MikeCampbell

He just took a bunch of time off, from November or so until the day after Mania.

And yet, he still went over Orton on the PPV. Edit: Will beat me by a nose.

I'm not saying he would never have gotten it, but I'm having a hard time to figure out where he'd have gotten the strap. The night of the accident UT won it from Austin, and Austin won it back a month later. HHH was being prepped as the next top guy, I guess they could have put Owen in Mick's place for the one night run, but that wouldn't make much sense, HHH/Mick already had the angle where HHH hurt his knee. Vince won it from HHH strictly to set up the six pack match at Unforgiven, and it went back to HHH. No reason for Owen to get it here. Maybe they could have put Owen in Big Show's spot for the Survivor Series '99 3 way match with HHH and Rock. Jarrett was already gone to WCW. It's not too "out there" to think that Owen's Blue Blazer gimmick might have turned him babyface, the same thing happened with The Hurricane a couple years later. But that was only to keep it warm until they went back to HHH and finally made him a major player 2000 was dominated by HHH and Rock. Again, maybe sub Owen for Big Show for the WrestleMania deal, but they only got Show in there with the goofy Rumble finish that they couldn't pull off with Owen. 2001 was Austin/Rock and then Austin/Angle, Austin wasn't going to work with Owen. I guess they could have given Owen the WCW Title at the time, but that leaves Jericho in the cold, and the whole point of the Jericho push was to put him in the main event. 2002 started with Jericho, who'd probably have a good program with Owen, certainly better than Austin/Jericho. But the point was trying to establish Jericho, no reason to put it on him then. HHH over Jericho was the climax to HHH's comeback after his quad tear. HHH lost to Hogan because of his huge popularity with his comeback. Hogan dropped it to UT when it quickly faded. I don't see Hogan putting over Owen. It went to Rock strictly so he could put over Brock before leaving again. Owen could have fit in there I guess. And then they split the titles. So the only real chances to give him the title all feature him as a transitional champion while they made someone else into a star.

I'm actually surprised that it finally happened. Between the signature bust and his frequent long injury layoffs, I figured if he hadn't been released by now, then he probably never would.

Cornette being a good friend of Dave, and the WON in general probably helped. Plus, I don't know about now, but I know that he used to have a ballot for the HOF.

Tom Zenk cons Verne Gagne into hiring and helping to further train him I heard this while I was at the gym listening to a Zenk episode of WOL: Zenk was playing phone tag with Verne about coming into the AWA. Knowing that Gary "Juice" Derusha had just left the AWA for the WWF, Zenk calls the office and tells them he's returning a message "from a guy named Juice" and asked the secretary if that was the AWA "or the other guys." She puts him on hold and comes back five minutes later and tells him that Verne said to be at his place first thing Monday morning to start working out with Brad Reingans.

They went back to the WWF in early '85, which probably put the kibosh on anything with the NWA. According to Dynamite's book, they split their time between the WWF and AJPW until they signed a WWF contract in early '86.

If you're still taking suggestions, Loss, I'll throw in the Midnight Express vs. Fantastics from 4/26/88 (The Fants U.S. Tag Title win)

19th Century

No, this was the first PPV under Kip Frye, Watts joined WCW in May or June of '92.

Per the request of JDW: "The Majority of Wrestling Marks thought Wrestling Was Real back in the Good Old Days."

My wife once related a story to me that an aspring musican landed a role on Beverly Hills 90210 playing Donna's abusive boyfriend, and that he wound up quitting because his music gigs would frequently feature people yelling at him to 'stop hitting Donna.' Maybe they thought it was real?

As a relative Lucha novice, I'm pleased to say this is one of the few Lucha matches that I seem to "get" on the first viewing. Lucha has this stereotype to people who aren't familiar with it of being little more than a bunch of whacked out holds and wrestlers constantly diving onto each other. This is the perfect match to show to that crowd, because it's very simple, yet very effective. MS easily winning the first fall by busting open Sangre and mostly refusing to let him in the ring and kicking at his head. Sangre getting revenge in the second fall and causing MS to bleed. The third fall featuring them both putting over the fatigue and blood loss, and I really dug MS constantly going for pins even after simple moves, but going for too much and being forced to submit. Tons of blood, good storytelling, what else do you need?

