Big Pete

I actually don't mind the idea of FTR being so in-ring savvy that they reverse a lot of the usual sports entertainmenty Bucks spot and force the Bucks to wrestle a more intense match. The Bucks are capable and I think it would have made the rivalry seem more believable than this hokey 'Days of our Lives' nonsense the Bucks have been doing on BTE. In classic Cornette fashion, he did go too far with it and I don't blame anyone dismissing him out of turn, but the stuff before that could have worked. While I think fans by and large enjoyed the match, the general concensus suggests the match under-delivered. Outside of the tributes to Bullet Bob and Smothers, the last piece of content I enjoyed from Cornette was his response to Meltzer criticising his ROH run. I've said it before, but it's a period I'd really like to see them explore, even though it would require Brian Last to do some research prior to. I thought Cornette provided some nice explanations, I think the only elephant in the room is that fans weren't as enamoured by the roster and felt they could watch better talent on PWG or Dragon Gate USA. At a guess, I'd imagine a lot of the same situations that applied to the Bucks and Bobby Fish would apply here as well but it'd just be nice to have it on record that Jim couldn't sign the likes of PAC, Samuray Del Sol, Ricochet, Uhaa Nation, Jon Moxley, Willie Mack, Brodie Lee etc. when they had buzz and a lot of them went onto become big stars. Regardless, the criticism with ROH stems from the way he tried to book the Steen/Generico angle and basically forced it to be an unsanctioned match and when Steen lost he'd have to leave the company for six months to get into better shape when he was the most over guy in the company. The wrestlers and the fans saw that and it turned them off the company. So Jim likes to pretend he made Steen his biggest star and gave him this huge push, but he fought the fans the entire way with it. The biggest revelation to come out of it was that Cornette was planning Generico/Steen for Final Battle. I remember they shot the angle with Lethal and Steen which appeared to be the direction and fans hated it. Supposedly Generico was playing hard-ball so they shot that angle just as a back-up plan incase Generico pulled out at the 11th hour.

Please no. Agreed, more often than not the show has an uneven flow to it that makes it difficult to appreciate as a whole. I don't have an issue with giving these wrestlers an opportunity and letting them "play their music", they just need to be smarter with their formats so the show actually builds suspense and anticipation.

They booked themselves into a corner with that steakhouse debonair. Either it could have played out like a typical wrestling segment which who cares, or they could go big and get people talking. At least they justified the reason to do the whole bit beyond just dragging things out.

I thought it was a pretty ho-hum edition of Dynamite. It seemed like after a stressful PPV with the heat and all the injuries everybody took a day or two to compose themselves and just threw together this show that didn't really flow. Until I read about Miro, if you had have asked me the most significant fall-out of the show, it was the Bucks super-kicking Marvez. Just about everything else could have been gleamed from the PPV or is just mid-card hijinx. It really seemed like AEW buried the lead with Miro, not so much having him talk about brass rings or anything, but by putting him in a train wreck of a segment with Sabien. Instead of getting the sense that we're about to see Miro has to offer, it just seemed like he picked up where he left off. It also seems like another example of a modern wrestling company bringing in a star just to prop up a struggling talent. Outside of that...? I spose Dustin had a good showcase against Lee. He's been the real success story of AEW for me and appears to be in the best shape of his career. I didn't think the match did anything for Lee until the post-match where he got to low-blow Rhodes. I hope this match doesn't become the blueprint of Lee's reign, I think he should be more dominant but as a once off where he kicks a great in the balls after they put in a great performance was fine. Maybe it's just me, but modern wrestling is really struggling to find it's flow. In AEW in particular, it just seems like a public access television network where guys and girls fight for television time and they have a bunch of commentators riff over the top and try to make sense of everything. It doesn't go together as wellas it should and I find it difficult to get up for any of their matches. Again, I get the feeling that this week was just about getting back into the swing of things after a very difficult show. They planted a couple of seeds through out the show and I expect it'll lead to a better edition this week.

