Coffey

I just recently starting listening to The Law on a regular basis and I was just curious if there were any other radio shows and how popular they were.

Didn't Meltz dispel this rumor now? The Benoit rumor?

Just because I haven't seen it typed out yet, Luger's spiel:

Jericho worked Japan, Mexico, ECW & WCW before going to WWE. Yet, it's funny to you that I think he was a big name before WWE? Like people didn't watch his cruiserweight run during WCW? So, the pop he got when he debuted in WWF was because he was pretty, right? What did WWE do with him? Give him some IC runs and a SHITTY World Title run where he had to pick up the shit of Steph's dog? Maybe you'll try to tell me that WWE made Fozzy and TV spots possible. *twirls finger*

This is, without a doubt, the dumbest fucking thing I've ever read. Especially on these forums. WWF stars were made in WWF? No shit. WCW stars were made in WCW too. Sting? Flair? Luger? It works both ways. Hell, I could list wrestlers, like Rick Rude, Dusty Rhodes & Ricky Steamboat, whom were better when they weren't in WWF just like you listed ones that were better when they were there. I assume your statement is based off the fact that Austin was in WCW and ECW before getting big in WWF? Well, so what? Hogan, Nash & Hall were all big in WCW. So, what's the argument that WWF can market wrestlers well? They had nothing to do with Goldberg or Sting or Flair and they made money. You think Jericho hit his highlight in WWF? He was a big name when he came in, WWF didn't do anything. You think McMahon used Cornette well?

What does it take to be successful in professional wrestling? A lot of factors are thrown around: charisma, workrate, drawing power, etc. However, do any of them matter as much as simply having the company behind you? For example, let's look at WWE. "Stone Cold" Steve Austin wasn't anything too special when he was the "Ringmaster." At least popularity wise. He certainly wasn't a "main eventer" when he was losing matches to Savio Vega. After he cut the "3:16" promo at the King of the Ring in 1996, the fans caught on. Maybe a little before that even, people started to notice him. Even jaded fans were behind him after his submission match with Bret Hart at Wrestlemania 13. He was a good worker but didn't get a ton of time to shine. Injuries started to catch up to him and his ringwork dwindled, however he got more popular than ever. He was being fueled by the WWE machine. His merchandise was hot, ratings were good, people made money. He was successful. I'm under the belief that it doesn't matter how many tools you bring to the table. The only thing that matters is if the company will give you a megapush. Then, it's successful if the fans accept it and it fails if they don't. Randy Orton, John Cena & Batista have all got the push recently. Cena was over on Smackdown, now his cheers are dwindling as he's growing stale. Orton pretty much got rejected doing anything that wasn't an RNN skit. He now gets "Jeff Hardy heat." Batista has seemingly been over for almost a year without a lot of character change. It might be because he's on Smackdown, which is taped and altered, or it could be because the fans haven't shit on him yet. I was thinking of wrestlers that used to be on the WWF roster. Ted DiBiase, Mr. Perfect, Rick Rude, Ricky Steamboat, etc. None of them got a chance to carry the company with the top belt, despite them having almost all the tools (if not all of them) required to be a top performer. So, I'm just curious what you guys think about it. Does it matter in this day and age if a wrestler can work or not? If they can talk or sell or bump or whatever? You can talk about going out and "making something happen" all you want but if the promotion isn't behind you, it doesn't matter how over you get. Look at Christian. How does it pertain to non-WWE promotions? This kind of ties into the "give new guys a chance" thread. If WWE were to megapush someone like Masters or Carlito, do you think it could be successful?

Basically that he doesn't respect most internet fans because they have no respect for the sport that they supposedly "love." They just get together and as a collective whole look for negatives to complain about despite being entertained for years.

The Konnan shoot interview changed me as a wrestling fan. I try to be a lot more respectful towards the entertainers that put their bodies on the line for my entertainment. Konnan had a great point. I've watched and been entertained by wrestling for YEARS so it doesn't make sense for me to be so negative. So, recently, I've tried not to be. I still care, I just don't have to always express my concern with a negative light. As far as fans being just as responsible for wrestling deaths, I think Loss put it well in the Trevor Murdoch thread. Fans as a whole are somewhat responsible.

