Parties

It speaks to one reason to have 30 writers on staff: keep grousing midcarders at a distance from the decision makers.

On a much smaller scale promotionally, but Yuki Ishikawa (BattlARTS) and Daisuke Ikeda (FUTEN)?

Weird situation with King of the Ring where it was kind of announced last night as a flashed logo, only to have the first half of the tournament tonight and the second half live Tuesday on the network. 1st round is: Dean Ambrose vs. Sheamus Neville vs. Luke Harper R-Truth vs. Stardust Dolph Ziggler vs. Bad News Barrett Feels like an obvious win for Barrett as an extension of his character, and an appetite suppressant for lack of an IC title picture right now. Sheamus has already won one of these and none of the other options make sense, unless they want Ambrose to become even more of a comedy goof. Also kind of odd that we've seen so many of the potential finals (Barrett-Ambrose, Barrett-Neville, Ziggler-Sheamus) in recent weeks. For novelty alone I'd be inclined to go heel v. heel in the finals and just have Sheamus and Barrett lariat each other for 10 minutes.

I believe at the time Meltzer said it was Michaels' belief that the company needed to "take the move back" and that he was the one leading the charge.

Bad main event which spoke to them not knowing what to do with Orton right now. He's in a weird spot where they feel obliged to push him when what he needs is a blood feud in the midcard. Pair him with Wyatt, get him out of the title picture. Rollins vs. random midcarder would be better than this. The Kane focus is that Vince loves him and he's a model company man, yes?

I'd have him above the Ascension, and Adam Rose if memory serves. His motivator schtick works live as a comedy heel - exuberant guy who's clueless and running around as chickenshit. As Bray Wyatt Lite he's a hack.

This is shaping up to be one of Big Show's best ECW title defenses.

Bad finish and Lana and Rusev def. shouldn't split, but I didn't hate that as a PG strap match. They did what they could uber-safely. I wasn't expecting an ultraviolent, bloody chain match where someone gets Roddy Piper hearing loss, and company seems against choking of any kind. Where does Rusev go from here? Would be great with Bryan once he's healthy.

The post-match rudo work from Sheamus was awesome. Best heel they have right now. Nattie's costumes getting more grandiose as the manager of popular heels has been great as well. Were Owen/Davey cheered as heel team? Title change felt like a good 1997 deal where genuinely annoying guys would win with genuine heat. Reality era version of New Age Outlaws or Billy & Chuck winning. Really good match. As a PG version of an Attitude era show, this has been really entertaining.

I love Sheamus as recklessly stiff heel giant who hates junior heavies, with the hope that he's not actually taking years off of said dudes. Some of those drops looked vicious. Kind of a badly executed flash pin by Ziggler, but the right idea for a finish. Match was a reminder of how good Sheamus was in 2013-14 in trio tags and elsewhere. Pressing questions: Can I roll a joint in time, before hashtags and the announce team overtake us?

So goofy watching this WWE approximation of sports broadcasting after UFC last night. Corny pregame panel notwithstanding, the finish to Neville-Barrett was very well done. Maybe not in the grand scheme of wrestling history, but in the grand scheme of Extreme Rules pre-shows. Barrett is a five-time IC champ. I just listened to the Wrestling Observer recap of Summerslam 2010. Amazing to think that Barrett was the leader of a bloodthirsty NXT heel faction about five years too early. That Kane segment was ridiculous, but I enjoy Tom Philips as the consummate pro tasked with bringing "We do apologize" order to absurdity.

At the time of Kobashi's '06 departure, I recall the best workers in the company being Misawa, Akiyama, Sano, and Takayama. SUWA's reign of terror was '05. The younger generation were not the ones I was excited about. April '06 had the really fun Akiyama-Inoue match, and I remember enjoying Misawa's title run (though the Morishima matches weren't his best). Even when Kings Road generation were falling apart, the mentors still had more fire than their proteges.

On paper it's a better card than Mania. Booking-wise, it's all deeply flawed: everything feels low stakes, arbitrary, or redundant. But the bell-to-bell potential of the matchups coupled with the usual Chicago crowd gives me hope.

Current thinking seems to be that they want a lot of workers on the show every week. But yes, a 15 minute six-man tag would almost always be better than three 5 minute singles. Fandango's win seems residual after his big UK response. Face turn? I could see him as the new Santino. Naomi asking aloud if wins and losses still matter anymore is some expert trolling.