That was my own interpretation. I just listened to the clip again, Cornette said Rhett did all the work, while Kenny only wrestled once every three weeks and shook his dick in Las Vegas. He called him a lying sack of shit, a mud-show wrestler and he didn't apply himself full-time so he always remained fairly awkward while Rhett was always digging in.

I really want him to cover his time in ROH circa 2009-12. He touched on his relationship with the Bucks. Apologies for any inaccuracies, but apparantly the idea of this being an elaborate angle started in Global Force Wrestling, when Cornette was trying to be cordial in the locker room. The Bucks told the story and the IWC just ran wild with it, turning what was meant as a polite gesture into Cornette trying to earn a pay day which he says he doesn't need. He then went back to their ROH days. In 2011, the Bucks contacted Hunter about joining the promotion. Cornette gave the OK with the understanding that they wouldn't join until their contracts were up in TNA, but they sought an early release so there they were. Cornette didn't have time to come up with any plans for them since he was in the thick of Haas and Benjamin, the Briscoes and the All Night Express, but he still found room for them on the card. Anyways, those at Sinclair didn't want to fly in that many wrestlers and considering their spot on the card, the Bucks were getting paid too much to begin with. They were a prelim tag team, yet were making more money than the main eventers when you factor in additional expenses. Furthermore, they struggled to follow instructions and when they were told to ease up on the comedy spots they were caught flat footed. Cornette went into detail about the pay scale and gave the example of the All Night Express. Despite Rhett doing most of the work, he was only getting paid $150 per shot, while Kenny King was on $350 despite being lazy and Cornette tried to rectify that discrepency. Where I disagree with Jim is that he went couldn't figure out how the fans could take the Bucks seriously against the likes of the Briscoes, Haas and Benjamin, The Kings of Wrestling (who were basically gone by the time the Bucks came in, Hero worked a couple more shots while he worked on his elevated enzymes), American Wolves (who were being broken up, much to the chagrin of both performers) and hilariously enough The All Night Express, the over-pushed team ROH fans put up with. I can understand the Bucks not fitting his aesthetic and being more fiscally responsible, but to say they're not on that level is just absurd.

It remains to be seen, but Cornette appears to be done with AEW after Double Or Nothing.

Spicolli would ride with the Kliq whenever they got split into A and B tours, the Kliq were fans of his work and Hall wanted to give him that rub in WCW. I'd like to think he would have continued as a journey man wrestler. Louie would have continued working with Hall before Scott took time off, then he'd find himself working main events on Thunder, mostly taking the falls against the Wolfpac and Diamond Dallas Page. He'd get frustrated but Terry Taylor would be a fan and he'd draft him over to the WWF where he would become somebodies lackey. It would only last a hot minute before he'd find himself in ECW, he'd have a nice run and turn a few heads earning him a WWF re-call where he would have one memorable backstage segment before being released in one of those big releases. He'd find himself working all those outlaw shows circa 2002-04 with a few international tours on the side. He'd then quietly semi-retire and become a trainer with a good rep before he leaves one of the majors and opens up his own school. He'd release one great shoot interview which would have made him another cult legend and that would be that.

The whole Becky Lynch diatribe just came across half-cocked. Like others have pointed out, Jim was under the impression that Becky Lynch has been portrayed as a Stone Cold type when really she just comes across as her own person. If anything, her sharing this moment with the world in the fashion she did felt on par with the character. The WWE actually handled it well and while the carnies wanted there to be an angle, that moment attracted just as much if not more attention since it came across as real. If half the roster was pregnant maybe I'd understand the need to have the conversation but the whole diatribe just came across ill-informed. To their credit, they addressed the situation again and while it began with Corny going 'y r u so mad tho' they did walk back a couple of points. Last pointed out Hulk Hogan took time out to be there with Linda for the birth of their first child in '88 and Jim walked back his point about money because of the nature of guaranteed contracts. The lesson of this whole fraccas should be gathering all the relevant information before going off, but Corny is going to keep being Corny. I'll echo Thread Killer's sentiments around Jim's improvised Archer promo, that was fantastic and he delivered a similar one not that long ago for Jacob Fatu that was also really good. While Jim does go 'full Corny' on Omega from time to time, I don't think it's completely unjustified. By design, Kenny is going to get a reaction out of you. Either you love the overly goofy tongue in cheek highly acrobatic style of wrestling or he's so over the top it's difficult to get invested emotionally. It reminds me of a story Raven shared on a shoot interview where he got mad at Stevie because he delivered his 'Big Dick Dudley' joke wrong. Instead of acting oblivious, Stevie winked at the camera which hurt the joke entirely and Stevie for the life of him couldn't understand why. Omega is constantly winking at the camera like a Looney Tunes character, rarely letting himself get lost in the moment.

