dawho5

Going back to DSoTR stuff, I have gone through the end of season 3. As a Benoit fan, his two episodes were super depressing. Then I watched the Dynamite Kid episode. So many thoughts... 1. If people were saying that DK was going to put himself in a wheelchair with his style at the time, this had to be common talk in the locker room when a lot of the younger, smaller guys were chomping at the bit to do that stuff. And there had to be some of that same "you guys just want to stay on top" pushback from those guys. I'd have to guess that smaller guys in wrestling (220-230 pounds or less) had beenfacing that issue for decades. 2. How many people had to try to warn Benoit about the price he was going to pay for what he did? There is no way he didn't know by about 2 or 3 years in that he was going to destroy his body. 3. Eddie as his best friend and the guy who had his ear did fail a bit in the sense of that last point. Very likely because he had the same problems with not giving up on the dream. Maybe it is better to have friends with different viewpoints that you really trust. It's awesome when people back you up, but there is a point where you need some constructive criticism. 4. What kind of crazy stuff did Eddie talk him out of? Don't answer that, I don't want to know. 5. End of the day, my belief is that a combination of CTE, his own drug and alcohol abuse, the enormous stress of trying to live in the world he did and succeed and an almost superhuman drive worked very much against Benoit. Having drive is great, but you need to step back and look at things objectively too. He was willing to sacrifice anything and everything for his chosen profession. It made him great at that one thing. But the cost was his physical and mental well-being, his life and any legacy he may have had beyond horrible. Nothing is worth that cost. In a way I think that the whole 90s wrestling style (which I loved at the time and is absolutely aesthetically pleasing as wrestling, was a horrific experiment for the people involved. Dynamite Kid is one of the guys who inspired it and kudos to him for being a pioneer. But there is something to the older styles that leave the workers room to have some kind of physical and mental well-being and still get over. Not that wrestling has been overly kind to many wrestlers on the mental side due to all of the sleazy folks involved.

Looked like Steinborn was an undercard vet leading a young guy through a quick TV match. Nothing overly good or at all bad, just a solid midcard match. Apollo comes off well here, even if his style is a little too NWA for PR at the time. Was it common to have the young native babyfaces come up showing they could do the grappling against the Americans before they got into the heavy brawls and blood stuff?

On rewatch, this match would not have been out of place as a Memphis undercard match. The hot tag was a little rushed, but I think we're used to matches with enough time to make the cutoffs like the Midnights would do possible. This was the 9 minute version of that formula, and done as well as could be in that time.

Not only way past the expiration point, but letting it splinter only to re-form it pointlessly.

I enjoyed Colon's way of keeping things moving early as Flair tries his normal stuff in front of a crowd that doesn't necessarily care for extended working of holds. He's careful not to let anything sit to long without switching things up. It may seem disjointed to somebody who watched the mainland territories a lot, but it was necessary to keep the crowd involved. Colon is a really good opponent for flair with the high energy style and I really wish we had more of these 2. I honestly didn't expect a real finish given this was title vs. title.

I also loved the interview prior to the match. Just a lot of fun. The match was a really fun Flair title defense against a clear underdog. I kind of like seeing Flair on offense more and mixing things up a bit. Nothing against the classic Flair formula, but sometimes you like to see the other stuff too. Gilbert shows a lot of fire in the shine and the comebacks, which I really like.

I'd agree Bischoff is presented maybe more favorably than he might have been at the time. If you had given me that kind of power when i was in my mid-30s I probably would have been more insufferable than I was, which is saying something. Also, I've worked in a corporation for a while now. If you find more than 3 or 4 people who actually care whtether or not you succeed and are willing to stick their neck out for you past a certain level you are very lucky. Bischoff was a middle manager in a large corporation. He never saw himself as a promoter or booker. He didn't care about the history of the wrestling business. All he ever cared about was how wrestling could make better TV. That's what he felt his job was. So I get the criticisms from a wrestling fan's perspective. I have the same criticisms. And I think there are parts he is perfectly willing to leave in the past because they aren't necessarily in his favor. We all have those. At the end of the day, with what WWF was doing at the time with the Attitude stuff I question if WCW could ever have beaten them at that game. Turner would have had some things to say about that stuff going on their TV. They would have had to go back to being second and maybe make some money doing a better in-ring show, but not really challenging the WWF. I tend towards the corporate espionage theory, but how much of a degree it affected things may have been amplified? That one will forever be unanswered unless Stu Snyder, Jamie Kellner or Brad Siegel decide they need to make a WCW deathbed confession. I also think we'd still have made it to where we are today because of the influence of Japanese & Lucha Libre styles of wrestling was just starting to become a part of the DNA of young wrestlers. Luckily a bunch of great wrestling from when I liked it was captured on video!

