Johnny Sorrow

My rankings 1.Buddy Rose & Doug Somers vs. Midnight Rockers (8/30/86) Dude, just the tits. Fucking awesome. 2.Stan Hansen vs. Crusher Blackwell (6/28/86) I was worried this was gonna be one of those "awesome on paper, not good actually" matches. Holy Fuck was I wrong. This fucking ruled. The only thing bad here is knowing that this feud never got to happen besides this introductory part. I'd imagine that Jerry eventually beating Hansen for the belt would have been an amazing moment for the fans of the AWA who'd stuck with the promotion. 3.Stan Hansen vs. Curt Hennig (5/31/86) Hot Fuck, was Hennig laying it in to Stan here. Killer match that established Curt. 4.Col. DeBeers, Buddy Rose & Doug Somers vs. Nick Bockwinkel, Steve Pardee & Brad Rheingans (5/31/86) This was fine. Buddy, Doug, and DeBeers ruled. 5.Alexis Smirnoff, Buddy Rose & Doug Somers vs. Midnight Rockers & Curt Hennig (6/28/86) Nothing bad. Just a fun little 6 man. 6. Col. DeBeers, Larry Zbyszko & Doug Somers vs. Greg Gagne, Curt Hennig, & Jimmy Snuka (7/26/86) Greg looks like he'd rather be anywhere else. Not awful, but not great. 7. Nick Bockwinkel vs. Boris Zuhkov (8/30/86) Bored the fuck out of me. Granted, we'd just watched The Rockers and Rose/ Somers completely fucking destroy it, so maybe I was just underwhelmed because of that. But I've liked some Boris matches, and I worship at the alter of The Bock....but this just left me flat. 8. Sherri Martel vs. Debbie the Killer Tomato (7/26/86) So who jerked off to this when they were 14 and held onto some weird fond memory?

Yeah, I can't decide who's #1, Col. DeBeers, Larry Zbyszko & Doug Somers vs. Greg Gagne, Curt Hennig, & Jimmy Snuka orSherri Martel vs. Debbie the Killer Tomato.

It's my night off, and I'm in a drinking mood. So I'm gonna do a shot every time Buddy Rose takes a crazy bump. Tune in!

Damn straight. Maybe I'm just in a great mood because I knocked it out of the park tonight at my audition for our local community theater's upcoming production of "Fiddler On The Roof", but this RAW wasn't anywhere near "worst ever." It really didn't have an exciting feel except for a couple of parts, I'll say that. I've read some shit about "It didn't build Mania" and I'm not getting that. Shit if anything, the show did nothing BUT establish and build Mania. Whether you LIKED they way they did it or not is up to you, but they did it. Shit on RAW I Dug: 1. Rufus "Pancake" Patterson. Titus is fucking great, and someone was referencing Rufus R. Jones and Thunderbolt Patterson when they came up with it. 2. I loved the whole Ryback and Mark Henry bit, despite the Teddy and Vickie shit proving that they DO need writers. 3. Punk/ Taker was great. Punk is such a raging asshole douchebag. I'm a heel fan and I want to see him get his ass kicked. 4. The tag was ok, besides that phantom dropkick bump and the camera catching Primo having a conversation in Bryan's ear. 5. Larry Zybysko was name dropped! 6. Cody/ Del Rio was decent, but it did kind of bore me. Until the post match stuff with Swagger. That shit ruled. Hey, you may not be a fan of the angle, and those spoof videos sucked big cock, but the brawl, beatdown, and breaking of Ricardo's ankle fucking ruled. Oh, and Ricardo's bump from the ring to the floor was a SPLATT! of Foley type shit. Loved it. 7. Booker in the HOF. I'm a fan. I've always dug Book, especially King Booker. The GWF footage was a surprise. I gotta be honest though. I get WHY he's the celeb guy, but seeing that douchebag moron Trump's face on the same graphic as Bruno, Backlund, Foley, etc actually annoys the shit out of me. 8. Big Show coming out to let Shield know he's gonna kill them dead at Mania was fucking awesome. 9. Kofi and Ziggler had their match. Big E's taking out Kofi in mid air looked scary. I liked AJ accepting the challenge while Ziggler was saying "no." 10. The three way started out "eh", but kicked in to be a pretty good match. I love Jericho's "Y2J 2013" tights, as he's embracing both his wanna be rock star shit with his wrestling character. His tights are like a t-shirt you buy at a band's reunion tour they do every few years, which is what he's doing wrestling-wise. 11. TOUTS! HOLY SHIT. I normally FF thru that shit but thank God I didn't tonight. TOUT Girl is my new fav. But black TOUTer was as cool as the other side of the pillow. 12. I LOVED the contract signing. Bearded indy scum badass was just darling. And watching HHH beat up Paul Heyman was "Wunnerful, wunnerful, wunnerful!" Someone at DVDVR said it was like a Wrestling Challenge from the 80's where it was all Mania build up with JTTS matches, I can see that.