Verne Gagne The Destroyer & Abdullah the Butcher This is my favorite picture of Raven. I used to be a huge mark for him and I used this as my desktop wallpaper for a long time.

Ron Killings has already been there, so he could easily be built up to that level again. I'm not seeing the problem. Abyss is just a Mankind rip-off? Well, in that case, TNA is a WWE rip-off, right? Besides, Mankind held the WWE title, so, again, what's the problem? It's better than Jarrett, whom is a Triple H rip-off. Samoa Joe has the X-Division title...

Flair & The Horsemen didn't suck and had real heat? Ron Killings, Abyss or Samoa Joe.

What about every other Jarrett main event that's ended the exact same way? Ref bump, multiple run-ins, guitar shot. Are those not necessarily overbooked?

Jackie Gayda ran out and slapped Jarrett. Team Canada & D'Amore interfered (two of them helped Jarrett back to the ring before a ten count and D'Amore hit Rhyno with a hockey stick to set-up the finish). There was a ref bump. A lot of crowd brawling (although it wasn't a no DQ match). A guitar shot. It was certainly overbooked and came off on TV overbooked. It was a typical Jarrett main event.

Any of you guys actually watch the PPV? It actually kinda let me down. Same ol' in the main. Overbooked with Jarrett retaining. Joe/Styles is what you'd expect...pretty good. The barbed wire match used real wire and had some decent spots. Jeff Hardy no showed the preshow. Konnan turned on Road Dogg and Billy Gunn. Kanyon showed up to wrestle Raven and went by the name Chris K. He looked sloppy and out of shape. The Aries/Bentley Vs. Strong/Shelley match was comedy. Strong and Shelley were doing crazy backbreakers and double team moves and all this other shit, then Bentley random won with a fucking super kick. Sting wasn't there but the arena went black, they showed scorpions on the titantron and then Sting's boots, jacket and bat were on a chair in the middle of the ring. That was the "big announcement."

HTQ likes West too. We've talked about it before over at TSM where I said basically the same shit I said here. I can see why people could like West because he's got a lot of passion. I can see why people might not like him too, because he's got too much passion. It's interesting what you say about Tenay. I haven't really noticed a change in him from when he was the third man on the WCW commentary team. That's part of the reason why I think he sticks out as being out of position to me. I hate his facial expressions too but that doesn't have anything to do with his play-by-play. Saying he's better than most WWF commentators doesn't have a lot of merit either since we all know they're carrying a lot of shit. Cole? Coach? C'mon. I will admit that Tenay has a lot of wrestling knowledge and probably a pretty big passion for the business but that can all still be expressed in the color side of the booth.

I agree with a lot of what you said but not the above quoted statement. It's been discussed a lot at various places but I can't get into the commentary. I can't get past the fact that Don West is bad. Yeah, he seems like he really cares about the product. He seems genuinely excited. He has "got better." That still doesn't make him good. I'll use the same example that I always use: it looks bad when West is as excited for an Amazing Red spot in the curtain jerk as he is for a World Title change in the main event. I think West brings a different perspective to the announce team, almost a marks perspective, but in order for him to work, I feel he'd be best as the third man in a commentary team. Just occasionally adding something in. Mike Tenay is a color commentator that's doing play-by-play. That's not a good thing either. He's out of posistion and it shows a lot when he's calling matches. Tenay should be doing color commentary. He can point out moves, storyline continuity, etc. Move West to the third man, Tenay to the color and look for a play-by-play guy. If they could do that, depending on whom the play-by-play man was, I could get behind the commentary. Of course, that's a problem as a whole in the industry today: there's not a lot of good play-by-play guys around. As of right now, second only to the Orlando crowd, the commentary is my least favorite thing about TNA.

You know, that wouldn't shock me if it were true. Even back during the Monday Night Wars era when Raw and Nitro were both entertaining, the only things that anyone ever talked about were the negatives. It's sad really. As long as some fans have been watching wrestling and being entertained by it, you think they'd have a little bit more respect.

Eddy is really only 5'6"? I thought he was, like, at least 5'8 or 5'9". How tall are HBK, Jericho, Bret Hart & Benoit?

