sek69

TNA's coming out with a Best of Christopher Daniels DVD soon, I'm guessing it will probably just solidify everyone's opinon of him no matter what side you're on.

I think if you went back in time one year ago and told the Carters that TNA would have a national TV deal, DVDs in production, and Sting under contract all by the end of 2005 they would probably have thought you were high. I think TNA is doing exactly what it needs to do. Panda seems to have the patience to let the company get their legs under them instead of making the mistake others before them made to challenge WWE right out of the gate. In fact, I don't even recall them mentioning WWE until Christian debuted and I guess the temptation was too big to resist then. Panda's a big company, they can afford TNA to lose if they have faith it will eventually turn a profit in the long term for them. Sure, TNA still has a way to go, but people shouldn't overlook the impressive gains they've had in 2005. We have two wrestling companies on national TV for the first time in 5 years. We should take a second to remember how cool that is before we go after TNA with torches and pitchforks.

Considering Impact got a .9 rating on Christmas Eve (at 11pm, where they went up against some guy in Rome with a funny hat), I think the Carters know they might have something with this wrestling thing.

I thought Morphoplex was just a sponsor, not a potential owner.

What I want to know, is with Panda owning a controlling interest in TNA, where's JJ's power coming from?

Considering the X division has headlined PPVs over the heavyweights on more than one occasion, I wouldn't say TNA thinks less of the X'ers at all.

Joe's in a nice spot negotiation wise. Either TNA's gonna give him a fat deal as a make good, or WWE's gonna give him a fat deal to rub it in TNA's face.

Interesting news in that apparently Mike Tenay is the one pushing for X Division tag titles and Jeff Jarrett is the one saying they'd only get diluted with only one hour of TV time a week. It seems like Sting's signing pissed a LOT of the wrestlers off who were taking less money to be good team players. I hope it's true that Spike was footing the bill or else there could be a mass defection.

If I recall, the Ellering-Long match match was a boxing match as well which added to the quality.

It was also tough to watch him talking about Dean Hart dying right before SS 90. I always wondered why him and DiBiase seemed to work so hard on what was really a fairly meaningless midcard match.

So I'm going through the extras on the Bret DVD since I admit I'm not a real huge fan so I wasn't too interested in the main interview portion. I came across on disc 1 an extra called "Bret remembers his colleagues that passed away" or something to that effect. It was Bret talking about all the people he's worked with that have died, and it was just mind blowing. The list of names itself was almost mind numbing: Owen, Davey, Pillman, Bossman, Perfect, Kerry, Rude (Bret even broke down when talking about him), Hawk, and especially Elizabeth, who Bret even compared to his mother by saying "both were too good for wrestling". We all know the stories, but to see it put to video like that really hammered the point that a lot of people we watched growing up aren't around anymore. Bret had the look on his face as if he was the only survivor of a plane crash and was as much confused as to why he's still alive as he was why everyone else died. Hearing Bret talk about thinking he'd sit on his front porch with Owen and Curt Henning, talking about their matches they had just ripped your heart from your chest since as he put it "I always thought we'd have that, and now I don't."

As long as he doesn't go back to running around naked in hotels on E, I don't see the harm in asking management to have a mask vs mask match despite him not wearing a mask. The wrestling biz needs more wacky-but-not-life-endangering personalities like that.

There's just something about having a heel (who as stated you're supposed to assume is lying) claiming rape creeps me out. With the Kane/Lita and Katie Vick stuff it was done cartoony which took a lot of the creep factor out of it. Its like, am I supposed to equate a false rape claim with other heel tactics, or am I supposed to cheer an accused rapist? Not only is it tasteless it's yet again sloppy writing.

WWE's already posted her "statement": So...does turning sexual assult and implied rape into a wrestling angle set the bar for disgusting angles, or can WWE find a way to go any lower?

I'm taking odds on his bad leg snapping ala Sid.

If I ran my own fed, I'd so hire Juvi just to hear what he comes up with every week.

What does Angle do besides a thousand German suplexes, the Olympic Slam, and the Ankle Lock? I'm not trying to be a smartass, I can't really think of any move he does besides that pop-up belly to belly from the top rope he busts out once in a while.

Maybe he'll get lumped into the male cheerleader squad and use the Pom Pom Piledriver for a finisher.

The only PPV I ever even consider buying is WrestleMania, but now that it costs $50 for that, I just wait for the DVD.

In business, there's always a tipping point in prices. If something is under a certain dollar amount, more people will go for it. I picked $20-$25 since the advent of DVDs have made that an acceptible price for 2-3 hours of entertainment. Lowering PPV prices to a point that people already feel comfortable spending would get a lot of on-the-fence buyers who don't want to commit $35-40 for a PPV that might end up the next Bash 91.

CM Punk: Mat Wrestler doesn't even sound right, but thats what they're trying to turn him into in OVW. I'm sure if he makes the mistake of having a good match in WWE, someone will tell Vince he doesn't know how to work.

The smart heel turn on Daniels occured right around the time it became clear TNA was his primary fed. Maybe it is just a co-incedence, but somehow I doubt it.

Maybe if Joe signs with WWE, he can be the token fat cheerleader the rest of the squad makes fun of but keeps around to make themselves feel better.

Vince's new moneymaking idea for the new guys coming up is "Team Spirit", a stable of male cheerleaders. Ken Doane apparently has been doing the gimmick in houseshows, Elijah Burke has already asked out of it. Surely this will turn things around in 2006.