Back in the day I blamed Bischoff almost entirely. Now I think there was a lot going on. First, Starrcade 1997 started all the dominos falling. And for all of Bischoff's whitewashing, you don't throw away a year and a half angle because Sting comes in not looking excited. Not saying he wanted to or didn't object to Hogan's decision. He probably did, but unlike Russo understood the legal ramifications of "creative control". And since Hulk is is friend he doesn't necessarily hold it over his head. Nash over Goldberg, Bischoff actually won me over on that. Goldberg was most certainly not going to keep squashing the main event guys. How do you make that work? His admission that the booking after and surrounding it might have been better went a ways towards my acceptance there. Maybe make the guy an attraction at PPVs and the Nitro before the PPV. Might pop some ratings when you need them too. Nash defending the FPoD as a "surprise" is all well and good. Not all surprises are good and I would bet even Bischoff (who seems to have engendered that idea of surprises in the first place) would agree. And the whole "Nash as booker because Eric was tired" thing is iffy at best. Not as reality, but as a good idea. There needed to be more of a process in determining that succession. It also speaks to certain wrestlers having Eric's ear a little more. As to all of the other wrestlers complaining about that, I don't buy it. You put Konnan or Booker in Hogan or Nash's shoes they would have had their own biases that ran towards selfish. They are not at fault for WCW going down, but that's a matter of circumstance. Most wrestlers defended their top positions well past the point of sanity. I'll go on record as saying that maybe a guy like Bret is different. But not many would be. Sting maybe as well. The Bret/Goldberg thing is silly. Bret had to know he was getting in with a guy who was not up to the normal standards he was used to. And he had to have heard how stiff Goldberg worked. Protect yourself. Goldberg should have known better than to throw the kick, which is probably not where the real issue came from anyway. You do what you know how to do, don't start throwing out new stuff randomly. Especially when it was a surprise to the other guy! And Bret continuing to wrestle after didn't do him any favors either. He's not 100% wrong about how things were handled in WCW. He's just not accepting his part of the problems he is still experiencing. Russo came long too late to kill WCW. It was on it's deathbed already. He still sucks, but it's not his fault. The whole David Arquette thing was just a horrible idea, but it's clear that Nash and Bischoff never really respected the NWA World Heavyweight Title and that's their prerogative. I disagree, but there's no way to make somebody understand that if they don't. I believe Nash when he says he didn't care after a certain point. My guess is he saw the writing on the wall and started doing stuff to amuse himself. I don't love him for that, but he's not wrong about Goldberg and the need to end the streak. Honestly here's the timeline for me. 1. Hogan gets a creative control -laced contract to come in and revitalize business. 2. WWF stars come in and the NWO deal starts, shooting the business up to the moon. 3. Slowly Bischoff learns how to manage it, with the help of some pro wrestlers who may or may not have an agenda. 4. Hogan decides not to go down clean. He did it before this, hard to believe it didn't happen again. 5. The WWF has started to take some of the ideas used to beat them and adapt them to their own purposes. As WCWs momentum slows, WWF is surging forward. 6. WCW starts trying old tricks and new tricks (Bischoff freely admits he went to the well too often on the NWO) to no avail. 7. WCW gets desperate and hires Russo, who now has no filter. This was never going to work, but it accelerates things. 8. Corporate finally gets their way and there is some shady stuff involving the sale.

I hate hardcore matches, but love violent brawls. Violent brawls between Abby and Carlitos are up there on that list too. Abby works really great for a guy his size, and I loved the ear work by Carlitos. After going through all the PR matches once I cringe anytime a heel wrestler is left alone near those tables with the crowd right there. This crowd was great, with a few different brawls breaking out during the one in the wrestling ring. Abby's elbow drops are amazing. I really hope that ref left after things settled down. I was a little worried for his safety after the decision he had just been a part of. The crowd was scared of Abby and gave him room to leave, but that ref....

