flairchops

I think Kanyon was praised for having a variety of moves, but I honestly don't remember if he ever actually did. I also can't think of any great Kanyon matches. I did enjoy the Jersey Triad stuff with DDP and Bam Bam.

Loved RAW this week. I'm starting to think WWE is aware of some of the mistakes they've been making and are making an effort to have patience with putting new guys on TV and giving them time to build some momentum. Also loved Punk/Bryan/Ryder coming in through the crowd like they were the Von Erich boys in Dallas circa 1983.

So I will talk about the new stuff that I like: I like the new ROH program. Could it be better? Sure. Is it as good as older ROH? No. But every Saturday night I get to watch a wrestling show on one of my five basic cable channels and nothing on the show is stupid, so that makes it a lot of fun for me. I love Dragon Gate (Japan, not US, huge difference, IMHO). I'm way behind on stuff this year, but hope to catch up over my winter break. Suggestions on what to catch from this year would be appreciated. I want to like current NJPW but haven't had a chance to watch much and don't know any of the guys so it's hard to get into it. And that's about it really. I like NWA Hollywood for the most part, but don't watch it regularly.

Peace Brother I is a very intriguing name. I'm imagining a team of Vietnam protestors who get the shit kicked out of them every night.

I'd be shocked if we saw a major overhaul. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm convinced Bryan/F4W doesn't give a shit about how their website looks or has thought much about the user experience on the site. That's not to say they don't work hard on the content - you get two newsletters and a ton of great radio content, but the presentation looks terrible, the content is awful to navigate, and their servers consistently have issues on big news days (though much less than in the past). I don't know specifics of numbers, but for what I'm guessing they make off of subscribers they could hire a professional web designer to make the site usable and find a dedicated hosting plan that will grow with their needs. And I deal with it because I want the Observer online every week and I'm going to continue subscribing unless they drastically jack the prices up on me. I don't think I'm the only one who subscribes for this reason, and I'm guessing they know this, so they probably don't worry too much about the site unless it completely blows up. Hopefully I'm wrong.

I, too, have stacks of DVDs and hard drives full of stuff to watch that will probably never get watched. No real strategy, just whatever I'm feeling like or what I'm watching for the next Old School Wrestling Podcast. Being a productive adult and parent also drastically cuts down on my viewing time (and those two weeks last month when I was doing nothing but watching Breaking Bad on Netflix). It's really pretty amazing to think about the vast amount of stuff we have access to now. I take great joy in finding stuff now that I remember only daydreaming about the 80s when I would see it in PWI.

Awesome! Everyone go be like Will!

And, hey, if you listen to GWW and decide to order the iPPV, head over to flairchop.com and click the DGUSA banner to order the show and help out the website. Thanks.

Pure speculation, but the blue bars always seemed far less scary to me as a kid, so perhaps it was another facet of the cartoon environment of the time. I still have vivid memories/nightmares of Flair's bloody face being raked across the metal mesh of those traditional cages.

The ironic thing for me is the only time I found him entertaining is years ago when he was doing the stupid shit that lead to his current state, so I feel bad about that. His straight forward/non-hardcore matches and promos never did much for me. I'm just happy the guy is getting out before something really bad happens.

I watched it live. I enjoyed it. I've accepted WWE for what it's become and really don't expect much rasslin', maybe a few cool spots and the usual big epic match. It's a spectacle and fun to watch. I liked the Taker/HHH match. Loved the intros. Any other stage and the entrance for the entrance thing would be absurd, but once a year it's cool. The only thing I really disliked was the double-count out > restart > weak Miz win thing. I really can't understand how that made it past the first round of suggestions as an acceptable ending. There's like two or three WTF moments in a matter of 2 minutes. And I'll just briefly mention the RAW encounter - if you're going to hold off a year, don't make it either one of their ideas. The fans wanted them to beat the shit out of each other. If they aren't, give them a good reason or someone else to hate, not Rock saying, "Hey, John, why don't we wait a year?"

The Thanksgiving piece was phenomenal and something I'm sure I'll read again. I liked the History of WrestleMania piece he just wrote, but not nearly as much as the Thanksgiving story. It felt more like a quickly written response to the WWE History of WrestleMania documentary.

I hadn't heard the Von Erich impressions yet when I posted about Ahmed. The Von Erich material was legendary.

Hero's Ahmed Johnson impression was great.

There's a link for goodwill on itunes on the front of flairchop.com on the right side of the page or go to iTunes and search for goodwill wrestling. or just add feeds.feedburner.com/gww manually to iTunes

I've also been amazed by the number of things Punk has been able to say online in the last year to amuse himself - Gallows release, venting about being a pro wrestler vs entertainer, basically calling fans fucking idiots, etc.

According to the article he was released because he was "in charge" of the house show where they booked Miz to interrupt the National Anthem with the National Guard in attendance. I'm no "USA USA USA" American-flag-vest wearing patriot, but I even know that's a really, really stupid idea.

I loved those first 10 or so COTCs. I probably watched all of these a dozen times or more and got way more excited about Clashes than most PPVs. Matches the I loved from these early shows other than the big Sting/Flair, Flair/Steamboat, and Flair/Funk matches - Clash I Dusty Rhodes & The Road Warriors over Ivan Koloff & The Powers of Pain The Midnight Express over The Fantastics Lex Luger & Barry Windham over NWA Tag champs Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard Clash II Barry Windham over Brad Armstrong Dusty Rhodes & Sting over NWA Tag champs Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard Clash III Brad Armstrong battled Mike Rotundo to a draw Steve Williams & Nikita Koloff over The Sheepherders Ricky Morton over Ivan Koloff Clash IV The Fantastics over Eddie Gilbert & Ron Simmons Clash V The Midnight Express over The Russian Assassins Clash VI Steve Williams & Mike Rotundo over NWA Tag champs The Road Warrior Ranger Ross over The Iron Sheik Clash VII The Midnight Express over The Samoan Swat Team The Steiners over Kevin Sullivan & Mike Rotundo Clash VIII Lex Luger over Tommy Rich Ric Flair & Sting over The Great Muta & Dick Slater Clash IX Lex Luger over Brian Pillman Clash X The Steiners over Doom Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, & Ole Anderson over The Great Muta, The Dragon Master, & Buzz Sawyer

I just watched this a few months ago and really dug it. I thought they did a really good job with the near-time-limit draw, though I remember the last few minutes felt slow until the nice finish. Bizarre moment in this match when Ventura suggested Benoit would win the match because of his "killer instinct."

I just checked again and it's fixed. Sounds much, much better.

some people were asking about the itunes link - should be available shortly. takes apple like a day to process the link.