Yes. The American TV audience of the late 70's/ early 80's was a completely different animal than today.

It was Epstein

Well, the fall of Kotter was directly related to the red hot Sweathog stable having to change as Vinnie Barbarino broke out as a solo star. They brought in Beauregarde "Beau" De LaBarre as a replacement, but no one accepted the Lance Von Erich type replacement, as he wasn't considered a real Sweathog. Also, attempts at tweaking them into more of a blowjob team by dropping Horshack's awkward look and Epstein's toughness wasn't accepted. Add in that the lead face/ manager of the stable missing dates due to contract problems, and the show fizzled as fast as it hit big. It drew big, and is fondly remembered, but like many promotions...it was killed by it's own success.

He WAS a proven Mid Carder thanks to Taxi, and when he got his shot at the Main Event he delivered. edit: Kotter, eh?.....

I believe I made it clear that that it wasn't until 1980 after Richie and Ralph left is when people really started dropping off watching Happy Days. 1977 was still part of the boom years. And the people who stayed watching weren't casual fans. They were hardcore Happy Days fans like me. And by the time Happy Days went off the air the sitcom had had it's big comeback, thanks to The Cosby Show on NBC. Happy Days actually survived the days when the sitcom was dead, like you say, but because of people who stuck with both the show, and the fact that it was instilled that Tuesday nights on ABC you tuned in. Who's The Boss was a hit because people expected a good family friendly show on ABC on that night.

Somewhat legendary Hollywood gossip columnist

This was fucking great. Not much else to add. I'm pretty much a lucha novice at best but my favorite Lucha I've seen over the years involves intense emotion and this delivered. Again, really great match. (I'm still sticking with that Rock n Roll/ Midnights match as the best I've seen on the set thus far, though.)

Ok, first of all, when Fonzie actually jumped the shark, it didn't affect the ratings at all. Ok, so to put this in Wrestling terms. The best comparison to the JYD stuff is actually when Richie and Ralph left the show. Now, the silly storylines were getting people talking in a negative way, but as a fan of Happy Days, I remember thinking that the show couldn't exist without them, but I stuck with the show because I loved it so much, the same way a lot of wrestling fans stick with a promotion for awhile before it dies out. And when Richie left, they brought in Roger as a replacement, like Watts did with George Wells and others for JYD. They had some success with putting the focus on Joanie and Chachi. Then, they try and expand into some new territories/ timeslots with Joanie Loves Chachi, sending three beloved mid carders (Al, as well as the title characters) away from home. Things started really going downhill as you now had a show with just Fonzie, The Cunninghams, and Potsie with new characters they tried to push like Flip and KC that no one wanted to see. Old veteran Pat Morita was brought back up to the promotion, but at this point the quality of the product was pretty bad. Still, people watched out of loyalty to the promotion. The Tuesday timeslot was also a big factor, as Happy Days owned that time for a hell of a long time, so people were comfortable flipping on ABC and seeing the show, even though the product was bad. They attempted some hot shot booking with the two parter where Richie and Ralph come back, and while that produced some good word of mouth, but the writing was on the wall. Joanie and Chachi were brought back but by this time it was over. Happy Days was moved to Thursdays right as the Juggernaut known as NBC Must See Thursdays was getting underway. So you see, people do tend to stick around after a show/ promotion loses it's biggest attraction. That being actually Richie, not Fonz. Or to be fair, it was Richie and the Fonz as a team. Once the show actually starred the Fonz, they had a lot of trouble finding ways to use him. He's a teacher, he's Dean of Men at a boys school, etc, etc... But the quality of the product caused the show to eventually lose fans over the course of time, and the death knell was desperate attempts at replacing the stars who made the territory so hot that at one point they expanded into two more timeslot territories successfully with Laverne and Shirley and Mork and Mindy. We won't discuss Blansky's Beauties, as it was a disaster. I'm not a big numbers guy, but I think they tell the story of Garry Marshall Promotions Ratings Season 1 (1974): #16 [27] (21.5 rating) Season 2 (1974–1975): Not in Top 30 "Good Times", booked on CBS by Booker Fred Silverman was booked there as a direct challenge to Happy Days. Season 3 (1975–1976): #11 [28] (23.9 rating) Change of promotional style, Silverman then jumps to ABC and has to save the show he was trying to bury the year before. Season 4 (1976–1977): #1 [29] (31.5 rating) Change of style mixed with Fonz as the now #2 Babyface Season 5 (1977–1978): #2 [30] (31.4 rating) Season 6 (1978–1979): #3 [31] (28.6 rating) Season 7 (1979–1980): #17 [32] (21.7 rating) Silly storylines do start to affect things Season 8 (1980–1981): #15 [33] (20.8 rating)Richie and Ralph leave Season 9 (1981–1982): #18 [34] (20.6 rating) Season 10 (1982–1983): #28 [35] (17.4 rating) Season 11 (1983–1984): #63 Now, the show did manage to hang onto viewers after Richie left, but you can see that the combination of bad pushes, leaving characters, and bad storylines all which are "the product" caused the fall of the promotion.

