sek69

In short, yes. To expand, 3 months is not nearly enough for the injuries he had to heal, he shouldn't be working any schedule no matter how light, and (if Meltzer was right about his non-compete going to Feb 2007) gave up a shit load of money to risk his life for TNA.

So I'm watching the MSG 11/30/91 show on WWE 24/7, and it's during the time that Flair was doing the Real World's Champion bit. They already gave the big gold belt back at this point so they were doing the "video distortion" thing since Jack Tunney ordered Flair to stop carrying his belt. Well for the airing on 24/7, they tried to black it out rather than do the pixelation thing, and they pretty much missed it entirely. You can clearly see it's a WWF tag belt that was perhaps modified a little so the fans at the arena wouldn't completely see through it. It's funny, when it comes to blurring logos, they'll find someone sitting near the roof holding a WWF sign and blur it, yet they did a pretty half ass job here.

I'm sure they'll get trounced, but I'd love to see Monday Night War 2.0.

Somewhere in the DVDVR thread (among all the people who usually bash TNA claming they'll never watch again) someone made a comment that TNA is going head to head with RAW and that was the real announcement. Anyone able to verify that?

That's kinda sad in a way. I guess once you start looking at things a certain way it's hard to go back, but it's funny that most of us used to sit in front of the TV with our bowls of Captain Crunch eagerly awaiting another hour of jobber matches on WWF TV but now we go into a major match on PPV with a blah feeling. Maybe I've been watching too much old stuff lately (the upside of being home sick for two days is that I end up with a lot of time to watch wrestling), but I really miss being able to look forward to a show without automatically assuming the whole thing is going to be terrible. I also don't want to become one of those guys who thinks everything current sucks and the only good wrestling was 20 years ago in tiny TV studios. That's why I was bummed over Boogeyman getting released. Yeah he sucked as a wrestler, but the character was entertaining. Marty Wright went into the role with gusto. Boogeyman never had a promo that sounded like he was reading off cue cards, or like a kid having to recite a book report from memory.

Kinda sucks, I liked the gimmick. Guess he wasn't going to be able to rehab his injuries fast enough. I like how WWE.com always makes sure to give someone's real name when announcing their release, as if it's their equivalent of tearing someone's rank patches off their sleeve.

I watched this match the other day, and I found myself into it more than anything WWE has done for a while. I realized it was because there was a lot of little things you don't see much in WWE anymore. For example: Shane McMahon's performance was so old school it was great. It was if someone gave him a comp of Tully Blanchard matches so he could perfect the "smug rich guy taking an assbeating" role. Shane gets a lot of flak for being what some people call the world's richest backyard wrestler, but he brings the goods more than just some idiot falling off stuff. He actually got a face pop for putting HHH in the Torture Rack, as if the crowd just all realized at the same moment "Holy shit, the guy who does the goofy dances just put a guy bigger than him across his shoulders". Plus he wore a white jersey in a match where blading was involved. I'm sure a certain someone who was also in the match probably hipped him to it, but it always makes the visual aspect look that much more violent. Vince McMahon being put into the Big Show's ass, while fulfilling the current WWE requirement of homoeroticism and naked man ass, was also the classic "heel gets his comeuppance" that is often missing in today's feuds. JR, to use an analogy he'd appricate, is like a former Super Bowl winning QB who's past his prime but every so often shows flashes of what made him great. His outburst of "JESUS CHRIST!" when HHH broke the sledgehammer across Vince's back was just the seemingly spontaneous outburst that's usually not there in the heavily scripted WWE universe. So while it wasn't the "Match of The Year" or a technical wrestling masterpiece, it was a nice little bit of old school goodness from a company that hates anything remotely old school.

I seem to recall High Voltage getting a push on WCW Saturday Night, but that show was in a parallel universe by that point. Didn't one of High Voltage end up winning the WCW tag titles with Rick Steiner as well?

Weren't High Voltage graduates of the WCW Power Plant? I'd assume WCW was just trying to push their students.

Meltzer was more of a fan of the NWA than the WWF in the 80s, and from the admittedly few examples of WONs from the time period, he goes to great lengths to shit on anything the WWF did during that time. Gorilla was always saying stuff like "you'll only see action like this in the World Wrestling Federation" in his commentary so he became the focal point of people who were anti WWF. I'll grant that Gorilla wasn't that great at the tail end of his career, but I don't see how anyone could say he was the worst Announcer any year in the 80s.

So most of you probably know how the WB and UPN networks are merging into the CW, right? Well part of the area served by the call center I work in extends to West Virginia (home of Jamie Noble). Their UPN station went dark last week, and the CW doesn't start programming till next week. So no UPN, on a Friday night, in West Virginia. Ho-lee shit. I think the whole state called in asking what happened to SmackDown.

I find that hard to believe unless Shamrock has had several neck injuries I'm not aware of.

I was watching Prime Time Wrestling from 2/23/87 on WWE 24/7 and during the "WrestleMania Report" segment Mean Gene threw in a tease about a big name possibly being in Hulk's corner. Considering the WON reports posted over at TSM saying how fucked Andre was at the time and how the main event was in doubt, was this just the WWF hedging their bets?

I marked for Roddy Piper tonight, I just can't help myself.

That whole match was hilariously unprofessional on both men's part. Hogan's before the match and HBK's during and after it. True enough, but HBK's oversell of the Big Boot is like a million times worse than anytime anyone ever stopped co-operating in a match.

After rewatching it tonight, I think HBK's oversell of Hogan's big boot at Summerslam 2005 might just be the most hilariously unprofessional moment in wrestling history.

Was watching some WWE dvds today, and I just noticed how often Kurt Angle appears in the "Don't Try This At Home" PSA thing that's on every disc.

Missy Hyatt mentioned something about Rick being in a car accident that left him with some sort of brain damage, but then Missy's probably not too much brighter herself so who knows.

By the time I started watching the WWF, Pedro was already halfway between midcarder and jobber. I always had a hard time squaring that he was a former world champion.

I know the original incarnation of the Harlem Heat gimmick (in Global, wasn't it?) involved them carrying chains.

Wow, "parodying racial stereotypes" from the same folks that brought us the Wild Samoans, Umaga, Saba Simba and Gang Warz 97. I can't wait to see how mind bendingly offensive this will be. Considering it's a team of two black guys (Shad Gaspard and The Neighborhoodie from OVW) that's being called "Cryme Tyme", I can just imagine the possibilities. Of course, they already have their bases covered to play the "OMG ITS JUST A JOKE" card whenever they really go overboard.

Chris Masters didn't look nearly as bad as those pics from OVW indicated. He looked obviously slimmer, but definately still buffed and defined.

What's funny is it seems WWE has gone back to its strategy of pretending the competition doesn't exist. Maybe UFC should start giving away the endings of WWE matches top get their attention.

Somehow I find it hard to believe that Hogan was the one who turned down the AWA belt *unless* by the time Verne finally decided to put it on him Hulk already had a deal with Vince. I just watched an AWA documentary on 24/7, and Hogan looked somewhat normal compared to the extremely bloated moon face look he had by about 1985. Maybe his roid connection in Minnesota was getting him weak stuff? Who knows, but he certainly got a lot more puffed up in relation to how big Hulkamania was getting.