El-P

See : Angle vs Joe, part 2. Their first match was a classic, basic build with them not touching, mostly put together by Mantell. It made TNA its biggest PPV number. The follow-up was classic Russo hotshotting and bullshit, which was the beginning of the end for Joe after a tremendous year and a half.

Are we going to pretend the 3:16 promo isn't vital to Austin eventually becoming the biggest thing around ? Just because the WWF didn't picked on it immediately ? To answer the bolded part : because he didn't. He didn't book alone during that period. Hell, like Charles said, Corny was around until as late as 1998, when the turnaround was already done and Austin was the hottest thing. Pritchard was also there. And of course, Vince himself. The filters aren't overstated. I'm not saying he didn't contribute, but Russo without filter got exposed immediately, and le's not go into "oh, but he couldn't do what he wanted in WCW" since it was the exact same shit in TNA. When you're a failure 95% of your whole career, when you can spot the patterns of his whole "creative spectrum" after going through his stints in details (and yeah, I've done that both for WCW and early TNA, the masochist that I am), it's easy to expose his way of thinking and writing. It's not like he's that creative to begin with (the word "creative" is so overrated anyway, especially in pro-wrestling). There's probably something to be said about some of his ideas going through the Vince filter, working with Austin & Rock & Foley, simply being repeated everywhere else because the guy had no notion of why it worked before (context, worker). Which is another proof, if needed, he's a clueless idiot.

The part I bolded reads like a pro-Russo argument, considering Russo started out with 1996 WWF and not 1998 WWF. Not at all. Russo has jackshit to do with Austin cutting his 3:16 promo. And Cornette was still on the writing team as late as mid-1997 FWIW. The only guy who believes Russo created Austin & The Rock is Russo himself. He's been a proven failure for 15 years straight in two major companies (on every level). Who the fuck cares about what this dumbfuck has to say in 2017 anyway ? No, the real heel-freezes-over stuff about this whole deal is to see Cornette on the Network alongside Eric Bischoff...

It's a wee bit easier to draw money when you work in the WWF under Vince MacMahon working with the two biggest stars ever, arguably, in the hottest period for pro-wrestling ever than when you do things on your own on a regional level during the worst period ever for pro-wrestling and you have Brian Lee & Tracy Smothers as aces. Wait, SMW did draw money for a while. So there.

They have nothing in common *at all*. Cornette and Heyman are the different sides of the same coin (for better and worse). Russo has no clue whatsoever.

Cornette is also a terrific host of KC's Back to the Territories as he's a true wrestling historian with a passion for pro-wrestling golden days, was a great manager (the greatest ?) for 15 years, one of the best promo ever, promoted a cool throwback territory in the 90's in SMW. No matter how much bullshit he can spill out at times (this is pro-wrestling, who doesn't spill bullshit ?), there shouldn't even be an argument. Russo, for fuck's sake...

I don't get to do my WCW Highway to Hell thread. Which is my best writing about pro-wrestling. So that would be a loss. Of sorts.

I miss WCW. That's probably why I'm going through TNA TV instead of watching old territory stuff or "cool" indies of today, or NJ, or lucha. This. Kudos to her. I wonder how Mickie James would do in the role.

Would be better than anyone on the booth currently. Lita can't be worst at announcing that she was at wrestling.

I had been a fan of Lioness stuff with Kyoko and Jaguar in Neo & JD' in the late 90's, but by this point, Lioness was exposed to me as a selfish, formulaic worker with no interest putting anyone over or work toward the strenght of her opponent. This was good because Yoshida can't seem to have a bad match and Lioness formula basically garantees a basic level of action, but this is Lioness taking over with her usual bullshit. Death spiral indeed. And oh, yeah, Chama couldn't give a fuck at this point. Totally forgot about that LCO match too, and I'm like the biggest LCO mark (hell, I take some credit for people using the acronym LCO), that tells you my interest in the promotion, and soon joshi puroresu, had been gone.

As far as when the question of the thread was actually asked (damn, 10 years), it strikes me as I just reached the point when Russo was hired back as a writer that after about one year of very good, easy to watch, pro-wrestling TV which included tons of very good to great matches and booking that made sense and also a feeling of momentum (for a while) thanks to some actual stars showing up (Christian Cage, Team 3D, Sting), it took exactly ONE SHOW under Russo to get a "This is stupid !" chant from the audience. And it was not even during the match (an X-div match mind you) that involved laxatives. Under D'Amore's booking, especially with the move on Spike TV, TNA really was a cool little alternative promotion for a while. It did began to slow down during the summer of 06, especially around Slammiversary, but there were still really good stuff afterward. Then Russo is hired back. And we get laxatives and some shit involving a blow-up doll that incites a "This is stupid !" chant from the everloving TNA Asylum crowd. Up to that point, despite some truly awful stuff (from, yeah, Russo already, but also Dusty Rhodes who's stint as a booker there was pretty terrible), those D'Amore 15 months or so would absolutely prevent TNA from being called the worst promotion ever. Nothing touches WCW under Russo. I should know. Still, the fact that question was asked just a few months after that idiot came back to sink the promotion is pretty telling. The fact It took so long to never improve and never become relevant since then is also amazing. So, all this to say that, no, in 2007, TNA had not been the worst promotion ever, not by a long shot. 10 years of irrelevancy and stupid decisions one after another after that point... well, it's a long history of nothingness indeed.