I listened to the March 2010 edition and while Bischoff was very careful to point out that he was only involved in Hogan's creative, it's worth mentioning that took up more than half the show. We're not talking about Paul Heyman handling a 10-20 minute self-contained portion of the show, the whole complexion of the company changed when Hogan was brought in. It was no longer TNA Wrestling, it was Hulk Hogan's TNA Wrestling, with Hogan as this drill seargent trying to whip these boys into shape all while juggling his friends who were all trying to corrupt him and run a bad show, which they succeeded in, both in kayfabe and in reality. Otherwise, like others I'm invested since this is a promotion that hasn't been talked to death and I have fond memories watching and pulling a part the shows 10 years ago.

The problem was that the old ROH model wasn't sustainable. The promotion was a money hole and Sinclair was sending himself broke before they sold to Sinclair with the idea that they could have a relatively low cost promotion that could help drive ratings and attract sponsers in the long term. The move was always going to alienate the old contingent of ROH fans to some extent but that was fine because ultimately they were trying to reach a wider audience that enjoyed Pro Wrestling and didn't like the Sports Entertainment both WWE and TNA were producing at that time. The issue is that Sinclair didn't come through on their end and the production was terrible and to make matters worse their streaming service which was to make the entire promotion far more accessible couldn't get their act together. Whatever publicity ROH was generating at the time was completely over-shadowed by those issues. What ultimately cost Jim his job is that he was a ticking time bomb and eventually he was going to explode. Jim didn't have the composure to manage the transition and things came to ahead because Sinclair didn't show enough interest in the product. It was one thing to give them dodgy equipment and not support their vision of having a headquarters, but when none of them went out of their way to assist the most respected wrestler in the locker room, Jim lost control and it was for the best for everyone that he moved on. However, he's a key reason why ROH is still around today and he really wasn't wrong on a lot of wrestlers. His biggest mistake was the Young Bucks and letting them walk to PWG because they didn't fit his aesthetic. Stuff like Severn or the ether rag were neither really here nor there by comparison.

Actually this is wrong. The heat started because Kevin Steen released an ROH Straight Shootin DVD that managed to piss both Cornette and Richards off. Steen was heavily critical of Cornette's 'cheesy' booking and called Davey Richards a dud champion because he was more committed to NJPW than ROH. These comments were supposed to be cleared with Richards before it was released, but Davey found out later and returned to receipt calling Kevin lazy. Things developed from there but eventually Kev picked up the phone the two hashed it out and released a highspots DVD together because that's wrestling. I've been watching their shoot interview to remind myself of Steen's criticisms. He had general criticisms like Cornette relying on run-ins and using lame slogans like 'The Battle of Richmond' to sell PPVs, but the biggest criticism was his feud with Davey. Kev didn't like how Davey was being booked as Jim's lap-dog and how Steen would hit him with all these home truths and Richards had to take it and be a company guy. Kevin felt Jim was out of touch because he gave Steen carte blanche to say anything he wanted but didn't extend the same courtesy to Davey. Then when the fans turned on Davey and started cheering Steen, he couldn't believe that Jim wanted to keep him full blown heel. Outside of his booking, Kev just couldn't believe Jim's temper and gave his own version of the Corino incident which was ultimately the last show Cornette worked. As the EMTs were loading Corino onto the stretcher Jim was losing his mind in the background and making life difficult for the EMTs. Steen jokingly said they'll probably have to comeback for Jim which they weren't happy about and they said they'd get one of their partners to do it because there's no way they'd want anything to do with that lunatic. For Kev, that was a typical Cornette meltdown and he was surprised by how put off regular people were. As for Delirious being the booker, that was true initially and the boys were happy with the arrangement. However over time, Jim took control over everything including the booking which is when Steen started having issues.

