to freak out Christopher Shays, who was hoping for a fairly easy to the nomination unless he got teapartied. Linda's cash is a problem. On the other hand, Linda's negatives are pretty high... though they weren't massive among GOPers. This also must make Chris Murphy and Susan Bysiewicz giddy. They will likely poll much better against Linda than against Shays. John

I think we've all seen regular plenty of hardcore Raw viewers bag on the angle at different stages. How much have Dave and Bryan liked it, post-MITB? While they might not be WWE Blind Luv folks, they both generally like Punk a good deal, and sure as heck like a lot more of the WWE than say Loss. There've been a lot of snowflakes handed out, including those five big ones right in the middle of this storyline. There's a desire to lump everyone who is critical of the angle into the WWE Hater column. Dave's been critical left and right, and while the WWE certainly annoys him regularly, calling him a WWE Hater is akin to calling Obama a liberal progressive. Those of us who are liberal progressives kind of laugh at that. I actually think if we looked close at those who liked the angle and have been very light on the criticism, the highest % would be Punk Fans. We have one clear WWE Fan on tOA. He's been hopeful all along, and clearly like Punk. But after each Raw he's not so happy with what they're doing. Then he gets a bit hopeful, then not so happy. I think there are more of those than you're admitting. I think even in this thread, the fans who LOVED!!!! it at the begining aren't as LOVE!!! over time. Will indicated he's still enjoying it / it's making him watch, but I think we've all seen Will write about matches/stuff that he LOVES... and over the last 2-3 weeks it ain't in this thread. John

I know it's not Dylan's goal, but the "you're not the intended audience" comes across as half of another changing the goal post and half exemption of criticism of the angle from people who aren't WWE Luv folks. The analogy would be that we couldn't be critical of the WWF in the 80s if we didn't watch it as much as the NWA. Well... there was a reason we didn't watch it as much: all those things we were critical of. I'd grant that WWF Blinders was a problem for a lot of us: too many failed to see how effective Hogan was as an anchor, or more accurately were jealous as all hell over Hogan's effectiveness in draw relative to Our Hero Ric. But that doesn't mean that it barred one from being critical, or more importantly that one's criticism couldn't be valid. Pushing the analogy further, I suspect that if we had a developed net like we have now, plenty of non-WWF fans would have been critical of Warrior. The "he sucks!" or "Anaolic Warrior" stuff would be of little use, but I suspect we would have had some pretty solid analysis/comment/discussions about him being chose to be Hogan's Heir and whether he'd do well in that role. I'm willing to be that some non-WWF fans would hit it out of the park, regardless of WWF Fans tossing "you're not even a target fan of the WWF" at them. There is value on both sides of the forest issue: being one of the trees, and being someone outside it. Both have some blinders, and both have positives. There certainly were plenty of WCW Fans who rode that boat right on down to the bottom of the ocean, more than watch TNA and frankly more than watch some current "hit" cable TV shows. Positives... blinders... or somewhere in between? John

Mike took the hit for Orton. John

My recollection back in the day is that some members of Creative contribute via Conference Call, which is a hell of a lot easier to do now with various forms of video conferencing. You're also mixing up Writers and Other Members Of Creative. I doubt Nash would ever want to literally *write*. He's a Big Picture Guy. I doubt Big Kev would turn down a long term gig in a creative role with the company. Nash being Nash, he's naturally set it up to do as little work as possible. While of course keeping himself close to Trip and letting trip hear what he wants to hear. John

I'm not sure if people are getting this: Nash just wrestling >>>>> Nash on Creative And that's while admitting that Nash just wrestling would be horrible. The thing is, Nash would bomb out just wrestling, as he did the last time around in the WWE. Sitting around on Creative for the next five years while Creative transitions from Vince Yes Men to Trip Yes Men... what was it that Vince said about the nWo? "I'm going to INJECT the WWF with a lethal dose of POISON." John

I look forward to Nash being added to Creative. The only think better than the Punk Angle being used to get over Trip is for it to be used to get over Trip & Friends. John