That's a helluva quote right there. Quote of the year. I third this.

That episode on Fall Brawl 97. Epic stuff.

(edit, me not reading right, it's late over here ) Agree with all you said there.

That's not the only word or expression I think fits this angle. "Racist beating" comes to mind also. Probably more literal indeed, without the "death" implication, which always sounds odd when you talk about pro-wrestling, I will admit.

Wrestling is about representation. It was a bunch of wrestlers portrayed as both good and evil all ganging up on one (and the only) muslim character, beating him up together while people loudly chanted USA ! USA ! in the crowd. Make of that what you will in term of representation. Use whatever word best suited to you for this scene and what it was figuratively depicting (of course they didn't kill the guy, no shit). And no, the "heel" argument doesn't work, because all the other heels ganged up on the guy too, which made it quite the exceptionnal case of *everybody* teaming up to beat up one guy for one specific reason. Even in the jingoist days of Hogan, such of thing wasn't happening (Savage helped evil Iraki sympathiser turncoat to win the title just to fuck the Warrior). So what was portrayed here went further than just "groupe of guys eliminating another one from a battle royal". Anyway, this goes into "racist shit" thread in the MIS.

When every wrestler in the ring, faces or heels, stop all action, turn to one guy and beat him up collectively basically because he was "the muslim guy", that's called *lynching*. Lynching doesn't need hanging to be lynching. I guess in the Attitude era they would have Taker put him on his "symbol" too maybe. Anyway. This was gross, offensive and easily one of the lowest point ever of WWE TV. Anyway. Back to the India business, how ironic it is that 20 years after he vaunted *huge signing* of Tiger Ali Singh as the next WWE superstar, they actually have made their Indian heel champion and he's from Canada too ! Jinder is better in the ring that Tiger Ali, but who isn't ?

The lynching (there's no other word) of Hassan at that Royal Rumble is the most shocking, racist thing WWE ever produced. Just wrong and hateful. I can't believe they got away with this shit back then. (of course, the fact that Hassan was actually Italian and his manager was from Iran tells a lot about how well WWE people know or care about the world)

Felt rushed a little bit and I wasn't a fan of Daniels business outfit. Not fitting, pu intended, to brawl all over the place. However, since it was a TV match with a hot title change, it pretty much worked perfectly for what it had to accomplish, especially since LAX are supposed to be street thugs at heart, so they win *their* match, with Konnan's cheating to boot. Konnan's two best roles ever are this and his Lucha Underground mentor stuff. Such a crappy wrestler, but as a manager when actual hot topics and feuds, he was excellent both as a face and a heel. Gotta love the fact minorities still are portrayed as heels, too... (thankfully, Konnan was also acting like a dick and a two-face bastard, so he was indeed heeling it up, despite promos that actually made sense and that Ventura would have defended by using logic). Loving this LAX stuff so far, and it's much better than anything WWE ever did as far as using latino characters (I mean, the Mexicools...).

Oh yeah, these blurred shows were brutal. Logos were everywhere. The Blurry Era.

For fuck's sake. Are we comparing a terrible angle (which is scripted stuff executed by an employee) and cheating on your boyfriend (throw the first stone, people, there's nothing scandalous here) with actual *criminal activities* ? This is not a matter of "private life". It's the fact Moolah, from all accounts, was a true scumbag of a human being. Neither here nor there since it's the Mae Young Classic anyway. What the fuck was classic about Mae Young, you tell me. I remember her "flashing" her boobs at the Royal Rumble 2000, giving a birth to a hand and taking the table bump from the Dudleys at the highest of the mysoginic WWE booking. And well, there's a wee bit more about Mae too actually. Maybe Bix wants to post his article over here. As far as the tournament goes, good for the girls getting exposure. I may watch this, it's more interesting to me than the cruiserweight or UK indies stuff since the women have been more or less the saving grace of WWE in the last year or so.

Moolah was (supposedly, wink wink nudge nudge) pimping and abusing her girls. On a business level, she arguably destroyed women's wrestling in the US. Terrific legacy indeed. They could have name it the Trish Stratus Classic, if they had to go by WWE Universe Golden Age Only. If not, what the hell, Wendy Richter Classic.

In a post-colonial and imperialist context, it isn't called cheating, it's called resistance. All kidding aside, it's smart that he actually cut a babyface promo in his own language toward the punjabi people. That being said, with the cast system in India, I doubt Jinder Mahal would be even close to a man "of the people". Following a Marxist analysis, Jinder is from the upper-class, so he's an oppressor himself. But people love kings and such (hey, we actually elect a "king" every five years in France too). But yeah. These people should chant "asshole" or "cheater". The fact they chant "USA" shows how much things haven't changed in the pro-wrestling realm. Still waiting for a real positive middle-eastern character pushed as a main eventer. (Sami Zayn is from Lebanon origin, right ? HE'S RIGHT FUCKING THERE !!!!!)

So embarrassing for the girls taking part in that. The WWE bubble is such a pathetic thing.

Most TNA referees did suck, I'll give you that. (and Hebner did not help from the matches he's been involved in thus far)