Great match for many reasons listed above. The one thing I had thought was a fault (but later realized was in fact a huge strength) was Finlay's increasing use of slowdown tactics as the match went on. For an opener it seemed to be not really bringing the crowd up when you would want it to, but it made the pop for any Benoit offense at all so much bigger. The cutoffs near the end serve increase that effect like cutting off a hot tag. If this hadn't been a match to put over the Benoit/Booker feud (read here, Benoit gets a big babyface win after the comeback) this would be better remembered for sure. That crowd would have eaten up a Benoit win.

Match was fine, but with too much brawling from Dean. I'll agree that it's not his forte (nor Jericho's really). I feel like the booking was off in forcing that kind of match when it was not a big strength for either guy. The end was interesting, but ultimately not great because Dean simply is not a "chairshots & dragging a guy around the arena" wrestler. He just didn't do well at all put in that spot, and knowing how he liked to wrestle it's not surprising.

I watched the highlights of the Cody vs. A.J. match and KNEW that wrestling had passed me by. They managed to take an I Quit match and kill the concept. It was everything bad about ECW plus everything bad about modern WWE. Every Kenny Omega/Bucks match I have ever seen looks like what would have been called a "spotfest" or "your turn/my turn" back when I was watching consistently in the 90s through late 2010s. I put down 10 bucks for Dragon Gate to watch what they were doing and it seems like they are less lucharesu and more NJPW juniors lite, with the standard elbow exchange that 99% of the workers using it besides the 5 Pillars get wrong. The whole idea was not that you should stand there and elbow each other to fill time. It was that Misawa had a killer elbow and would try to lure his rivals into giving him some extra damage while he was on the wrong side of things. If you're not Misawa or you aren't known for throwing killer elbows, you shouldn't be doing it. Especially if you are the small guy in a match.

There is a modern homage to the Spidey/Torch relationship that recreates a lot of the funny/awesome moments and takes off on the way the whole relationship works. I am not overly a fan of Spidey or Johnny Storm, but when you put them together they are amazing beyond belief.

Fun tag for sure. I liked the way that Hase and Kensuke actually worked the chinlocks instead of just sitting in them. The lariat/DDT transition basically guaranteed a Hash/Hoshu win, especially after Hash had DDTed Hase.

So one of Watts' big moves when he comes on is to kill the heel group that is as hot as the Horsemen ever was (DA) because he didn't like Heyman's contract? Given the lack of credible heels he is facing it might have been wiser just to eat that and continue to push the DA.

Great stunt from Barby with the bricks. I have no issue with him as a monster contending for the title. He would have made a good Hogan opponent with the right build.

Probably should have waited until Watts had some better wrestling clips to show honestly.

Horner looked really good here. Obviously he doesn't have the charisma to carry things himself, but with guys like DWB and Wright around all he has to do is hold up his end, which he does.

Corny and the Bodies make this. Not sure I like the idea of insulting Corny's mom even if he's got a lot coming his way.

So between this, the Bret interview and the time machine Backlund segment I am confused. Did this all air on the same show??? Every part of it seemed so different. And I know that you are supposed to have some variety on the show. It just seems like this segment is the more of-the-time WWF segment, Bret's interview was almost like a WCW babyface promo and the Backlund deal was trying to bring back the WWWF of the late 70s.

Great interview from Bret. He plays the humble champ so well. And puts Flair over!

Definitely out of place, but it fits Backlund.

Didn't love it, didn't hate it. The timing on some of those spots with the Cowboys and Misionerios in the third caida was something to see. Very fluid and well-done!

I enjoyed the opening a lot with Kikuchi showing some good offense beyond just the elbows. Sadly he is almost to the point to completely out of the main event picture. As is Ogawa, who has started to look better. Taue continues to shine and I love it. Kobashi is great and getting better, which is no surprise as 1993 is almost upon us. Misawa is good here, especially in that opening exchange with Jumbo. I thought it was a good sendoff for Jumbo. He wasn't a huge part of the match but got in all of the signature Jumbo stuff without anything feeling shoehorned in. Admittedly you might want something more spectacular, but I'm not sure he was up to a big singles match in the condition he was in.

I really loved this match. Great meat-and-potatoes work with some great limb selling by Flair. Easily one of my top 10 WWF matches I've ever seen. Since when does a guy get a title win in his dad's hometown? That's crazy talk.