Eduardo

While the last few years he hasn't been able to work much due to injuries, he still had an almost 13 year run that was filled with all sorts of interesting stuff, outside of his ring work. Random interesting notes in his run. --Key WWE draw with Dave Bautista in Spain and Italy. Led to some sort of boom period there that Jose Fernandez could explain way better than any of us here. --Key WWE draw in Mexico, and also important house show draw for WWE in the Southwest. --One of the top merchandise sellers for years, usually behind just John Cena. --Program with Eddy Guerrero in 2005 drew some wild numbers. I forgot exactly how many people were tuning in just to watch those segments but they were impressive. --Was promised lengthy run with Intercontinental Championship, was then told to drop it. Refused to lose to Dolph Ziggler, and then failed Wellness Policy. --The horrible way WWE booked him after his title win at WM22. --Was refusing to cash checks to get out of his contract. Mysterio (and people close to him) probably have some wild stories about WWE management.

At the time, Meltzer kept writing that the plan was for Randy Orton to get the championship. Mysterio had just come off a year where he was one of the companies best TV ratings draws, as well, so there was some groundswell support for him to get the title. A lot of people were really upset when Orton beat Mysterio for the WM title shot in February. He had a lot of support at the time. Meltzer noted that the reason Orton didn't get the title at WM22 was because he got himself suspended, and McMahon finally being convinced by others around him to put the title on Mysterio. I think Angle also had some serious injury. Orton did that last job to Mysterio the week or so after WM22, then left for a bit. If anything, WWE was trying to use the death of Guerrero, and Mysterio's connection to him and the crowd to get Orton more over as a heel at the time.

Good point. When I was young, I used to mess around with a TV antenna to get grainy, barely watchable silent feed of a TV station in Corpus Christi that aired ECW and old Memphis reruns. As a kid, I just wanted to see wrestling by any means.

TJ Dillashaw had to fight Joe Soto on late notice after Renan Barao couldn't make weight and had to go to the hospital. Ultimately it was a shitty situation, and UFC was forced to have Dillashaw vs Soto (who was originally in the prelims) as their main event. It's easy to understand that it was a difficult situation, but still be honest about this being a pretty shitty fight to headline a PPV that costs 50 plus bucks. Pre-show has a really odd Rogan interview with Barao, that folks were mixed on. Actual fight itself has Soto being competitive in the later part of round one, and early part of round two, leading Rogan to oversell that brief success big time. Finally Dillashaw puts Soto away in round 5. It was as a whole, a pretty one sided, at best decent fight. Rogan afterwards starts lecturing fans who criticized the fight, saying how it was a great fight, and one or two other random Dana White talking points about fans who question match-ups.

Re: The Thread Killer/MMA Joe Rogan's performance at UFC 177, specifically Dillashaw-Soto, was all time levels bad. Lecturing the fans afterwards was pretty embarrassing and made MMA commentators look more dishonest than pro wrestling commentators.

Was the WHC always considered the secondary title during brand split run? By the point Ziggler and Swagger won, it was, but when it was HHH's title for so many years, it was usually presented as far bigger than a "secondary championship".

It's very easy for me to zone in and out commentary. I like Dr. Alfonso Morales a lot, although he has some really odd moments at times, like sometimes claiming Lex Luger invented the small package (probably because of the "Total Package" nickname) and can be repetitious (but who isn't really?). I need to listen to more, but Javier Llanes is good too. Modern WWE and UFC is really poor, but it's really easy for me to just concentrate on the match and crowd. I guess I don't put much importance on commentary since I just don't expect much from it. When it's actually good, it's a nice surprise. But if it's not, I just ignore it.

Wild to see this trending worldwide, legitimately.

I was really taken aback by how much the crowd hated on Konnan here. The crowd was so dismissive of him from beginning to end, and would start making a lot of negative noise whenever he entered the ring. It wasn't heel heat, it sounded more like rejection, or something along those lines. I wish we could somehow know what all these six guys said to one another, or were thinking, as soon as the match was over. I didn't think the match was good as a whole, a bit mediocre to average at best. As you mentioned, it felt like they were working at half-speed early on. Also, selfishly I wanted Brazos comedy and shtick and I didn't get that here. But I thought this was still pretty interesting just because of the crowd and how much I dug Dandy in this. I thought Dandy-Oro exchanges were great, and he looked so fluid in some other moments as well. Makes me want to go back and rewatch Dandy's 1990.

