Lee

Apparently Zumbi is out and Prince Mustafa Ali is in.

It's true, I believe that's how the uncut version of the Bret Hart-Chris Benoit tribute match for Owen Hart ended up doing the rounds on the trading circuit before they put it out on the Benoit DVD. --- Does anybody know why the Midnight Rockers vs. Buddy Rose & Doug Somers match seems to be missing from WrestleRock '86? Loads of places have it listed but unless I skipped right past it, it's nowhere to be seen? Here's a Talking Heads music video with a couple of still frames of it at 1:47:

Not the same thing.

In that case, were there two Little Mr. T's? Or is this a case of multiple online sources listing the same wrong information? I guess the confusion comes from Haiti Kid being paired with Mr. T? Edit: I've also just read this on a decade-old WrestlingClassics thread which probably explains a bit of it: "Someone just tipped me off that Little Mr. T was NOT in fact the same person as the Haiti Kid, which is something I have believed for almost 20 years as one of the first smarky details I ever learned."

Haiti Kid is Little Mr. T. Maybe it's just how I worded it (and I did not that he was back to being Haiti Kid by Mania III, at least in the WWF) but I was asking if the Mania 2 association was how he got the gimmick and if he had Mr. T's blessing on it.

I didn't think this was especially worth starting a thread for, but I was watching WrestleRock '86 and it got to me to thinking about Little Mr. T. Obviously he was in Mr. T's corner at WrestleMania 2 after Roddy Piper cut his hair on Piper's Pit, but does anyone know if he had Mr. T's blessing to do the gimmick? I can't imagine in the outlaw world of wrestling that he would have paid for the rights to it, and by the time WrestleMania III came around, he was back to being the Haiti Kid. I figure that was partly because he'd already been the Haiti Kid in the WWF, and partly because Mr. T wasn't with the WWF at the point. I wonder if he would have been Little Mr. T had the PIper-Mr. T cage match happened instead of Piper-Adonis? Also, did he resume the Haiti Kid gimmick full time at that point, or did he carry on being Little Mr. T elsewhere? Even if Mr. T/The A-Team were rapidly on the way out in 1987, I figure that wrestling often being so far behind the pop culture pulse that he would have just carried on using the name into the 90s. On a related note, I thought Cowboy Lang looked pretty good in that WrestleRock match. Does anyone know if that troupe used to do "serious" matches anywhere? I realise they were a once-a-year sideshow attraction in most places, but did the guys ever get tired of doing the same comedy spots in every town and decide to tear it up one night, or get booked in any programs that would have seen them do returns?

I think Lance Storm said the shaky camera/zooming started when Hulk Hogan came back in 2002 because he was so old and slow and it was Kevin Dunn's way of "creating motion" for him. Which is fine, but doesn't explain why they do it to the point of nausea for literally everyone on the roster now. I can absolutely believe the Shield thing as the point where it went into overdrive, but I don't suppose their fears about moving to HD in 2008/2009 had any bearing on it, did it?

Yeah, I was watching WrestleRock and after sitting through three matches that did nothing for me and marvelling at how the AWA managed to make an impressive 21,000 crowd look like shit (i.e. booking it at the metrodome and pointing the camera towards all the empty seats), I was faced the dilemma of wanting to watch the Misawa/Tiger Mask match but having to put up with Buck Zumhofe in order to do so. In the end I just shut it off and went to bed because, yuck.

So were WrestleRock Rumble '86 and SuperClash III, all in the AWA section of the vault. Fun way to spend a weekend!

To elaborate on that last point a little, I believe what Dave said (at least on WOR) was that USA Network who called to move SmackDown to Tuesdays and go live, but that it was Vince who then got the impetus to do a brand split in order to try and give both shows a distinct feel. Personally, I suspect it's more likely that both shows will just read from the same playbook but claim they're totally unique because of the different players.

I didn't really like the way he seemed to lump in the deaths of Kerry's brothers as if Kerry were in some way responsible for any of them.