I enjoyed this so much! I don't want to sound like I'm parrotting Childs' post, which mentioned a number of things that I loved about it. I really liked the way it was sort of laid out, with the first fall being a straight up wrestling match, and when Jumbo gets the better of him Flair turns up the heat and the second fall is more of a brawl, with some good wrestling sequences thrown into things, and then Jumbo gets the better of him too, with how much he gets the blood flowing. I especially liked the bit at the end when Jumbo wouldn't quit and Flair let him out of the hold and started dropping knees onto his leg and then put the figure four back on.

Ric Flair goes insane is the perfect description for that promo. It starts out like your typical Flair promo, and then he just snaps and goes flying off the handle. It's almost like the famous Nitro promo on Bischoff, only Flair was projecting anger and rage instead of emotion.

I used to think that I was simply not 'getting' Lucha and that's why these matches didn't appeal to me. But having seen a fair amount of it now, the minis matches still don't do it. I enjoy things like Mascarita's ability to do an armdrag from seemingly any position and be impressed with his willingness to dive off the top to the floor head first. But these matches just don't do it for me. It probably didn't help that Espectrito got hit with the big plancha from the top and then had to no sell it and roll back in so Espectro could take the cheap shot, and that the ref's hesitation on some of the near falls telegraphed the kick out.

I actually expected to walk away from this match feeling let down, and I was. I didn't think it was horrible or anything, but after so many years of hearing the hype for it from various people and places, my hopes were somewhat high for it. That said, I really liked that all four of them weren't afraid to bump like pinballs, Dustin's nasty 360 bumps from Austin's lariats, Barry tumbling over the top, and both heels stooging like mad for the faces. I also really liked how it was Dustin who seemed to be out for blood, the way he went after Larry's arm while Barry was more all business. The only thing that I disliked actively about the match was the heat portion on Dustin, because it just seemed to drag on and on, and aside from Ausitn's lariats and them trying to bait Barry into running into the ring it didn't seem like they had much to do.

What did Dave say?

Has anyone held more titles for one promotion than Barry Windham in NWA/WCW? Not in terms of number times that he was champion, but just for sheer number of titles that he held for that particular company. NWA World Title (1993) NWA and WCW Tag Titles (1988 with Luger and 1992 with Dustin) NWA United States Title (1988-89) NWA United States Tag Team Titles (1986-87) WCW TV Title (1992) NWA Western States Heritage Title (1987-88)

I very much liked the When Worlds Collide Tag, but I never thought it was super great. I usually just passed it off as me not really getting the Lucha style. So I'm really looking forward to this one.

Meltzer is reporting that the reason for the renewed main event push of CM Punk and the John Morrison face turn is because Undertaker is hurt and Hardy's future is in doubt. Can anyone elaborate on the latter? Is he injured? Wellness issues? Something else?

I'd agree that restholds bring down a match, but only if they're truly restholds, meaning that they're not done for any other reason than to give them time to rest. I've seen plenty of matches where headlocks and chinlocks are used extensively, but are done in a way that it's clearly being done for a purpose and not just to kill time and rest.

I don't really have a problem with things like this, so long as it makes sense in the context of the match. Look at Edge's reverse X-Factor spot that he always does for a two count. It's not like he grabs the guy at does it, it comes when he ducks a big swing or avoids a lariat, so it makes sense for him to do the move. It's when guys do stuff for seemingly no reason at all other than to do it or to have it backfire (like Flair off the top) that I'm not really a fan of. I'd credit nWo Bischoff for this more than McMahon, and Bischoff was actually doing the sort of things that Jkeats was talking about. The Outsiders "lost" the WCW Tag Titles several times and he'd simply give the titles back to them. I think it's been overdone over the last five or six years, but I don't think it's such a bad thing. And it's not like the evil authority figures don't get their comeuppances. This is a big part of what separates pro wrestling from the legit fighting, it's supposed to be a performance. It's such a big part of wrestling. Can anyone picture an Alien movie without the alien bursting out of someone's chest or a Die Hard movie without explosions and gunshots? It's certainly something that could be done, but it wouldn't feel quite right and the fans of those movie series would complain. I don't think finishing moves are a huge stretch from that. Finishers are something that are very much anticpated by the fans because it's a sign that the end could be near and their favorite could be winning.

When Loss gives you the passwords?