Cox

I think Dave's love of PWG is sincere, but I also think everything he says on Twitter is a gimmick (he basically admitted this in Bix's Deadspin piece on him from earlier this year regarding the Omega/Okada matches). I don't know exactly how it results in increased readership, and personally speaking, Dave on Twitter led to me unfollowing him and dropping my Observer subscription, but if it's working for him, good for him. And good for him for enjoying New Japan and PWG as much as he does, especially since earlier in this decade, it really felt like he barely enjoyed pro wrestling anymore in any form. It's not my favorite wrestling in the world, but it works for him and it works for their crowds that are paying ridiculously high per average ticket prices to see them every few months, so they're doing something right.

I know a little bit about BRAWL as they are a New Jersey-based indie group that used to run pretty close to my parents' house, though I never went to any of their shows . They use some of the same guys that have worked for another New Jersey-based indie group that I used to work with called the UWC, the common connection being that both are run by former students of Iron Mike Sharpe when he ran his wrestling school in Asbury Park. They have a website (at Angelfire of all places, and it looks to have been updated as they have results from 2017 listed) and a Facebook page I've linked for you below. For what it's worth, I would not expect them to come after you. They have been around since the late 90's, but this is a group that really only runs maybe once or twice a year, if that, and they mostly use a crew of unknowns unless you really know the Jersey indie scene pretty deeply. These days it seems like they're basically just using a crew of family and friends, so I would not be concerned that they're going to try to sue you, especially if you're in a completely different part of the country. If anything, knowing the wrestling business, they're more likely to raise a stink if you mention this to them than if you just left it alone. http://www.angelfire.com/nj/brawlwrestling/ https://www.facebook.com/BRAWLWrestling/

If I were to make a list of the worthiness of the candidates on this year's ballot (a list that I am not inclined to make), Fujiwara wouldn't rank anywhere near the bottom, and I'm not even somebody who is advocating he be elected.

Is this the weakest modern US/Canada ballot ever? It feels so depleted that I can see even a bad candidate getting some support because of the lack of competition, and because most of the voting pool are US-based and will want to vote for somebody on that ballot.

That doesn't necessarily preclude them from being voted in, as last year demonstrated clearly.

Gabe isn't working as a writer for NXT, I think it was just a case where he and a few of the promoters for other WWE-aligned indies (Jim Smallman from Progress was one) were observing the NXT process and perhaps adding feedback. WWN has been pretty clear that Gabe is still working for them. I think that's where Gabe wants to wind up for sure, but I don't think it's a lock by any means, and I can't help but think that this mess won't help him obtain full-time employment there. At some point, I have to think that WWN just isn't worth the trouble. I think the issue with FloSlam and why it didn't ultimately work is that Flo put all of their eggs in the WWN basket. They needed a second marquee promotion doing live events monthly. They needed an ROH or a PWG (both of whom turned them down) or even an AAW. They needed at least 2-3 weekends a month of providing quality indie shows, and even with that, from a value perspective, it was going to be tough to justify the $19.99 price tag, but it could have at least appealed to a wider audience. With only EVOLVE, they're basically getting the people who bought the old EVOLVE iPPVs and that's it. It was a good deal compared to buying two EVOLVE iPPVs a month, but not a good deal compared to other streaming services on the market.

He had about a two year run in All Japan.

I didn't do a great job explaining what I meant in my original post. I guess I'm mostly surprised that Dave hasn't really covered Evolve much in the past few years, because they run a style that is very Dave-friendly, and Gabe and Dave have been friendly in the past, as Gabe used to openly leak ROH storyline direction in the WON. I realize that even for a half-man, half-wrestling/MMA robot like Dave, that there are only so many hours in the day, but that Evolve never really broke through in the Observer when I'm sure he would have enjoyed most of what they have presented in the past few years is fairly surprising to me. A lot of the guys who he raves about in PWG have matches that are at least as good in Evolve.

I think the bigger surprise out of all of this is that Dave apparently hasn't seen any of the other Dijak/Lee matches. Considering that they had a spotlight match for EVOLVE during Wrestlemania weekend just 5 months ago, that's at least a little surprising. Does Dave really watch any American wrestling outside of WWE, PWG, and maybe ROH big shows? Does he even watch GFW?

The only reason to care that Low Ki burns bridges in wrestling is that it means fewer places for him to work and we sometimes have to go long periods of time where he's not really working anywhere. Otherwise I don't give a fuck what kind of issues he has with various management, especially in GFW, which is run by mostly the same people that gave us 15 years of TNA.

No. Gabe used the aliases Chris Lovey and Jimmy Bauer while doing ROH commentary, but Lenny Leonard is somebody else entirely.

Here me talk about running into Roman Reigns at Newark Airport on my way to SCI! Spoiler: it ends in sadness for me.

