PeteF3

That was great on all levels. Perfect fuck finish.

Pretty much no public attendance numbers for any event of any kind are legit. Though you can figure legit numbers from the WWE's SEC filings.

Asuka's streak should not end on a bells-and-whistles cheap screwjob where all the heat is put on the promotion and not her opponent. That would be Goldberg Redux. Whether it's Rousey, Charlotte, or someone else, when she's finally beaten it should be clean and decisive. But no, she shouldn't lose at WM at all, because you have a money match for next year if you keep her and Rousey both strong and unbeaten until then.

For someone who preaches positivity and fun you sure seem to have a real bug up your ass about what other people might enjoy. Here is the thing though. It would be one thing if this was revisionist historians trying to get to the bottom of conflicting reports and accounts of events, or new evidence coming to light in order to prove or disprove an urban legend. But this is more about crusades by anti-WWE PR spin machine types to flat out prove the WWE kayfabed (keyword there as opposed to a non scripted sport fudging numbers) their WM III attendance numbers. For no other purpose than to put up a big "GOTCHA! HA! HA! (that was meant to be in the voice of Nelson from The Simpsons). This is quite literally nothing like that. If anything Bix's argument (and mine as well) actually serves in the WWF's favor, because we're claiming there's *more* people there than the "real" number of 78.5K. I kind of wish 93,173 could just be ignored entirely, because neither the 78K believers or skeptics believe in it. Attendances are worked for every sporting event, wrestling event, concert, et al when released publicly--it's nothing unique to wrestling. But the figure's presence complicates the issue because a lot of the people supporting the 78K figure go by the argument, "Oh, you're just a WWF fanboy who believes what they tell you." No--both 93K and 78K can be wrong. This false dichotomy needs to be taken out back and shot.

If people are willing to believe they would inflate the number to seem more important, why wouldn't they believe that they would deflate the number to potentially save money on taxes? They weren't a public company at the time, so I could see internal financials being a little murky. Does WWE really have a reputation of doing something like that at any point in their history? When 32's attendance came out as 80k, no one seemed to think they might be fudging the taxes even though the official pictures don't make it look like anything near 1/5 of the arena is empty. If the main crux of the argument is that the arena "looks" at or near capacity in official photos and camerework, then that is some pretty poor evidence considering it's pretty much the job of the guys taking those pics to make the attendance seem as impressive as possible. There's no way they'd make it easy to see the empty seats scattered around the top level. 32 came when the company was publicly traded and they weren't going to play games like that. Wrestling has a long, long, LONG history that probably continues to this day of promoters claiming smaller houses than they actually drew when it came time to decide payroll or pay taxes. Also, compare and contrast this (also professional) photo of the Hoosier Dome at WM8. You can do all the camera tricks in the world, there are clearly more empty seats in the upper balcony and on the floor than there are at Mania 3. https://static01.nyt.com/images/2014/08/22/sports/Y-JP-MACUR/Y-JP-MACUR-master1050.jpg Here's the 1994 World Cup also at the Silverdome, also with a pro photographer at virtually the same angle, also with visible swathes of empty seats.

For someone who preaches positivity and fun you sure seem to have a real bug up your ass about what other people might enjoy.

Dave has also said the opposite--that the WWF came up with a number to "beat the Pope," which would be a hell of a feat considering the Pope's visit was September of '87. Granted, Basil DeVito said the same thing in the WM coffee table book.

I don't find that particularly likely. Especially since the number of football tickets available had to be known for blackout purposes.

Well, no, the point is that Meltzer and others insist that 78K is the actual attendance, not just paid attendance. Which doesn't pass the eye test unless someone can provide some compelling evidence that the Silverdome's 80,311-seat capacity is a work. To my knowledge, the WWF never, ever claimed that 93K was paid attendance.

I know there was some pretty intensely negative reaction to STWW's episode on Houston wrestling. I expect this to be tons better...and for Cornette to be able to ask Bruce questions without resorting to the Observer or a 3rd-party source.

Are we also forgetting that Moolah brought ZERO positive qualities as a performer and set back women's wrestling in the U.S. to a point where it's only now recovering? She has zero good matches, zero good interviews, was tangentially involved in maybe one good angle (the Richter feud, where Lou Albano did 90% or more of the heel work). It would be a disgrace to name it after her even if she lived up to the WWE's grandmotherly presentation of her. It would be akin to naming the Palme d'or at Cannes after Herschell Gordon Lewis.

The Other Arena guys were shitting on it back in the late '90s and I'm personally about the least indy fan on this board, maybe because it's so similar to the stuff I don't like about the series.

Yes, that turn sure made that young up-and-comer Curt Hennig, didn't it? Six months later he was about at the same level as Stevie Ray. Second Katie Vick. I haven't been a regular long-term viewer of Raw since.

Conrad tweeted that while there might be changes, WHW will be sticking around after all.