PeteF3

Speaking as someone who has Herodes on ignore, it all seems like fair game to me. It's all public and it's all out there, and it's not 100% unrelated, either.

Slim Jim, IIRC. It was one of numerous things he discussed on that infamous AoW.

Or they can decide, as in the case of CM Punk, to simply deny him the commercial opportunity and then turn around and give them to somebody else (Cena, Big Show, Rey, and Eve Torres in his case).

It never seems to occur to these people that the economy and businesses might actually be *helped* if the rank and file actually have spending money of their own. But how it affects those poor, helpless "job creators" at large is a red herring anyway. The simple fact is there are specific criteria laid out for what constitutes an "independent contractor" and WWE wrestlers meet every single one of them.

Wow, THE Matt McEwen weighed on this to shoot it down? Amazing. Unprecedented. Wait...who is Matt McEwen again? I'm hearing directly conflicting info on whether this law is across-the-board or not, so I don't know what to believe. But some of the responses to Eric D. Anderson's tweets (the lawyer who Dave is RT'ing) do a more effective job of illustrating how WWE could argue against this law (like arguing that it's unconstitutional since it in theory regulates interstate commerce, which is under federal authority only). Edit: McEwen implies he spoke with an employment lawyer regarding this law. Which one? Who and when and where does he practice? I may be jumping to conclusions here but it sure sounds like Dave and Eric Anderson have had correspondence on this issue already and that Dave did in fact consult with him.

Wrestlers in 1970 and indy wrestlers of today really were/are independent contractors. Ones under exclusive deals aren't anymore.

I don't think this will kill indy wrestling in California, incidentally. Indy wrestlers are very much closer to being independent contractors than guys under contract to major promotions. There are also certain business size minimums (I think 24+ employees or more) that business would have to meet to be affected by this bill, which I don't think most indies qualify for.

I agree with JRH, but isn't there a story of some shady-looking guys coming up to Bruno offering to "take care" of Zbyszko for him? And Bruno having to beg for the dogs to be called off and assure them that he'd handle Larry in the ring himself?

Trying in vain to follow all these tap-dance-filled conversations has me on the verge of dying of an overdose of euphemisms. Someone let me know if some actual fucking facts come out.

I think we need more announced #1 contenders and fewer title shots won through multi-man clusterfucks and tournaments.

I believe Ladd & V lasted for just that first taping cycle. Clint raises a pertinent point--you really weren't meant to watch every last WWF show in those days. Things moved slowly enough that you could really stick to any one of the weekly TV shows and not miss much. I never got Challenge in my market until around when JR took over, and then for awhile Superstars was on an independent station that my cable company didn't carry until another year or so after that, so All-American ended up being my primary show, supplemented by Prime Time. I doubt any major angle or development took place that wasn't shown at least partially or in full on those two shows.

One other correction: it was All-American that became Action Zone, in 1994. Action Zone was mostly Challenge with an added feature match, a format that lasted for about a year when it became basically All-American all over again, a strict recap show. That lasted for about another year (all of these switches started roughly with the new fall season) when Superstars switched from syndication to USA. Superstars itself became a recap show in January of '97. At some point, I think in early-to-mid '86, Tuesday Night Titans moved to Friday nights and simply became TNT.

Why should we be launching a bullying investigation regarding Kylie Ray's disappearance and not Kacy Catanzaro's? Or Alex Koslov? Or Dennis Condrey or Brian St. John, for God's sake? People leave the wrestling business all the time. If you have something on this, spill the beans. The "I'm not saying, just saying" act reeks of 1994-era Mean Gene Okerlund. rovert, seriously, you should probably quit this argument while you're behind.

I think it actually did air, on the same episode of TV where the Giant did a moonsault.

Meltzer is reporting that AEW has signed Tony Schiavone.

Re: Austin...his real break was Bret asking to work with him upon coming back moreso than winning KOTR. I have a feeling he breaks out anyway and probably either gets another opportunity to drop the Austin 3:16 catchphrase or comes up with something else that catches on in a similar way.

Helmsley did a clean job to Jake's DDT and even got the snake treatment afterward, which almost never happened to pushed talent (even as a kid I noticed when Hercules got Damian at SummerSlam '88 and thought, "Wow, that's rare, Herc must be on his way out.") He also had a countout loss to Freddy Joe Floyd at one point. I do think there was something to the "burial"...but it's also known that he scored a lot of political brownie points for doing all that without complaint (as well as going along with Warrior's late demands to squash him at Mania 12), so it's hard for me to see it as HHH scratching and clawing his way back to the top, either.

That's almost an insult to Bay, though they both peaked "artistically" in the late '90s. Freidberg and Seitzer is probably a good comparison, though.

Orange Cassidy officially signed. I'd be less disheartened if they'd instead announced that the Librarians would be given a bye to the tag title tournament finals.

You seriously have to ask this? Why did Vince sign Brad Rheingans and Rod Tronguard away from the AWA?

Dave seemed pretty okay in the "real world" debate in his reaction to El Paso, but that's not very prowrestlingonly of me, I guess.

Well, they've announced a Hidden Gem for Thursday: the 1993 SummerSlam Spectacular (featuring Steiners vs. Money Inc. in a cage). Now to see where the hell this show actually ends up.

But why is AEW portraying itself as a heel promotion if that's the case? Haven't we had enough of that with all the reliance on evil authority figures in WWE and elsewhere? I'm also not sure what the target of the satire is--circa 1995 WWF occupational gimmicks? Is that a thing that was really begging to be taken down a peg in 2019? It seems slightly less up-to-date than Bill Clinton cigar jokes.

Who's "outraged"?