Have to say, these were a great pair of shows. Night one had a ton of good variety, with the great matwork in Arik Royal vs Dominic Garrini, the sheer craziness of Joey Janela vs Darby Allin, great heel/face work in Curt Stallion vs Jason Cade, some great hard hitting action in Gary Jay vs Anthony Henry, and the emotion of Tank's final match vs Matt Riddle. Night two had the best match of the entire weekend with Gunner Miller vs Matt Riddle, which was kind of the perfect indie version of Goldberg vs Brock Lesnar, with the power football guy going against the MMA guy that was short, but hard hitting, epic, and spectacular. Night 2 also had a great six man street fight with the Carnies and the Hierarchy, and the main event with Riddle winning was fantastic. Highly recommend folks check this one out when it's available, and if you haven't attended an SCI yet, change that! I flew in from New Jersey and had a blast. It was great to finally meet a lot of folks from this board, lot of great peeps out there and everybody I met seemed really cool and chill for the most part. For the price point and for what you get with everything involved, you're not going to get a better value for your money, as I'd put these shows up against any shows that will take place on the indies this year, and they are all super affordable. I really hope to try to make this as much of an annual tradition as I can (my wife doesn't love me leaving her alone for the weekend, but I did bribe her with some City Cafe cake and biscuits, so hopefully that helps me next year).

With the Meltzer stuff, if you listen to the shows, he probably confirms Meltzer's reporting as much, if not more, than he debunks it. It's just that when he confirms Meltzer's reporting, it tends to be fairly low key and matter of fact, but when he debunks his reporting, he tends to make a big show about it, even if it's only a tiny detail or two that Dave gets wrong. It's one of his gimmicks, just like one of Conrad's gimmicks is "annoying guy on Reddit who asks Bruce 'hard' questions that aren't that hard that Bruce evades anyway." I also tend to believe that Bruce believes most of the WWE justifications he presents on the show, which is why I usually find it fascinating. I don't always agree with Bruce, and often don't, but it's a fascinating look into the WWE's mindset behind various decisions over the years. Often, as fans of WWE, we'll be thinking "What the fuck was Vince thinking," and more often than not, Bruce is able to give insight into exactly that. That's not to say Vince was right about those things, but those ideas usually aren't pulled out of thin air, and I find that this show is as close as we're ever going to get to a Vince McMahon biography in a lot of ways. That's the value I find in this show, even if I do think Bruce is full of shit a good portion of the time, and I do get annoyed by Conrad quite often.

I don't understand not liking Beau as a guest. Yes, the spitting got a little annoying, but he is exactly what a guest on a podcast should be. He adds a wealth of knowledge and information about the topics discussed that the hosts themselves do not have, and tells funny, interesting stories. I think he's in the pantheon of great BTS guests, along with Prazak, Dylan, and Emil. Those guys always add something to the shows.

I'm flying in for this and looking forward to it! Looks like a fun series of shows, and I've always wanted to see a southern indie show, and this is looking like a fun pair of shows.

Conrad has used Meltzer the past few weeks as a resource, so I was wrong about this. The thing is, I should have known that they didn't have the 2002-onward WON archives on the Observer site because when I was on Between the Sheets, I wanted to read as much as I could about that week beyond what was sent to me for notes by Kris and Bix, so when I couldn't read the Observer because it wasn't on the site, I read that week's F4W instead. So I had even done what Conrad has done before.

Professionalism goes both ways. Jim Ross, who has been calling wrestling matches since before I was born, was such a pro that he continuously messed up names (including Tama Tonga's). I can certainly understand Tonga's frustration since this was one of his big breaks in the US and the guy calling the match couldn't even say his name correctly.

Cody as ROH champ will be fine. He's not going to have match of the year contenders in the main event or anything, but when was the last time an ROH champion did? He'll be a good working main event heel world champion, and he might get a few new eyeballs on the product. Cody has actually been a fairly decent draw across the indies and has been part of some truly impressive independent wrestling houses, so unless ROH's promotions department is TNA level bad, I think he'll be a pretty good house show draw for the company. He's not the most exciting choice, but he might honestly be their best choice. And for me, rock bottom for ROH will always be the era where Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards traded the ROH title. Those dudes suck, and I'm glad they're wrestling midcard for a company that has never been less relevant. That era of ROH pretty much drove me away from supporting the company, after I had gone to almost all of the Philly/NY/NJ area ROH shows for years.

I've noticed that Conrad started using Figure Four Weekly for his research instead of the Observer. I wonder if either Bruce didn't want to keep plugging the Observer every week, or if Dave asked Conrad to stop using the Observer since Bruce would bury it every week. I mean, both sheets come from the same online archive, so it's not like he switched sources, so something must have happened that caused Conrad to switch.

I think Terry Taylor was hosting WWF Wrestling Spotlight around this time. I have a vague recollection of him hosting one of the studio shows at this time and the only thing that makes sense is Spotlight.

Garvin was old but still good in 1990 after he left WWF after becoming a virtual jobber. He had something left in the tank, but unfortunately by then Dusty had power again in WCW (the most obvious destination for him) and he was never going to go back there after the way he left in 1988. It's too bad, because I think he would have been a lot of fun in the late 90's on WCWSN and the syndies, and would have had some entertaining Nitro squashes. I think in particular, he'd have had a great sub-4 minute Goldberg match circa 1998.

I think Savage drops the IC title to Rude, no later than WMV, and Rude drops it to Warrior at SummerSlam '89, as he did in real life.

Without 1989, that also hurts Flair's claim as the best wrestler of all time. It might also hurt Funk's claim as well. GWE on this board turns out completely different!

Dave still pretty clearly has passion for wrestling. He just doesn't have a ton of passion for WWE.