I was wondering if there is a standard operating procedure when a belt is vacated/stripped under Vince. WWWF/WWF/WWE Title 02/12/88 Andre vacates: 03/27/88 PPV tourney 12/04/91 Hogan stripped: 01/19/92 PPV Royal Rumble 02/13/97 Shawn smile: 02/16/97 PPV Final Four 09/27/98 Austin held up: 11/15/98 PPV Tourney 09/20/00 Vince vacated: 09/26/00 PPV Six Pack Challenge 10/02/07 Cena injury: 10/07/07 PPV Vince gives Orton title (essentially a forfiet) 06/09/09 Batista injury: 06/15/09 Raw four-way World Title 12/06/04 Hunter held up: 01/09/05 PPV Elimination Chamber 01/10/06 Batista injury: 01/10/06 SmackDown! Battle Royal 07/17/07 Edge injury: 07/17/07 SmackDown! Battle Royal 04/29/08 Taker stripped: 06/01/08 PPV Taker-Edge decision bout 09/07/08 Punk "injured": 09/07/08 PPV scramble match 02/15/11 Edge stripped: 02/15/11 Vickie gives Ziggler belt 04/12/11 Edge injury: 05/01/11 PPV decision bout For the most part, the SOP is to fix the vacating on the next PPV. The Edge stripped thing earlier this year really wasn't much of a vacating as it was resolved by the end of the same show: Edge won it back over Ziggler. Knocking that one out, they *have* done three quickies fixes on TV. Interesting they were after Batista and Edge injuries. So Punk's quicky fixing wasn't unique, though they tended to be exceptions rather than rules. The most recent vacating should be something we probably all remember: this year after Edge's career ending injury. That was dealt with in a common way of a new champ being crowned on the next PPV. John

For what happened on Raw that night "to have made logic", there would have needed to be some advanced seeds. Instead, Vince (and Creative) pulled the tourney out of their asses. And Trip dumping Vince later in the show. John

Yeah, Pop Idol / American Idol is Fuller's baby, now Cowell's. And it was lifted from Popstars: not just the original Aussie one, but the one that washed up in the UK 10 months before Pop Idol. Cowell has built up a great mythology about himself, pretty good for a guy who a marginal figure in the music business before getting lucky with Pop Idol and American Idol, then was smart enough to: * jump over to his own promotion (X Factor) * settle out with Fuller for lifting Pop Idol * play nice with Fuller in the US Cash Cow (American Idol) My guess is that the last two are related: as part of the Pop Idol / X Factor settlement, Cowell got locked into an AI contract. I do recall that the terms of the AI contract kept him from dragging X Factor over here. Don't know if Fuller also gets a cut of the UK X Factor, and in turn gets a piece of the US X Factor. Either way, Cowell was pretty smart in taking something very small (asshole judge) and cashing in on it with loads of salary, "creating" his own show, and working a great con on getting the winners onto his own management / label. Suspect that's more of what he learned from pro wrestling. John

Yes, or he loses the title via forfeit. Which realistically is how this should have ended. I'm sorry... on MITB (or before) it was announced that whoever came out of MITB back as champ, that champ would defend the following night on Raw? And that if Punk won it, and he didn't show up, he would be vacating the title? I must have missed that. John

What did he think would happen if he left with the belt and did not defend it? Leaving the promotion equals vacating the title. Who said he wouldn't defend it? It sure sounded like Punk planned on taking the belt and defending it in a Bingo Hall or some such other place. On Sunday, had it been announced that the WWE Champ was schedule to defend on Raw the next night and if he didn't show up he would be vacating the title? It's the governing body / boss who steps in and says, "Hey... you're not the champ because you left. We're stripping you of it, and holding a tourney to create a new champ." Except it did. Punk left the promotion with the championship. Promotion needs championship, so they scheduled a tourney. Makes perfect sense. It would of made less sense to go on TV and advertise that the WWE champion left with the belt. So then why is Summer Slam Champion vs Champion for the Undisputed Title? You're basically saying that the title isn't disputed: Punk vacated it, Cena is the champ, Punk isn't the/a champ, and Cena will be defending against challenger Punk at SummerSlam. I'm not sure that too many people see it like that. John

I tend to blame all of the WWE's creative problems on Vince, Steph and Trip. John

The belt in the fridge was Punk's way of frigging the WWE. John