efrim

Theme music distraction - is there a worse finish in wrestling?

Crowd seems very dead.

Enjoyed the pre-show panel because watching Bret Hart try to be personable and somewhat spontaneous in speaking is just hilarious. Never fails to make me smile.

Yeah, I could never keep his legs crossed around my leg while he was still on his back. It was super easy for him to just twitch or kick his way out of that setup. I could never hold on that setup before turning him. The crab was fast enough that I could do it, but not the sharpshooter.

Classy. This is the same guy who supposedly begged his "good buddy" Chuck Liddell to retire because he was so punch drunk, yet still let him fight when it was clear Liddell's chin was gone and his brain was damaged and he had no business fighting anymore And he wants to try and guilt GSP into fighting when everyone around GSP is coming out now with stories about how GSP is close to bad news status brain wise, if not already? You stay classy, Dana White God, what a scumbag. I guess the judges made a sketchy call with this last GSP fight, but I still think it would be pretty cool to have a guy with the career of GSP go out "on top".

In retrospect, it should have tipped me off that wrestling was a work when at 8 years old, even putting a sharpshooter on my 4 year old brother was functionally impossible if he struggled even slightly. I could occasionally lock in a single leg boston crab though

The Dragon Sleeper is a move I just loved the look of when I first saw it in middle school, and I'll pretty much always go crazy for it. Love the Crippler Crossface and the Crossface Chikenwing - always felt that those lent themselves perfectly to really crazy/intense heels because of the way the camera angles set up. You get a nice close shot of both guys and it usually made the likes of Benoit and Backlund look like they were enjoying their work a little too much...

It was so wretched last night that I could barely keep from muting it. King is just collecting a paycheck and has been for years, Cole is mediocre at best, JBL has his moments but is more often miserable. Its not even the best announcing talent you have in the company. Regal is running a damn commentary clinic at NXT every time he sits at the booth. And of course, there is so much Vince in the talking points/imposed quirks that you'd now be significantly better off with Vince coming out like he has amnesia and doing mid-90's jacket Vince. At least that would be someones genuine voice.

It's possible they tried and no-one bit. Two years ago, when the WWE network was first thought imminent the word was that were having great difficulty finding someone willing to pick up the poisoned chalice of running the channel. Its no surprise really. WWE is not a super large or very prestigious company from the average business sharks perspective. Add to that the fact that the undertaking is very risky and you're probably only going to get up and comers. If somebody succeeds in doing a WWE network, I wouldn't be surprised to see them jump ship soon afterwards to a larger company

Its really hard to understate how important the sports-like live event feel is to the positioning of the wwe. Live sports is really the only thing holding up the whole traditional tv model. I recently got an anti-sports friend of mine to start watching basketball games with me. During games, every time a commercial comes on, it is the first time he has ever seen that commercial. He consumes a lot of media, but this is the one time where he is actually a captive audience to traditional advertising. Advertisers are very aware of this and covet advertising during sporting events. Despite any missteps, wwe has that same inherent advantage. I think things are really going to change when they negotiate their new TV deal. There will be a lot of interest from networks that didn't exist the last time they inked a deal and it might be the moment when a lot of quality ad buyers get over their pre-conceptions about the pro wrestling audience.

This is still sticks in my mind as a colossal train wreak where Nattie was at fault:

Natalia strikes me as competent, but fairly uncreative and very incapable of dealing with something unexpected. I haven't paid that close of attention to her, but it seems like her botches are always really bad and noticeable.

I don't think that does her any favors considering she's supposed to be a heel right now. She's single-handedly carrying the Diva's division right now, so a passive aggressive rebuke is about the best they could do. Like I said, it just strikes me as very petty.

It probably wasn't anything special, but last night commentary felt especially bad to me

"What was that?!? The dragon screw leg whip!? I gotta remember that for later on tonight! 'What was that?' 'Honey, that was the dragon screw leg whip!'" - Dusty Rhodes

Sometimes it just takes my breath away how petty the wwe can be.

I'd be really interested in a show that basically does director's commentary for important matches. Get a good host that can ask a wrestler some more probing questions about the specifics and do a set-up interview/match/wrap-up interview format. A great idea I heard somewhere else (can't recall where) is a tough enough show but for past their prime wrestlers. Guys that have either turned their life around, or who have retired but think they have one more good run in them. I think that could be a top flight reality competition show.

