The Chief

Wow. Is there a worse team to match the Steiners up with right off the bat than Double Trouble? You eliminate about 80% of the Steiners offense (and their appeal) right away. Checking Graham's site and it looks like they may have realized that as there's only one Double Trouble match and all the other road dates are the Beverly's and Hardy/Gill. Hehe, jobber pimps! And I need to find that Howard Finkel heel run yesterday. Great show guys!

What a weird show. I feel like I've missed months of TV but I watch every week. So The League of Nations has replaced the Authority as the top heel group. The group doesn't have an identity besides the fact that they're all foreigners. Rusev and Del Rio are busy with their own story lines so they're just kind of there, but Lana and Zeb don't come out with the group. Lana should be there as she flipped heel overnight. But apparently they already gave up on Zeb and Del Rio. What was that about? Charlotte has also flipped overnight so I guess Paige is a babyface again. Stardust is somehow in the most entertaining segments of the show thanks to Titus O'Neil. Where did Darren Young disappear to? A lot of moving parts.

WWE went through this goofy phase a few years ago where all of the sudden they felt the need to resolve 15 year old dangling plot threads. They revealed Hornswoggle was the anonymous GM, they brought back Mae Youngs hand all grown up, I could have sworn they resolved the GTV thing around that time. I know it was originally meant to be Goldust before he left in 1999 but didn't they confirm it one of those old school raws?

That submission breakup by the Uso was possibly one of the dumbest most dangerous looking spots I've seen in a while. Fun match though!

Shah! Shah! Shah! Crazy how over he got that chant when those types of things weren't really done back then. A lot like "yes." And yeah, he was very young. I was always surpised he didn't do much after ECW. Hell, he was out of ECW before they even got really hot. Anybody remember when he showed up in the WWF as a Jakked/Shotgun jobber? Didn't even look like the same guy. I have fond memories of Hack. RIP Shah.

Watching some of these AWA's and I have to ask, who is "Bun Boy" Barton and why isn't he a legendary jobber meme?

I was wondering, do any bars show PPV post network? I remember seeing quite a few back in the day as a way to save money with friends but I have no clue how that would work now. I know the bar has to pay a pretty sum to show them.

"Little" Larry Nelson. I need every episode of AWA Superstars. The series of clips in the beginning with Larry in a clown wig sealed the deal.

Damn, glimpses of 2005 Joe tonight. Super solid episode of NXT tonight. Or as Chad Gable would say, sick.

Off the top of my head, Hillbilly, Vader, Sid, I'm sure there's plenty more.

Damn, I see the new Crockett TV but no category for SMW or Mid-South. Amazon Fire TV. Anybody else having this problem?

I'm a few beers deep and in the early stages of a food coma and I can't wait to get home and check out Paul Jones Army vs Jimmy Valiant on that new upload on the network. Happy Thanksgiving everyone and thanks for making this place the best!

Maddox and Rose just debuted a new gimmick on Main Event, that's odd.

I got a real kick out of "grizzled salty veteran" Zack Ryder. "Dude, I'm 30!" Where did the time go?

Overall they used a lot of fresh faces tonight and I approve. Guys like Goldust and Rusev coming back from injuries and then guys like Swagger and Slater who never get TV time outside of the C-Shows. They even gave The Lucha Dragons a little bit of promo time. Its too bad there's so many injuries right now but the show did feel fresher than its been.

THE RED X!!! I vividly remember getting THE RED X as late as 1996. I live in Upstate NY and we used to get CKWS TV (Canadian channel) that would have their own version of the syndicated shows. The always aired months late, at least two or three months after the original air date. They would talk about how Ultimate Warrior is on his way back to the WWF when in real time he had already left the company. Anyways, I remember they were very sensitive about violence. Anytime a chair was used, they would flash the red X and I think they may have also freezed the screen on occasion. It became something of a running gag between me and my friends where we would guess which parts of the show would be censored months later on the Canadian version.

Does anybody else see the early seeds of a Shield reunion? I can totally see The Authority pushing Rollins aside to go with Sheamus. Rollins is "weak" and dropped the ball, etc. And if there's one thing I'm looking forward to for WrestleMania it's Xavier Woods hair. The dude has been going all out on PPV and everyone knows Mania is where everyone brings their best look. I'm expecting something insane like Princess Leia buns or a scale replica of The Alamo.

Ultimate Warrior action figures were so awesome that they were even making them when Warrior was on the WWE shit-list, Jakks being a separate deal from WWE itself. Kamala also had some great figures.

Sid fist bumping fans

Tenryu and Kitao. Played completely straight. I've seen stranger entrances in Japanese wrestling.

Nope. There really was nothing to that Perfect run outside of the initial Rumble buzz.

Who knows what's true and what isn't, but it seemed like the tearing up was coached, like she was told to pause for effect and show some emotion. I think it was real just based on how odd the entire thing came off. She did seem pretty shaken up a few minutes before she even started talking about Reid. And when it looked like she was about to lose it, she backed away and continued cutting her promo with her back to the camera, a big no-no in WWE. Seemed like a combination of things, she's an emotional Flair so she was all choked-up about getting the main event slot on Raw, she's not that type of a promo yet so she was getting emotional about tripping up, then you just add the Reid situation on top of all that and it was a recipe for disaster. I don't think she was forced to do this segment or anything, but they really needed some controls in place to move this thing along in the event of it flying off the rails.

Well, they've established that Charlotte got into wrestling for her dad and her brother, so I don't think it's exploitative or as disgusting as some. But I really don't think Charlotte is the person to be cutting these types of promos yet. Real emotion is great but that segment felt like it was going to completely unravel at any second. It was a little too real. Paige played her part fine but they probably could have used Cole to help move things along just in case. Just an uncomfortable segment, probably one of the strangest Raw segments I've ever seen.

Bockwinkel is one of those rare guys that's so easy to "get" no matter what your age is or what your tastes in wrestling are. All time great and a legendary performer. RIP Bock.

I just hope that whoever wins this thing doesn't win by joining the Authority because then we're just going back to the same old. If a crowd favorite does take it leading to an immediate Sheamus cash-in, that's also same old. They honestly have NOTHING to lose by trying something different. This just makes me bummed that Rusev is hurt. This tournament was made for him. This would have cemented him as a star and we would also have a monster heel champion who is just a heel's heel without Authority ties. Like Brock's run without the four month long breaks for deer season.