sek69

Also I love that Otis is literally a giant ball of charisma. He's amazing.

To be fair, Gulak presented the only way WWE would know how to present him on the main roster would be assured death. Hopefully Bryan can extend his cloak of protection long enough to show management there's ways to feature someone like that.

Lacey Evans going from "40s Pinup Girl" to "Sexy Circus Ringmaster" is certainly an interesting change in looks.

I mean, most of the last few years of New Japan were Okada doing just that, but YMMV I suppose. Okada vs Basically Anyone Not Tanahashi resulted in better matches than the opponent normally would have with anyone else. That was pretty much the theme of last year's G1, "Can Okada get the best match possible out of this guy?" IIRC.

Yeah at this point it seems Bryan might be the best IRL promo ever, since he's able to talk Vince into letting him do whatever he wants to.

I think it's partly due to Misawa being an intensely private guy and Okada living in the world of 24/7 social media. I love Okada and think that if you put a gun to my head I would have to say he's probably the better wrestler, but the Four Pillars era was my intro to Japanese wrestling. To this day I still get goosebumps hearing the crowd chanting MI-SA-WA while Spartan X plays, something that doesn't really happen with anything else of that era or since. But I have to be honest, I think Okada is the better of the two bell to bell. Obviously Misawa was involved in some of the greatest matches of all time, but Okada has that innate ability to have the best match most of his opponents have ever had.

I just love that Bryan is seemingly hell bent on getting Vince to care about folks he clearly would have no interest in.

I would agree with this, but the one notable exception would be Baba famously making the call to have Misawa go over Jumbo based on how the crowd was reacting at the show as opposed to Gedo dragging Naito's big moment (at least) one year too far before pulling the trigger.

It is. I get the feeling the plan was to move the Big 4 shows off the network and get people to pay more though. I could see people shelling $60 or more for Mania, this show not so much.

Yeah I just assumed as a shitlord who (presumably) hangs out with other shitlords it was just a case of shitlord demographics overlapping.

I'm always reminded of the time they did a skit backstage in WWE years ago, someone (I forget who) was looking for the Undertaker and was asking Kane if he could get in touch with him. Kane said no, since Taker's not exactly the type of guy who uses a cell phone. Everything I've ever read or heard about Mark Calloway IRL makes me believe that's true in reality as well.

It doesn't help that they gave Isaiah Scott's intro video a font that looks like the 90s jizzed all over the place.

The wrestling wasn't much to be sure, but the way they were planting the seeds for future programs was pretty solid. I know we're all trained to not expect wrestling companies to follow up on....well.....anything, but you can already see how the next few months will be shaping up.

Man this whole show was so Mid South I'd swear Bill Watts was booking, right down to Jake Roberts showing up and JR talking about someone's football background.

MJF is money.

I'd be satisfied if all it was is PAC and Pentago making crazy faces. Also this is the typical "show after a blowoff event" you used to get back in the day where they start up all the new feuds for the next cycle.

Guess Jake is bringing in Lance Archer.

People are getting too silly over Cody's neck tattoo. Yes, it's unfortunate for sure, but people are making too big a deal over it.

Am I crazy for thinking the inevitable Chris Jericho babyface run might be even better than the heel one? He's doing everything he can to keep the crowd from turning him as it is.

Mox also getting his money's worth after all those years of not being able to say the word belt too.

If I would have known you were going, I'd have created a "Johnny Sorrow run in" betting pool, lol.

Honestly, the bigger factor was probably Stacy Keibler being on Dancing With the Stars. She was getting the full "look we got one of our folks on a show with mainstream stars!" megapush until the celebrities there smartened her up to what it's like being a star outside of WWE, with actual benefits and standards and whatnot. As soon as that happened it became clear she wasn't going to go back to wrestling and all promotion came to a screeching halt. Ever since then, WWE has taken great pains to make sure they personally curate all exposure of their talent to the mainstream so they don't get to full of themselves.

I would expect Archer to make a big splash for his debut, immediately attacking the champ would seem to be a good way to do it.

I 100% believe if Brock hadn't have gone to UFC and won the title, he would have been on Vince's shit list to this day. He's come closest of anyone in terms of getting a court to call bullshit on WWE's ridiculous contract terms (they tried to keep him from wrestling anywhere in the world when he left WWE to play football). Had he not gone to UFC and activated Vince's "real sports cred" boner, the narrative would probably be he was a spoiled baby who couldn't hack it in WWE.

Am I missing something about Nick Gage? Wrestling Twitter constantly marks out for the guy but all I see is someone answering the question "what if New Jack was a white dude?"