From the standpoint of just about anything I value, Kofi is absolutely dreadful. Easily one of my least favorites in the WWE. Oddly though, I think his tireless mediocrity has a certain value to the company. Its pretty clear at this point that he's got no issues with having a middling career and its nice in a way to just have reliable space filler like that. For whatever reason (HIGH JUMPING) he connects well enough with casual fans and children, moves a decent amount of merch (based on shows I've been too), doesn't rock the boat..you can see why they keep him around despite a terrible grasp of psychology and some generally sloppy ring work.

Definitely agree with the sentiment of marketing the Divas division to young girls. As it is now, its just a self-perpetuating cycle between WWE not caring about the divas and the fans not caring about the divas. They need to give it some reliable time and consistency and reach out to that demographic. It probably won't set the ratings sheet on fire or anything, but its an investment in a fanbase that will be more robust. Total Divas is getting some fresh eyes on that product too, so its an ideal time to do something. Getting your announcers to not completely shit on every divas match would also be a step in the right direction. Between the main roster and NXT there's enough talent to do something real.

If there's anything I've learned about Ric Flair, its that he doesn't respond particularly well to slights or disrespect (perceived or real)

Really it speaks so well of Foley that both the "debuts" of Dude Love and Cactus Jack were such perfectly executed moments. I remember reading about the Cactus death matches and watching some of his run in ECW and just being hyped to the point of near heart attack when he came out on Raw. There was a wonderfully lurid spread in WWF magazine about Cactus Jack in Japan well before his WWF debut. That combined with the JR interview laid some perfect groundwork for me to think of Cactus as this mythic figure prior to his debut.

Have to thank you guys for making me aware of Negro Casas via this discussion. My life is now 100x better forever. I have such a gaping blindspot on lucha - can anybody recommend an El Dandy match to jump in to his non-WCW output with?

Just a phenomenal main event to Raw. True instant classic territory as far as the history of Raw goes. Dustin looks possibly better than ever, easily on the shortlist for best workers in the company. The Shield continues to impress - they're starting to accumulate a dizzying number of great matches. Each member is so excellent that its become difficult to put one over the other. Rollins is such an athletic bumper, Reigns is a perfect monster without ever feeling clumsy, Ambrose has a wonderful sense of unhinged menace in the ring. I hope they stay together for a long while to come and really maximize what is already a great run.

I'm new around here, this seems as good a place as any to write a formal introduction. I was born in '84 and started watching wrestling via my grandpa sometime around '89 - probably had my peak as a pure childhood fan around 94. Had my first live show that year which was Summerslam '94. Grew up in Chicago and during this time it was a pure WWF diet for me. I had kind of seen Sting and Vader just from around, but I wrote off WCW as a second rate show thanks to childhood reasoning that largely revolved around a lack of ice cream bars. I was pretty devoted to renting VHS PPV tapes from blockbuster video, so I had a much better knowledge of the preceding boom era WWF than anybody else I knew. The first show I ever watched was my grandpa's VHS copy of Wrestlemania IV, and while that's a pretty lackluster show, its somewhat fateful because Savage is my all-time favorite and at no point has ever been less than a top 5 guy for me. Was able to watch on a much more consistent basis in 1996 and became a devoted Monday Night Wars watcher. Kind of rapidly became a prototypical "smark" type fan as I went deeper and deeper. Got really into ECW sometime around their 2nd or third PPV and did my only real tape collecting to get older ECW stuff. After the Invasion angle I became a much more casual fan and mostly got burned out on the intense vulgarity of WWE around that time. Combined with a lack of wrestling fan friends, I felt pretty alienated from the form. Really dropped off the map as a wrestling fan from 2004-2010, watching raw maybe about once a month if I felt like it. Since 2010 though I've had a really enjoyable renaissance as a wrestling fan that I mostly ascribe to the internet. Between the availability of video and the ease of finding likeminded fans on twitter and other blogs/social media, its just an easy time to be a wrestling fan. I joined up here after being impressed with the breadth of knowledge on the pro wrestling culture podcast. At this point I've done some reasonable dabbling in stuff like puro, old nwa, old memphis, modern indies - but its pretty negligible compared to the level of discussion here. I feel like for the most part I've gone as far as I can go with the WWF sanctioned version of wrestling history and I need a community like this to get to the next level as a fan. I've enjoyed what I've seen from the board so far, looking forward to more.

Ah, great! I'll check it out soon. Obviously I'm new around here - heard about the board through the pro wrestling culture pod, which I in turn heard about through Holzerman and The Wrestling Blog. I'm not up on any podcasting outside of the whats hosted on the talk shoe culture pod page.