NintendoLogic

I think Arn takes this easily, but come on. He wasn't even the best worker in his company in 1992.

You'd think that by now, these guys would be smart enough to realize that getting involved with other people in the business only leads to trouble. Um...unless you're HHH.

They have to release him now, obviously. What would happen if some kid did a Google image search of Seth and came across those pics?

Except Rusev is a much better worker and promo.

"Where deceased bodies go to decompose"? Who writes this crap?

That's the thing, though. They're not giving the fans what they want, at least not fully. It's certain to backfire for that reason. If the fans know that they can force the company to cave in, are they going to be satisfied with a few crumbs or are they going to demand the whole loaf?

Once you've established the precedent that fans revolting can force you to change the direction of your booking, thinking that token half measures will appease them is sheer lunacy.

It's pretty clear they've got a good cop/bad cop thing going where everything hardcore fans don't like is attributed to Vince and everything they do like is attributed to HHH.

For the record, Summerslam in 1990 didn't outdraw WM6. It was close, though. WM5 did more PPV buys, but WM6's gate was more than double that of 5's. In fact, it was the biggest gate in wrestling history at the time.

HHH's current on-screen persona has been good about showing ass and putting people over. Stephanie is a far worse offender in that regard.

It should be noted that WWE no longer receives any cut of the ad revenue. And even if it did, I'm willing to bet that ad rates for Raw were higher in 1999, when the trashiness was at its peak, than they are today.

I thought the consensus was that he had significantly regressed after coming back from his quad injury. That's what I remember Scott Keith saying in his contemporaneous rants. Also, I've seen quite a few people point to the crappy payoff to the 2000 HHH-Angle feud as a jump-the-shark moment. That might be more in retrospect, though.

I recently finished Stan Hansen's book, and he says that with Misawa/Kawada/Kobashi, a lot of the spots were laid out in advance, especially as the decade went on. He doesn't say who was responsible for laying them out, but he implies that it was Fuchi, the booker at the time.

Well the question was should she be in the HOF, and he was trying to put it as nicely as possible that while she deserves to be in, they can't because because let's say some kid who doesn't know who she is looks her up online they're gonna find porn and overdoses. This would be a far more compelling argument if they hadn't already inducted a convicted rapist.

I remember hearing that it dated back to Austin's neck injury. They wanted him out there to draw ratings, but he couldn't be put in any programs or do anything physical. So they'd have him out there talking about nothing in particular.

I thought the 1983 Lawler/Dundee show was 90 minutes. Anyway, I would argue that the style Tanahashi and Okada works is rooted more in 90s All Japan than the New Japan heavies. There's hardly any matwork. The offense is distinctly pro-style. The matches have the length and pacing of a 90s Triple Crown match (did Hashimoto ever work a 30+ minute match in his career?). Even the crappy strike exchanges owe more to King's Road than strong style.

Brock not being on wouldn't have been a problem if his presence still loomed large over the show. Instead, they went out of their way to avoid mentioning him, which completely destroyed the internal logic of the show. If there's no championship to contend for, what was everyone fighting for?

You are aware that you're a modern internet fan too, right?

I think what would make the most sense is tying Kane to a rocket and firing it into the sun.

I guess they figured that if they announced Bryan wouldn't be in the Rumble, it would hurt buys. There's also the whole wrestling thing where saying something isn't going to happen usually means that it is, in fact, going to happen. If they don't say anything, people would probably figure that Bryan would be a surprise entrant, guaranteeing that the #30 entrant would get the Rey Mysterio treatment. From their perspective, it was a no-win situation. These are the kind of problems you run into when you're hellbent on not giving the fans what they want.

WCW grossed 200 million in 1998. They were gone less than three years later. And they had a hell of lot more structural advantages than current WWE.

The way I see it, where you stand on this question is mainly a reflection of how you feel about Tanahashi and Okada. I really like both guys, so this is an easy win for NJPW in my book. On the other hand, there's only one guy in CMLL I have any desire to go out of my way to see, and that's Hechicero.

I wonder if it's possible that WWE would actively try to bury Daniel Bryan so their hand picked guys don't get shit on specifically for not being Daniel Bryan anymore. We all know how well that worked in the past.

Utter rubbish. It is more profitable than ever. WWE lost more money this past year than WCW did in any year of its existence except for 2000.

Reigns, Show, and Kane in the final 3. Whoever wins, we lose.