Gregor

At ringside with Dominic? Or was that a different person? I meant figuratively, not literally! Are your friends hoping to adopt a child together, or are they on the list separately? If they're on it together, I don't see why they would be the ones tasked with getting the ladder, unless their prospective opponent(s) would have to get the wrestling ring, book the building, and rig the suspension of the briefcase and contract. And there's no point in letting them keep it for practice, because there's no way to learn how to fall off a 20-foot ladder.

I'm pretty sure that there's no way you can get a legally binding contract that allows child custody to be determined via ladder match. Where was child services in all of that? I assume there's something in wrestling contracts that accounts for the volatile nature of the characters who populate the sport and the violence inherent in the sport itself. I mean, Austin attempted to murder HHH. It looked like it was more than just trying to win the match, but I guess you can argue that it was like a boxing match in which one boxer ends up dying - just a hazard of the sport. I don't think I've ever seen anyone face legal trouble for causing injuries during a run-in, though, and that certainly can't be argued as just part of a wrestling match, as it's clearly premeditated assault. But then there's stuff like Vince McMahon getting arrested for assaulting Steve Austin and Kevin Nash getting arrested for performing a move banned by the promotion for which he works, and I end up having no idea what in wrestling is actually punishable by law.

Wasn't Jannetty not with the company at this point? I thought him showing up on that RAW in May was a big surprise return.

What was the original plan for how the KOTR match would go? I assume it was Michaels losing as a result of Hart Foundation interference, but I've never heard anything about it.

I was so disappointed when I finally saw this. I expected it to be this awesome shot from a condescending Flair said right to Syxx's face, but instead Flair was hopping around like a kangaroo and hugging Roddy Piper. I dunno - I guess I had this image in my head of Flair showing that he was still cool even near 50.

A lot of people call this a great match, and I've never really understood it, so I'm looking forward to reading others' thoughts, especially of those who love it. I watched it again today and ended up liking it more than I had before. I knew Vader's performance here was always praised, but I never really appreciated just how much punishment he takes, all after his eye has been busted open. The guys spend most of the match split into pairs, and it's usually Vader vs. whoever that is the more interesting of the two. There's not enough rhyme or reason to the stuff going on for it to be great, though. Bret wrestles like he'd rather be somewhere else, which is odd given that he's winning the title. His win does come off as anticlimactic. I'm having trouble thinking of three things he did before the match came down to him vs. Undertaker, and then he just clotheslines Undertaker over the top for the win. Austin looked like he really did injure himself before going out. Ross and Lawler were good together on commentary. For all of JR's faults, I think that the WWF's announcing improved a lot once he became a regular in the booth. Part of it is that Vince and Lawler seemed to bring the worst out in each other.

Yeah, that was my favorite one he's done yet. Hall sounded great.

I don't think it's charisma. Hogan had tons of charisma, and from 1998-2000 he annoyed the internet as much as HHH did later.

A cleaner version just surfaced on YouTube a couple of weeks ago. I have to admit, though, that the graininess and darkness of the old one made the match seem even cooler and rarer when I first watched it.

Vader-Owen might be Vader's best WWF match. It's definitely among his best there, and I don't know how much from his WWF stint is going to be represented on the yearbooks. I figure you guys would want quite a bit, just to show how his WWF stop went in comparison to all of his other ones on the yearbooks.

Oddly enough, given that Buddy Rose and Doug Somers were the first two names listed, the guys who came to my mind when I saw the thread title were the Rockers.

In the "General Thoughts" thread, Shawn Michaels vs. British Bulldog from October 6 was listed as something that had to be dropped from the set for space considerations. I think that's probably the best match the two had together. I'd also list Bret vs. Bulldog from November 12, for the finish as much as anything else, but in the same thread it didn't sound like that was something that was even close to making it.

Booker T and Chris Benoit. Marty Jannetty in the WWF. La Parka in WCW got good reactions even though he didn't really have any kind of push. D'Lo Brown from mid-1998 (when he won the European Title) to late 1999 seemed really over for a midcard guy who wasn't pushed that whole time. That went away after Russo left and he had the accident with Droz, though.

I don't think that this is true. Some guy uploaded his recording of the original PPV broadcast (complete with long "The WWF is experiencing a power outage at the arena. We will resume when power is restored" screen in the middle), and the main event was the same length as the one from the Coliseum Video release, with the same commentary and everything. If there was a difference, I couldn't spot it.

I love Luger's character during this wretched period. There's an episode of Nitro or Thunder that he carries by being hilarious in a series of backstage skits - they were all about him impressing the Powers That Be by promising to wrestle Liz in a mud match. I think there was another episode in which he's booked against Sting or Sid and keeps trying to leave the arena to get out of the match, but something always happens to foil his plans, like when Silver King steals his taxi. He also corrects anyone who refers to him by his old name.

I dunno if people think La Parka love is ironic. A lot of people remember him as the guy in the awesome skeleton costume who got big pops for bashing everyone with a chair. Even fans with no interest in or knowledge of lucha thought that he should've been pushed harder. El Dandy was just a dumpy guy who looked miserable all of the time and had a goofy name. While WCW's other Mexican wrestlers were doing crazy acrobatic stuff, Mike Tenay was on commentary talking about how Dandy had a good right hand. The guy's finisher (not that anyone would know it, as it almost never finished anyone) was a cradle. You'd actually have to have some knowledge of Mexican wrestling to know that he was way better than WCW made him look.

Psychosis defended three titles on WCW TV that year. He actually won only one of those titles, never once pinned the champion, and had no successful defenses. All in all, he won one title that year and lost three, one of which he isn't recognized as ever holding.

It happened once, and all it did was ruin what should have been Luger's moment of glory. Even when Flair was gone, he overshadowed poor Lex. You certainly never saw Hogan skip town just to avoid passing the torch to Luger. Luger costing Flair the title at Superbrawl and using their history as justification for rejoining his pal Nash would have been, at the very least, better than the David Flair heel turn.

Pettengill did color commentary on Action Zone.

I'm with Loss, and in fact I loved the finish just for obviously bogus it was. The ring area was a war zone, the two men were flinging each other around like maniacs, and the referee had already taken a shot to the face; he saw both guys down and realized that it was his chance to put a stop to this and get the hell out of there.

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He's been saying this about the Goldberg injury for so long that part of me wonders whether it's just a lie or if it really is a delusion and he actually believes that's how it happened. My favorite Nash lie/delusion is that he didn't book himself to beat Goldberg. I wonder if he ever tried to spin the first hour of Nitro with no wrestling as a positive.

Is this thread for these specific Kevin Nash delusions, or is it more of a catch-all thread?

I think Bret has a decent amount of hidden gem-type stuff, especially when you consider that the WWF didn't really have very many of those. He has the Flair iron man, the Yokozuna cage matches, and the Action Zone Backlund tag. There are people who like the iron man with Owen and the Flair series from '92-'93. He has a couple of good RAW matches against Hakushi and Jean-Pierre Lafitte (not really sure why they booked TV rematches against both of those PPV opponents). The biggest fault with Bret is that, if one of his matches doesn't go any longer than 10-15 minutes, you're probably not going to remember it. He doesn't have any heated sprints. I don't know if that's an issue with effort or if his wrestling style just didn't translate to that kind of match. But I think that's a bigger negative than the hidden gem deal. He did do some really good stuff on smaller shows; he just needed the matches to be given time.

It looks like he wasn't lying, although the site has August 20 as his last WWF date of 1990.