That's interesting, I only started following Generico late in his independant run so I only really know him for his work in ROH, Chikara and PWG. Cornette saw Generico as one of the biggest stars on the roster, the problem is that to an attract a larger audience you need somebody to cut promos. ROH had a real dearth of quality promos on the roster, so he needed his stars to be able to be willing to talk. It was fine when Generico was facing Steen who could do enough talking between the two of them, but when he needed Generico to feud with other wrestlers like Roddy it could be a problem. Again, Jim was happy to sign Generico to a contract until Generico rejected them so he could join the WWE.

Generico could have been booked better but he was still figured pretty highly on the card. At the first Final Battle Jim was in charge of Steen/Generico was the main event and Generico was consistently booked in marquee matches all the way till Wrestlemania Weekend 2012 where they were trying to re-sign him to a contract but Generico rebuffed them so he could sign with the WWE. So they capped the Steen/Generico rivalry there with a Last Man Standing match most fans didn't get to see because GoFightLive couldn't get their act together. There were some aspects of Generico's run that could have been handled better in my opinion. I wasn't a fan of how they had him drop the TV title to Lethal in a babyface vs. babyface deal because it hurt Jay and put an unnecessary mid-card stink on Generico, especially when he found himself working three-ways with Lethal and Bennett. However, he was basically out of the door and at that time it was Davey's time. Not to mention Steen wanted to return ASAP after losing a Mask vs. Career match. Cornette was happy to go along with the stipulation with the idea that Steen would come back in better shape and help drive the product forward, but Steen didn't get it and couldn't understand why Cornette wouldn't want to use somebody of his star power. When Steen came back, he lost some weight, some not all and disappeared again because he was an outlaw and he'd only work the big shows. The next time Steen returned, he was even heavier than he was when he was initially fired. Even so, Cornette still went ahead with his run towards the title. The whole situation came to a head when Steen and Richards did a shoot interview together on highspots to settle their differences and they both buried Cornette when all three of them were working together in the same promotion. Some of the complaints they had were valid, but it was completely unprofessional to do that, not to mention counter-intuitive to the business. Jim didn't even bother to bring up the mask thing, all he asked was for Generico to cut promos because they were on television and needed to connect with a mass crowd and Generico refused. It's worth mentioning despite hating the gimmick and finding him a pain in the ass to deal with he still wanted to sign Generico to a ROH deal but Generico became skiddish because he was chasing a WWE deal so they moved on. As far as his choice of main event talent, it's hard to say for sure since he's never really gone into detail about his plans, but I believe Eddie and Davey were merely placeholders while he worked the roster into shape. Cornette was clearly high on Lethal and I wouldn't have been shocked if the plan was to put the title on him at Final Battle, for better or worse.

Richards was the biggest star in the company and if anything was over-due for a reign. The reason why Jim didn't pull the trigger sooner is because Richards was always one step off from becoming a firefighter or a paramedic or a full-time NJPW talent. In hindsight his reign was a disappointment and Richards always had his vocal detractors, but the fans who followed the product were into his Best in the World 2011 victory. Jim had no control over Richards' antics outside of ROH. In fact that was one of the biggest gripes Jim had during his time with the company where he had this talented in-ring wrestler who had the ability to be a fantastic in-ring worker but he was always doing and saying some real silly shit. It wasn't Cornette's best work, but it wasn't as terrible as the diehards pretended it was either. A lot of decisions were blown out of proportion, like they were representative of every booking decision the company was coming up with and ignore a lot of the good work the company was doing at the time. A lot of the guys who were pushed during this period like Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, Michael Elgin, Tommaso Ciampa went onto become the backbone of the company and the product had a clear aesthetic which went by the wayside when Delirious was left to his own devices.