I wasn't aware that he had suffered countless concussions in ROH. Seems like I've heard Sapolsky dodge the question when asked about guys working hurt, so if that was a recurring issue, that obviously sucks. My point was that Bryan's smart/talented enough to work much safer matches than he currently does. Cooler offense that would better protect his head and neck. Even from a viewer entertainment perspective, it's stuff I like more than top rope headbutts and headdrop powerbombs. He's not like a Ziggler type with a broken motor who can only work at one 100MPH speed.

When he was on the indies, the best things in his act were his heel work, his matwork/MMA influence, selling, and getting small packages and abdominal stretches over. He had some very stiff matches in those years, but his best stuff was rooted in character. He had the intelligence and athletic prowess to understand what was getting over. If anything he was a model for how to work a safe, long-term style.

double post/wrong thread/Bryan is being discussed everywhere.

True, but Nitro's early days (say 95-97) were always booked with a presentational gameplan that they more or less stuck to. They were always stacked shows. They at times booked too much rather than too little. But Bischoff as an announcer in particular was always really good at laying out at the top of the show what the night was going to be and why it mattered. As did Heenan, Tenay, Larry Z. They knew how to present a show that seemed to have forethought and hype behind it, and matches with high stakes. Which is what would happen in both a kayfabe and real world if Ted Turner was pouring millions of dollars into your company. Modern WWE is a billion dollar company presented with the loose ambivalence of your office's talent show.

This is just the inverse of my "utter love" thread comment about TV time remaining, but: it's a drag how much modern wrestling TV (really just WWE/TNA) is presented as if each week's main events and other big matches are being booked on the fly in the middle of the show. The Authority coming up with 11EST's main event during their 8pm promo. Segments which lead to matches thirty minutes later on the same show. Matches which Kane cancels and rebooks into a different match halfway through. From a kayfabe perspective, it's ridiculous that the show either goes live with little-to-no forethought, or that the would-be schedule is completely changed by workers walking into the ring with microphones to book themselves into feuds. With no thought of what would have happened had Randy Orton not decided to make a ten-minute speech at his own accord. It's so lazy and haphazard in a way that seems glaring to casual/non fans. Totally antithetical to the presentation of UFC, or stuff like Memphis/Mid-South/Crockett, in which the shows are presented as self-aware TV programs adhering to actual schedules, contendership, matchmaking, etc. All of which creates drama. You need that realism and structure not only to color in the nuances, but so that the chaotic moments actually feel chaotic. Time limits seem like such an obvious way to enhance TV right now, especially at a time of so much parity booking.

Best RAW in ages. Almost all matches, a lot of them good (if too short, to get everyone on the card). I liked this more than any week I recall leading into Mania. Lots of new storylines and guys in the mix, if only for one night. Naomi proved me wrong, cutting a solid heel promo backstage. They book crowd-pleasing shows in the UK. Even if the spoilers don't sound compelling, and the final segment was flat, this was entertaining throughout. Even Kane did well in a tough spot.

Intentionally didn't watch the first 30 mins to avoid the inevitable long boring promo. Instead it's a good Barrett-Cena match. RAW's unpredictable right now. Don't get Naomi as a heel. Not sure I get her as a face either, but this makes even less sense. That was a surprisingly fun Dragons-Ascension squash. I'm grading on a curve, but that was good mic work from Reigns. Said the right things to distinguish himself from Cena. A babyface whose gimmick is that he wants to kick ass and win titles. Cool.

HHH being the problem in like half of these examples is pretty amazing. One recent case that seems to have become prevailing wisdom is that Ryback could have ended Punk's long title run. Instead he lost three big title matches in a row, all due to blatant interference. I don't know if Ryback would have been much of an ace, but he had real fan momentum, and it seems better to try and fail than not try at all. Having him win it and go into Mania 29 as champ made a lot more sense than the Rock getting it just to add the belt to a Cena-Rock match that didn't need it.

Did he actually write that somewhere in the Observer? I only heard him on the radio show saying that he initially thought it was one of the 2 or 3 best Manias, and that it was one of the best shows he's attended live. And even that was something he seemed to dial back once he realized that much of the show wasn't as exciting on tape.

Booker and Batista still have heat? Goldberg-Jericho? Sid-Arn?

Reigns being the guy who runs off the Authority through hellish Walking Tall destruction could actually be the thing that makes him who they want. Poor man's Austin beats poor man's Vince. HHH losing to Reigns at Summerslam with some Loser Leaves Town stip would be a big pop in Brooklyn of all places.