That raises an interesting question. Out of all the professional wrestling promotions, who is the shortest World Champion there's ever been? Mikey Whipwreck in ECW? How tall was he?

Anyone else plan on watching this tonight? I'm actually looking forward to it. I'm going to watch it and then hopefully get home in time to catch the LAW. I think that TNA have done a better than average job of building to this PPV. I care about almost every match. I don't care about everyone in every match but I still want to see the outcomes of the matches.

Bobby Lashley ~ I have to admit, Lashley is the reason I wanted to re-spark these discussions. We've already talked about him a lot in other threads. To me, he has yet to show anything. Still, I think WWE dropped the ball by having him be the first person eliminated from the Survivor Series match. He's big but his look isn't anything new. Of course, being his size of big might just be enough. He might become something, he might not but right now, to me, he's nothing special. Ken Kennedy ~ I think Kennedy is similar to Lashley in the sense that he hasn't really done a lot. His entrance gimmick is over but it looks to be as if it could grow stale quickly. His injury might be a blessing in disguise. Orton was more over during the RNN skits than anything else he's ever done. I think Ken's wrestling, at least from what I've seen, is better than Lashley's. That might just have something to do with the fact that Kennedy isn't muscle-bound and has been having matches with Mysterio instead of squashes over Simon Dean. Carlito ~ He's a great talker. We've discussed him a lot too. Mainly in regards to people on-line not giving new talent the time to develop into something. My biggest gripe about that is that OVW is supposed to be where they develop. WWE is supposed to be the "big leagues." The best wrestling company in the world, or at least that's what it was supposed to be at one time. Carlito is the shits in the ring. His selling is passable enough but not great. His bumping is his best attribute. When he's on the offense, the match seems to fall apart. No matter what Konnan says, I'm not seeing Carlito becoming anything in the ring anytime soon. Hopefully he'll prove me wrong. John Cena ~ No matter what WWE try to do, Cena will never become the next Austin or the next Rock. Austin & Rock were both better in the ring and both had more charisma than Cena. Everything Cena seems to do seems forced. He got a monster pop when he came to Raw and that's when WWE should've capitalized on him. Instead, he just kinda played second fiddle to Triple H/Batista for awhile and by the time it was over, the iron was cold. Now WWE are trying everything they can to get the fire back but I think it's a lost cause. I think the best bet is to turn him heel. Abyss ~ I like Abyss a lot. I think he'd make a good TNA World Champion, especially when compared to Jarrett and with Mitchell as a mouthpiece. I don't know if he'll ever get past the stigma that he's a "generic Kane/Mankind" but he's a good worker for his size and he's willing to bump and sell for smaller guys. He needs to get away from being TNA's "hardcore wrestler" before he reaches the point of no return. The last thing he needs is to be known as the thumbtack/barbed wire guy.

We haven't had one of these in quite some time. Here's some links to the older threads first then I'll try to get us five new cats that we haven't discussed yet: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine. Here's the list of everyone that's be talked about so far: Alright, and here's the five new guys I'd like to converse about:[li] Bobby Lashley[/li][li] Ken Kennedy[/li][li] Carlito[/li][li] John Cena[/li][li] Abyss[/li]

Never. He's supposedly in control of booking all things main event. So, he'll hold it until Christian or Monty knock him off and then he'll get it back a month or two later. I certainly don't see Rhyno posing a threat to his spot. Nor Raven or Abyss.

You can say what you want about iMPACT! but it sold me on the PPV. I'm watching it tomorrow with a couple of friends. I think Monty/Christian, AMW/3D & Joe/Styles are what sold me on the card although the video packages hyping up Rhyno and a couple of questions play into the equation too. Plus, I might get to see Kanyon debut. Who bedda?

I agree with that except the problem is that no one remembered about the show on which the hyping took place. I thought the show did a great job of hyping the PPV. I liked the closing video package. I've liked all of the Rhyno video montages. I think the build to Abyss/Sabu has been good. Bobby Roode is one of my favorite wrestlers. He reminds me of a lot of my favorites from the past. His offense and intensity remind me of Rick Rude. His selling and bumping reminds me of Curt Hennig. I like him as a heel but I really want to see him get away from Team Canada and fly solo. The biggest problem being that he kind of needs D'Amore as a mouthpiece.