I'd get 'em over, too.

I do. More than anyone should, probably. Later on after a few beers I'll delve into this comparison.

This reminded me of them mentioning the Dave Schultz-John Stossel incident and saying that Schultz responded to Stossel's question about wrestling being fake. This in a kayfabe mag where the entire fifteen minute segment on 20/20 was exposing the business. See, back when it happened though, the Apter mags ran editorials saying that the two guys were just nobodies who had an axe to grind. AND that the shots of punches missing were obviously wrestlers dodging punches. They also pretty much praised Schultz and rewarded him with a cover story, "Ric Flair vs. David Schultz" Flair: 'I Wrestle the Men Hogan is Afraid Of!'" based on one match in Puerto Rico, I think.

So, it's completely reasonable to speculate that if JYD was the phenomenon he was, that drew non hardcore fans to wrestling shows in New Orleans, then his leaving would eventually cause gates to drop. People probably stuck with going to shows for a bit, but when it became obvious to these fans that it was JYD they wanted, they stopped showing up. I love that story.

This is the first time I've had a chance to listen and watch rather than be on "the panel". Great show, guys. Here's my rankings: 1.) Christ, of course Gibson was better than Rogers. 2.) Phil's reaction to Will's mush mouthed Matt Hardy observation. 3.) "Boring" chants happened in the 80's a lot in the NE, Will. I swear it was never me. 4.) Murdoch actually never went to West Texas Sate but did manipulate his way into an alumni-varsity game once. I remember someone telling the story that he hung out there all the time drinking beer with the team so much, that people just considered him an Alumni. 5.)Thank you, more people who remember that shitty Cali fed. 6.) Kris being the Mr. Data from the South. Just info at the drop of a hat. I loved Phil's "How would I know? That's what I'd ask you" And Kris being able to access Greg Gagnes work schedule instantly is amazingly scary and disturbing. 7.)Doug Somers being the sleaziest looking guy ever. He looks like Riff Raff from Rocky Horror before going bald. He's Lestat after letting himself go. 8.) THE SEVEN SEATS! And a group has sat IN THEM. 9.) STANDIN' TALL BILL WATTS! 10.) Will talking while eating a pizza, during Somers/ Rotundo. 11.) Will and Kris doing the big shill in the middle of Rotundo/ Somers. Oh, match rankings... 1. Stan Hansen vs. Nick Bockwinkel (4/20/86) 2. Mike Rotundo & Curt Hennig vs. Mr. Go & Larry Zbyszko (5/1/86) 3. Buddy Rose & Doug Somers vs. Midnight Rockers (4/20/86) 4. Mike Rotundo vs. Doug Somers (5/1/86) 5. Rick Martel vs. Harley Race (4/20/86) 6. Buddy Rose & Doug Somers vs. Jesse Hernandez & Leon White (5/1/86) 7. Buddy Rose & Doug Somers vs. Scott Hall & Curt Hennig (5/17/86) Just because of the stupid AWA finish that pissed me off as much now as it did then. TWO TAG TITLE BULLSHIT CHANGES IN A YEAR.

Since we're using the term TV Star, instead of comparing Sting to an athlete, how about comparing him to an actor on a show that had a period of time as a hit. Say like, SNL? Who'd be a guy who was a star on SNL thru a big ratings period and during lows? Darryl Hammond?

That's actually witty. Jerry, did you read Superman comics when you were a kid?

This match can cure depression. I've never seen it before and I'm grinning from ear to ear. It's God Damned AWESOME.

I was at the ROH show where they founded Gen Next (Shelley, Aries, Strong, and Evans) and at the time Shelley was the only guy who could talk...so he became the "leader". But it didn't take long even in ROH for Aries to outshine Shelley both in ring and eventually on the stick. I will say that the show in the tent at Philly Gen Next formed was a ton of fun, and Generation Next was a really fun gimmick for a bit.

I don't buy that for a second. Vince McMahon doesn't need a reason to fire anyone. And Dylan has been touchy lately because Mark Henry isn't in the WC Match with Del Rio, and I agree. But don't let it turn you to the dark side, man. It'll be ok.

Tonight's show was a fucking blast, not only a night of great wrestling, but we had jokes, history lessons, and an all around fun damn show. Thanks to Will, Kris, and Sarp.

He looks like a tall Seth Green.

It's obvious that Punk wants to beat the Streak, he kept going on about it, and now he's using mindgames because he's a fucking asshole douchebag who will do whatever it takes to get to Taker and throw him off his game...so he can beat the Streak. Kane only beat Punk because Taker's gong went off, Punk got scared for a second and an exhausted Kane hit a chokeslam, after a no DQ match where they beat the fuck out of each other. THEN Punk destroyed Kane with the Urn, leaving him lying there. Don't give me that old "He took a pinfall, that's all that matters" stuff. And come on, man...you didn't mark out even just a bit, as Taker and Kane saluted Bearer at the end of that match? Have you no heart, sir?