flyonthewall2983

Then following it up with that great match with Shawn a month later. I'm sure there are equal examples to him in terms of guys going out strong, but I can't think of any offhand. 96 was definitely a solid year for Taker, overall. The next night on Raw they started the feud with Mankind, which helped the company out of those dreadful mid-90's doldrums, and really revitalized the character.

What happened to his WCW run in 92? I vividly remember seeing him and The Barbarian behind Cactus Jack cutting a promo (with emphasis on Reed being Ron Simmons' former tag team partner) followed by a real barnburner of a tag match with them against Dustin Rhodes and Barry Windham. Then, nothing.

He would be the poster boy, certainly. I watched the match with Luger from 88 in Baltimore, and while I think Luger was good Flair made him better. That's a pretty commonly held belief, but it shows not just his unselfishness but his application of craft because he almost never looked foolish putting guys over either.

For 20 million a year I wouldn't think transferring everything would be so hard. What I'm worried about is how the interface will be affected. Currently on the Network you can skip over matches, or scenes in documentaries. The only other platform I've seen have this is Prime Video, which you can do this with their originals. Peacock doesn't have this.

Comcast has had a streaming box for awhile now, Flex, which is free if you have a subscription. Included in that is Peacock Premium, a 9.99 value free of charge itself. It essentially means (if you're a Comcast subscriber) you can get the Network for free.

Will the Peacock deal screw this up in that maybe NBC tries to buy this for their platform?

I want to say someone mentioned Undertaker being undefeated (he might have even said it in a promo) at WM in the build-up to 13, but nobody used the word "streak". This showed more promise into what a long-term feud between these two could have been. For much of the fall of '91 to the build-up to WM, Undertaker was in both the Jake/Randy angle and in the Hogan/Flair one too. It was kind of one big angle that involved lots of other workers in supporting roles (like Sid until he got hurt and Jim Duggan), but with the world title picture being somewhat separate. Whittling it down by this time and turning Taker face was the right thing to do. Hogan was about to leave and while Taker didn't fill that spot they probably did this as much to maybe groom him for such a position later. This segment is great. People were cheering him for months, and this is in a sense cathartic to see him turn against one of their hottest heels but it also amped the heat up when Jake attacks him, but stalks after him with the casket locked to his hand.

They actually teased this before WM when he came out during a contract-signing segment between Warrior and Savage

I kind of understand his point of view as far as self-preservation, and keeping the heat on for his own character. "My lunchboxes gotta sell too" is a quote from one of his last shoot interviews that really sticks with me. Hogan should absolutely not have dropped the belt for any length of time during those four years, but that doesn't mean everyone had to drop like flies around him either. At least the guys he could maintain a good pace with. The monsters like Bundy and Kamala had to eat those pins eventually, but I wouldn't say quite the same of someone like Piper, Savage and Orndorff (at least until his injuries caught up with him). The audience turned Piper babyface, Savage moved on to programs with guys like Santana and Steamboat, without either of them being absolutely jobbed to Hogan (Savage doing at WM 5 not withstanding).

Bret Hart, and if we're talking behind the scenes he might be a case where that was detrimental to him and more specifically other guys on the card because he was willing to take a hit in his paycheck to be the champ. Bob Backlund maybe? I don't know enough of the minutiae of that timeframe, but I can't imagine that he had an ego problem about being outshone on the card by other matches and angles. I watched that Pat Patterson doc the other day and he's in it, proudly saying their matches together was the first time MSG was sold out four times in a row for the same match, and that doesn't happen because Bob got his hand raised at the end. I don't think Hogan should have lost at all in that first reign. The company needed to establish themselves, and having one guy on top during that time was necessary to keep the faith during that time they were taking over the country. Besides that they needed a guy who was in lock-step with Vince about going into people's territories. Piper had a real problem with that.

The horror stories of those overseas trips, never cease to amaze me. While everything else from The Plane Ride From Hell is pretty disgusting, I have to say I was really sad to read about Curt Hennig. Here's a guy who had so much talent, not just as a worker but as someone who co-opted himself into "sports entertainment". It's almost understandable that he was not willing to pass the torch to some degree, and maybe the company could have done a better job valuing his talent while pushing him towards being a mentor to Brock.

It's just on Davey Boy Smith

The first episode of Icons, on Yokozuna, is pretty good. Production-wise it's very good and it's clear they are modeling it a bit more on the Andre HBO doc. No voice-over guy, with some brief external information just shown as text, and not so crazy on the editing either. I don't know what the scheduling is on these but I hope Luger's episode is next as there really isn't any other episode I'm excited for. It's clear they are trying to counter what Dark Side of the Ring is doing to some degree, but I can see this being a really good program in the future for them.

Ric talked about another Charter flight in his first shoot interview that I really want to know more about, where they were experiencing extreme turbulence and landed in Russia with everyone stuck inside before having to lift off again.

I'm sure that played a role too, with a bit of grandstanding by having shows in the three biggest cities in America (well, technically two). The worst thing about the Valentine/Earthquake match from VII is that they cut down on time so they could interview some dude in a suit with silly hair.

I liked it, but I feel like they skimped out on fleshing his story out a bit more. I take it this has a lot from the doc about him before, Accepted?

The first two stand best as curios of where the company was in terms of transitioning from a regional company to a national one. A lot of trial and error, especially with the 2nd one, as how to really pull a big show off. Hulkamania running wild in NYC with Cyndi Lauper and the Rock & Wrestling era was the birth of the vision. WrestleMania 3 is the realization of it, and also the beginning of Vince wanting to make the company bigger than any one star. The booking of WrestleMania 1 is a bit odd to me in that they didn't have more blow-offs, specifically Santana/Valentine which was a hot feud. I get that they teased it quite a bit in both of their matches, but it's disappointing that one had to open the show and the other had to work the Junkyard Dog in light of the classics they had in that arena. 2 is a bit of a hard watch, mostly for the guest commentators. They rectified this by having Bob Uecker yuck it up during two matches at 3 and 4. And while it comes across okay on video, it's my understanding the live feed was a bit of a clusterfuck, not having mastered the satellite hookup. I can imagine Vince watching Live Aid thinking he could do the same thing but across 3 cities, his ego not anticipating the problems even that show had putting it all together. About the only match with rewatchable quality is the battle royal, something I doubt they could ever pull off again.

Tito Santana beat him in Spain too

Interesting parallel to their 1987 and 1992 matches, with Davey Boy still in the Bulldogs in 87 and Dibiase already tag team champ with IRS in 92.

Did Ted Dibiase and Davey Boy Smith ever have a singles match during DBS' singles run from 90 to 92? Feels like a natural fit for house shows, or maybe the odd Prime Time taping.

https://variety.com/2021/digital/news/wwe-network-peacock-exclusively-streaming-1234890954/

I thought Bruno Sammartino would have outlived him

The way Vader put it, that's kind of what happened. I can't help but feel that whole situation would have been avoided if Harley Race was still in WCW. He could have been effective in calming down both guys before things ended up the way they did.