Jim didn't run ROH into the ground. He was a key figure behind their deal with Sinclair which helped get them out of the hole they found themselves in after Gabe. The problem was Sinclair didn't live up to their side of the bargain and the production quality of ROH was rotten. Furthermore their PPV provider GoFightLive was completely unreliable and all of their major shows had terrible issues. The shows would review well on replay, but nobody was willing to order them because they would be throwing their money away. The biggest mistake Cornette made during his time is that he let the Young Bucks walk. The Bucks actually received a nice push coming off their TNA run, but by 2012 they had seemingly fulfilled their purpose and Jim was happy to move along and book the All Night Express as his ace tag team. Kenny King would later walk out on the company after winning the ROH Tag Team titles and the Bucks would go onto become the biggest draws on the scene. Whether the Bucks fit the aesthetic Jim was going for or not, over is over and their departure sent the message that Jim was behind the times.

Cornette finally gets the Network and they have all these amazing hidden gems and documentaries they can go through and the four best choices they can come up with is a gawdy reality tv show, one of the most revisionist documentaries the WWE has ever produced, a horrible 80s wrestling spin-off and since Cornette didn't make himself clear the first dozen or so times another NXT review. Ruthless Aggression actually won the poll, but it was such a close call that Cornette decided to go with Legends House first and would review the Ruthless Aggression documentary at a later show. Surprisingly Cornette actually enjoyed the pilot episode of Legends House if only because he got to watch his contemporaries once again and if you give them a chance they'll make good television. I voted for the RA doco with the hope that he'll expand on this period from an OVW perspective. I thought his recent review of the FCW documentary was even better than the documentary itself and painted a better picture of what was going on.

Unfortunately yes, Dean has Parkinson's. He announced it during his panel at one of the Starrcasts after he couldn't hold up his microphone properly. It looked pretty tragic, but Dean had a great sense of humour about it and gave a much better interview than the one he gave for RF videos where Feinstein kept asking about Benoit even though Dean was clearly uncomfortable. I believe that's one of the reasons he left the WWE, because he was finding it difficult to keep up with their schedule with his condition. He also loves The Miz, which may have been more surprising than the Parkinson's announcement.

I felt for Chris during his 2012-16 run. The WWE had an all-time legend on their roster and they never did anything to make him feel special. They bring him back for the Royal Rumble and instead of bringing him in hot and having him go over to set up a dream match with Punk, they have him lose to Sheamus. They still ran the Punk-Jericho match anyways, but instead of it being a significant match, it paled in comparison to Cena-Rock and HHH-Taker III. What makes it worse is that Jericho and Punk actually came up with ideas to sell their rivalry but they fell on deaf ears so you just ended up with this blah match. Then Jericho puts over Ziggler and goes away only to come back and find himself in a program with Fandango. It was a prepostoruous match up and not surprisingly it stunk the joint out. They kept him around for a match with CM Punk who was returning from a break who clearly didn't want to be there just so Jericho could put him over and put his lackluster year behind him. That was how it went for the remaining years. Jericho would return, do his greatest hits and put over whoever they needed to. The only exception was when they had him go over AJ Styles at Wrestlemania. However, in typical fashion, it backfired on Jericho and the planned Jericho-Reigns feud that had been building since Night of Champions 2015 was put on the shelf for Styles-Roman which would save Styles' run. None of these events helped Jericho in any shape or form and while he had his share of mistakes they would have been easily avoided if he was treated like a Shawn Michaels calibre star. Instead he's the proto-Ziggler - the guy who built a great reputation with the fans, only to get the ball yanked away from it time after time after time only for the fans to lose interest. Leaving the WWE was one of the best decisions he's made in the last decade or so.