There's another TakeOver in Brooklyn scheduled for August so I figure it's just "The End" in a metaphorical sense since it'll likely be blowoffs and guys getting called up. Might as well go "dark" in terms of touring house shows while the entire company is in flux right now and you can't really guarantee any names.

The idea that Cary is the pathetic one when Flair owes him 41 THOUSAND dollars is... pathetic.

Isn't the (unspoken) connection that they were/are all agents?

And people still praise this shit?! If WWE or TNA tried that, oh boy... I don't care if it's supposed to be a "TV show" and "not wrestling, that's still idiotic. (WWE, BTW, claims it's "not wrestling" too.) To be fair, I've only seen one episode of LU and couldn't get into it at all, but they're smarter than TNA (and who isn't?), they'll strike that rumored deal with Netflix or Hulu and open themselves up to a new audience. I'd certainly give it a fair shake then (I don't have El Rey - or cable at all, for that matter). Superman is an alien who can fly around at the speed of light, what's your point?

The ECW TVs are all over the place too, and not consistent with the season sets that people have online. Some of the episodes for example will have more (or less) than 14 days between them where a missing episode should go between them. In fact: #260 is listed as April 18th, but #261 is listed as April 20th, two days later. #262 is then listed as May 2nd, 12 days later, followed by #263 on May 6th, four days later, then #264 is listed as May 16th, ten days later. If you go back earlier in the year, #254 is down as March 2nd, #255 is missing, and #256 is listed as March 21st, so there's a 19 day discrepancy between the two available episodes. Later on, #272 is listed for July 11th, #273 is July 13th, and #274 is July 25th. There's 14 days between #272 and #274, so surely #273 should be July 18th, not 13th. That same weird numbering gap shows up again for #276-#278 (August 8th, August 10th, August 22nd), and is followed by #279 (August 24th, another two day gap) and September 5th (14 days after #279). he exact same thing happens again twice more that year, in October and November, but it's such a strange anomaly because they aren't listed like that consistently at patterned intervals, rather seemingly more arbitrarily.

Why would they include it if it was speculation? Surely they'd have lead time on contracting the inductees too, specifically so they can prepare those kind of materials?

Don't shoot the messenger, that's what was on the banner.

Is there any footage of the Gordy & Garvin version of the team from 1994? Does anyone know anything about the "1st Annual Fabulous Freebirds Hot Fun in the Summer Time Golf Classic"?

Does anyone else remember that 12-or-so-year period when everyone was looking for "The Next Hulk Hogan"? And what the WWF ended up with was... Steve Austin, who couldn't have been much less like Hogan if he'd tried (Steve-O-Mania bit aside). And when they went looking for "The Next Steve Austin" they ended up with John Cena who, again, wasn't much like Steve Austin at all. What I'm saying is that if WWE are really looking for a carbon copy of Rey Mysterio, then they're not learning from history (surprise, surprise) and are going to shoot themselves in the foot by hiring a bunch of little guys in masks who jump off the ropes but don't connect with the audience. If anything, "The Next Rey Mysterio" is more likely to be someone like Finn Bálor, since nobody's really done the whole bodypaint/mask/tassels transformation thing on that scale yet, and I can see that catching on huge with kids when it hits the main roster. It's new, it's cool, it's different, and it's not just some guy cosplaying as someone who used to be a big TV star 6-14 years ago.

"Women that are good looking and horrible wrestlers, it's just like, they should throw them all in a lake." - I'll be honest, I laughed more than I probably should at that line. I think it was in the delivery, like he went down a cul-de-sac and realised he had no out, like the time Bryan said he was so angry he "pissed straight up in the air" and was already laughing before he'd even finished his sentence.

Clem Layfield might be the best thing Heath Slater has ever done.

Which would be fine if Vince was the babyface and Shane was the heel. Instead, they're asking for a stadium full of fans in Texas to boo a home town hero for siding with Vince. It's WrestleMania 17 all over again.

That was going to be my suggestion, but it still gives you the audience essentially cheering for Vince & Stephanie's tyrannical rule/driving the company into the ground. It's such a weird angle.