Ricky Jackson

The old story goes that Vince Jr wanted Bob to turn heel, specifically by dying his hair and doing a punk rock gimmick and Bob refused and quit. God knows what that would've been like but I guess it may have got him involved with the Rock n Wrestling MTV stuff

I think Bob writes in his book about how Vince Sr had big plans for guys like a returning Superstar Graham, Ray Stevens and Blackjack Mulligan for the fall of 82. He didn't see dollar signs in Orton or Rose, so they were basically one and done placeholders at MSG before the supposed bigger draws got their shots. Yes, Kung Fu Billy drew three straight MSG sellouts, but apparently wasn't a draw elsewhere and was seriously washed in the ring. Stevens and Mulligan were also washed, and weren't drawing either, so they didn't even get a single MSG main event with Bob. IIRC Bob thought they should've done more with Orton and Rose instead of going with past their prime guys who could no longer work at a main event level. Late Vince Sr seemed to love bringing back guys who drew well in the past instead of trying new faces, and 1983 of course has a rep for a stale main event scene, despite some good matches, as you've covered. But looking at the available MSG #s for 83 show strong attendance, so I think a lot of the "territory in decline" narrative comes from old Observer's and their anti-Bob bias. It's kinda hard to argue against Vince Sr's thinking when it comes to 83, but his picks for main event heels in the Fall of 82 were definitely questionable

Canada counts as part of US box office #s

Box office up to $18.2 million as of Monday, so holding up quite well. The Wrestler grossed nearly $45 million (about $4 million more than Fighting with my Family), and Iron Claw hasn't had an international release yet, so solid chance it takes the wrestling flick BO record when all is said and done

I'm not a conspiracy guy, but I don't think one can ignore the obvious, multi-layered conspiracy against "rule breakers" in the WWWF/WWF lasting from 1963 to about 1997. Managers being banned from ringside, obvious fast counts by refs, feet on the ropes being ignored, bs blood stoppage decisions that always benefitted the "good guys", refs turning a blind eye to selfsame good guys breaking the rules, etc, etc. And screw Arnold Skaaland, combs his hair with buttered toast-looking MFer

XFL name is dead again (forever?) with merger with USFL and new league named UFL

Saw it this afternoon. Really liked it. The performances are great. Flair wasn't as bad as I thought he would be, but definitely off. The guy playing Race was pretty good. Definitely up there with the Wrestler (Aronofsky version) but let's see if it reaches the heights (I assume) of I Like to Hurt People, which I'm watching for the first time on Sat with Johnny and the boys for Mystery Titans

Somebody seems to have cursed my beloved Eagles since the beginning of the month that's for sure

Pretty good reviews and, for those invested in the will-it-be-a-success-or-not debate from a few weeks back, projects to be about a $7.5 million opening (end of Monday). So not too shabby. Aquaman is around $40 million for comparison

If you can find the footage of their Oct MSG match (it's just the end, like this one) it features one of the best post match pull apart brawls ever

Pretty much all the Baba vs Fritz matches I've seen are really good, maybe Baba's best American invader feud. Other than that, I don't think there is a ton of footage, like a lot of the 60s-70s stars. I don't recall his Hidden Gem match vs the Sheik (1977?) being anything special

Yes, Arion and Bruno were partners in the late 60s. Arion was gone from the territory for 5 years or more. He came back and teamed with Strongbow for a while, chasing the Valiants for the tag straps. Eventually Jay ended up accidently costing Arion a match against Killer Kowalski on TV. He finally turned on Jay shortly after during a match against the Valiants. Bruno stormed the ring, but was triple teamed by Arion and the Valiants. On the Jan 1975 MSG show Arion roughed up Bruno protege Larry Z after beating him in a match, and Bruno made the save I love this 3 match series at MSG. The crowds are as hot the they get, given extra passion because of the Italy vs Greece aspect. The Feb match is great. I don't remember a lot about the Texas Death other than the hot crowd and the disputed finish. April match is cool for being a proto-I Quit/Submission match

I see its budget listed as $15.9m, which is pretty low these days. I have no idea what kind of release it will get, but it doesn't have to set the world on fire to be successful with that kind of number

I thought the trailers made it look great. I think it will do well

It's fascinating for me as someone only following this from a distance how history has kinda repeated itself with a cool company and a cold WWE(F) turning into a cold company (with a bunch of backstage drama) and cool WWE over the course of a year or so. AEW is still much more stable than WCW, it seems anyway

"Mysterious" is a strange choice of words

What does "Samhain" even mean? Never mind, I googled

Time for a new thread, or I guess start using the old TNA one again Why?

Similar fate for the Eagles, tough defense on the road. Also sad to see their 12-0 all-time record against the Jets finally have a blemish

Plus the "vanilla" part only works if the guy can't talk

The novelty of Hogan finally going heel + big WWF stars joining WCW + a cool gang vibe = the feeling wrestling was at last moving away from kid friendly, inoffensive presentation and was generating a buzz for the first time in forever. With all that in the air, and how fun it was to follow week to week, I didn't really think too much about Hogan's technical heel performance, other than from a Kayfabe perspective it was illogical he suddenly went from invincible Superman to cowardly wimp overnight simply because he was now a bad guy. But I guess it's not really suprising to find heel Hogan lacking because lot of the 90s boom stuff doesn't hold up watching in a vaccum

I was definitely skeptical that this would be anything other than a shallow, surface level take on the story. Nope. This looks like it could be awesome

Eh, the Eagles had multiple potentially great seasons derailed by QB injuries when I was younger (on the other hand, they won a SB with a backup QB). Anyway, we'll see who the better team is Dec 3

Fly Eagles Fly

I think he means the one that is, you know, not a democracy