Agree with the overall point that I don't see Michaels making much, if any difference. But just wanted to share this amusing Meltzer quote from January 1997. "Bischoff made a remark that they didn't have to give tickets away at a 7-11 to get people to come to this [souled Out] PPV. That was in reference to the WWF which only could get 48,000 paid for its show last week." - Dave Meltzer, Wrestling Observer (February 3, 1997).

Eh, I don't think this is anything like any situation we've seen before in the WWE. Or I don't see how this situation, compared to others, can be talked about as a double standard like Mad Dog is saying. There is no legitimate reason to punish Rollins in this situation. He and Zahra Schreiber had their private photos posted without their consent. Rollins apologized publicly, even though he did nothing wrong here.

Also, it wasn't too long ago that Jack Swagger was a World Heavyweight Champion.

Are there any wrestlers from Spain actually in the company? Seriously though, some would probably get upset or confused about being listed as being "Spanish".

Another point, doesn't HHH, apparently, hold grudges longer than Vince? Wasn't the story that Vince was more open to the idea of Punk returning (if Punk wanted to, that is) than HHH? Also, Punk leaving, and Del Rio's stories of the atmosphere backstage, along with HHH's history, makes me take the same stance as SLL above me.

I don't know, HHH accusing Kane of being obsessed with a friend, and raping her after dying in a car crash, then having HHH himself playing the role of Kane and doing a simulation of that, seems worse than your typical Undertaker stuff from 98-99 or the Mae Young deal. Probably worse than the date rape angle that launched HHH as a main eventer.

It might pretty good if it's worked like Hart-Diesel at WWF Royal Rumble 1995, but not sure if Reigns is as good at selling as Nash was then.

Well the question was should she be in the HOF, and he was trying to put it as nicely as possible that while she deserves to be in, they can't because because let's say some kid who doesn't know who she is looks her up online they're gonna find porn and overdoses. This would be a far more compelling argument if they hadn't already inducted a convicted rapist. That. And Jimmy Snuka too. Three of the very first six results you get after you Google his name have to do with Nancy Argentino.

To add to what Loss said, doesn't this also have to do with Terry Funk? During a segment on WCW, Nash changed directions during a segment, shooting on Funk. Funk wasn't expecting it, and was lost. Nash bragged about getting the better of Funk, an all-time great promo. As Loss said, Nash would then tell folks that he would/could do the same to The Rock. Rock knew this and the Funk story, and well, you know the rest.

There was an estimated 420,000 buys in North America (U.S.,Canada). Not sure of worldwide, but while still a really great number, the number of folks that actually bought the PPV for a price in that range is nowhere near 700K.

DDP! Awesome.

Airplane Spin!

I was at the Nitro event which had Hogan-Wall as the main event. The best match that night was a dark match involving El Dandy, Silver King and Chavo Guerrero Jr. vs Three Count. It's been almost 15 years so the details have faded, but at the time, I thought it was such a cool sprint. Also, Ric Flair & Lex Luger vs Sting & Vampiro match was a blast too. The piledriver on the Gulf of Mexico finish was so awesome. But yeah, no one in the audience could see The Wall at the top of the hotel. Was so confusing live. Other than that, and few other things, that was actually a pretty fun live wrestling event.

This one? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ut28TwKhgL4

New Mountain Goats song about Chavo Guerrero - https://soundcloud.com/mergerecords/the-mountain-goats-the-legend-of-chavo-guerrero/s-hbYou

If you ever picked up the International Challenge set, Magee vs Gibbs is on there. As someone mentioned earlier, I've always wondered whether Meltzer actually 'has' a copy of Bret vs Magee or just watched it somewhere? The assumption online has always seemed to be that he 'has' a copy because he's written about it in the Observer, yet I can never specifically recall him saying outright that he does. I think Meltzer said before that someone sent him an actual physical copy to watch. Also, Meltzer said that a few years ago, Hart wanted WWE to put that match on his 3-disc DVD set but it didn't end up happening.