Jindrak was the unlikely star of the Evolution episode. I was always curious to hear what the story was about the promotional shoots and the only story we heard is that HHH put the kabosh on the plans. Now we know why and as unbelievably silly as their antics sounded, they actually have video proof of these two doing their barnyard toy act. To Mark's credit, he didn't take it personally on Twitter and it was cool to finally have some closure on it.

I just can't remember anybody of Cena's type being fired outright. Even guys like Sean O'Haire, Mark Jindrak, Nathan Jones, Bull Buchanan etc. had a couple of stints in OVW before they were let go and usually their behaviour played a large role. From all reports, Cena was a model student who worked incredibly hard to overcome his deficiencies. With his natural charisma, I just can't see the WWE actually going through with it. I don't deny the reports mind you, I just think it was speculation and the company was never really going to go through with it. If things got really bad and they had to re-think the brand split, maybe, but there were a slew of washed up talents and addicts that had to go before him.

It's just difficult to accept that the WWE would give up on Cena entirely when it's clear from his OVW tapes that the guy had a ton of personality and they had barely scratched the surface with him. I could see him being relegated to OVW, but fired altogether? I just think it makes for a better story in hindsight.

Jim has dropped his NXT reviews. He didn't hate the show, he just found himself bored and kept making the same points over and over again. Everything that involved the Undisputed Era was great, he liked some of the other acts like Keith Lee. Otherwise the show didn't do a lot for him. So he's turned his attention to Raw and spoilers he hates it. The show doesn't make him appreciate AEW more, rather it makes him want to quit reviewing modern wrestling altogether but the show is everything he hates about modern wrestling. Too contrived, too slow, nobody is getting themselves over like stars and nothing seems to be happening in general. What really set Jim off is Seth Rollins. Cornette has been an advocate of Rollins since they worked together in ROH but he hates the Monday Night Messiah gimmick and thinks they've just paired him up with a bunch of job guys. He specifically hated the name Murphy and believes Vince is just trying to bury him with that name. He couldn't believe fans were into the Kabuki Warriors and wondered how woke Twitter wasn't pulling that apart given how racist and stereotypical the gimmick was coming off. I think his most interesting observation involved Ivar and how he should be booked like Bam Bam Bigelow and allowed to go on a tear. He was a huge fan and wanted them to drop the Viking Raiders gimmick pronto. I don't think I've ever heard a past legend ever really pull for Ivar/Hansen before but I can see his point and agree he'd be a much better star than Erick Rowan.

Skip it, Rob just talks about weed and his relationship history.

I loved how they had Hogan on there going 'WWE? That will never work, brother' like Vince was on the cutting edge of innovation. It wasn't like they needed to twist it around to suit the story either, the name change was just another in the long line of losses that led to this new era. I also enjoyed the WWE's version of the Invasion era. Forget about turning Austin heel, the real reason for the decline is that Shawn Stasiak and Buff Bagwell weren't believable superstars. Nevermind the fact they could have signed all the WCW stars if they wanted to, or they completely squandered the few stars they did have. Guys like Diamond Dallas Page and Booker T didn't stand a chance and there was no reason why they had to rush it. The documentary also went soft on Austin. I'm not surprised they didn't touch the Debra incident since it doesn't fit the vibe of the documentary, but the way they positioned the documentary, it was like they went to great lengths to justify Austin's position. I guess Austin has apologised for it that many times they're happy to accept some of the blame, but in a documentary that treated their name change as a milestone instead of what it was, was fascinating. So far the star of this documentary for me is Gerwitz. It's nice to see him back in the WWE family and I think he's doing a really good job of telling the story. If you haven't listened to it, I'd highly recommend his episode of the Edge & Christian podcast. His stories about the type of writing kicks Vince would have them go on were hysterical, especially with how it all panned out in one instance with Flair/Batista. But yeah I was genuinely curious to see how the WWE would treat this period. I see it as a really bittersweet moment for the company where they made stars out of John Cena, Randy Orton and Batista but it was really trying time for the company all the same.