El-P

Sid isn't exactly the poster boy for pro-wrestling fandom either.

I had interest in watching Rock come back last year. I was not disapointed and enjoyed the match a lot. Needless to say the idea of having a John Cena big celebration this year is not as appealing to me, especially after all I heard about Rocky looking about ready to explode. Lesnar vs HHH I could care less, since anything about HHH I could care less, although it can't be as horrific as his match last year with Taker. CM Punk vs Taker... mmm... I've been tired of the streak about 5 or 6 years ago, and Taker hasn't look good for the past three years. The only great thing he was involved with was the *awesome* Johnny Cash introduction a few years ago. So yeah, kinda curious to see that match still because of CM Punk, but not getting my hopes up. Swagger vs Del Rio, whatever. No interest in the undercard, although if Henry and Jericho get a good opponent it might be fun to see. So there will be my yearly WWE moment, but as much as I was looking forward to it last year because of the Rock, I'm not that much interested this year despite Lesnar. Biggest pop of the night should be Bruno.

I could third that match and drop Ai Fujita's name. Now *that* would fuck up this whole thread, I don't think anyone but FLIK could answer that one. But I'm going with that SMW TV match vs Tracey Smothers which ended by the swerves of all swerves, Ron Wright stepping out of his wheelchair to fuck Smothers up (sorry I don't remember the date and all, I don't keep track).

Never saw a match that I thought was good or interesting (from either WWF or Mid-South, haven't seen him elsewhere yet). The gimmick was racist as all hell. The guy had cool looking back kicks and singular maneurisms. Gimmick was racist as hell. I dunno. The guy played his role right. I guess. I'd rather watch Kimala II.

This.

Not saying it's not valid, but it had been overstated at points to me. Maybe less so now than 3-4 years ago, I'm not following closely enough, but like Jerry said, it really depends on who is debated and for some guys it pops up quite quickly I believe.

AWESOME !

Yeah. Look at Raven. But seriously, this kind of thinking also seems flawed to me. Tons of dull and mediocre workers know what and how to do things. It doesn't mean they do those things very well nor that those things make a great, exciting or compelling match. Hence the "he played his role right" talking point being one of the most overrated lately.

WEEK 14 (April 5 to 10, 1999) Match of the week : Raven & Perry Saturn vs Rey Mysterio Jr. & Kidman (Nitro). The tag team championship keeps on delivering each week. This time, we get Raven & Saturn vs the smaller champs, and they do bump like crazy, including Kidman taking one of his ridiculous bump to the floor. Rey is very clearly the best worker in the company, which also makes it the best worker in the big two (I'd argue that Tajiri was better than him then). ECW match of the week : Hardcore Hak vs Mickey Whipreck (Thunder). This is pretty surreal. Whipreck had injured an ankle in his debut match against Kidman, so he was off TV until then. Good little match. They had no idea what to do with Whipreck, no idea why they signed him. Dream match of the week : The Cat vs Norman Smiley (Saturday Night). Two of the most entertaining characters on the roster, and they can't get a match elsewhere than on the C-show. Meanwhile, we get a battle royal on Nitro with all the nWo B-team guys. Depressing. Anyway, this is a fun little match. Wiggle is not showed on TV, and even Tenay and Hudson joke about the whole "controversy" stuff. Comeback match of the week : Jim Duggan vs Lenny Lane (Nitro). This is Duggan's first match coming back from cancer. Looks pumped up as hell, with his large scar on the right side. I wasn't happy with his comeback promo a few weeks back, but this match made me smile. Fuck cancer ! Debut of the week : Nitro's new look. This is what WCW needed to get back in the ratings. Yes ! I think Jericho almost tripped on the giant C. Death of WCW angle of the week. Sting returns in black and white and points to the video screens, which play a video of Macho Man announcing the main event for Spring Stampede, a four-way match with himself as the guest referee. Okay. Bare with me. Earlier in the show, there was that long sequence of promos by Flair, Hogan, Goldie and DDP which led to a four way on Nitro for the title. It was made clear that Flair was calling the shots, and *he* made the match himslef as he was provoked by DDP and attacked by Goldie after he first gave Hogan a title shot. Sting was supposed to adress the fans. So, ending of the four way sees Sting rappeling down to the ring, like it's 1997, baseball bats and all. Which already makes no sense. And then that abortion occurs. So, the WCW production team put together a video of Macho Man announcing a four-way match that includes Sting and himself as a guest referee. Makes the whole company looks like a total joke on so many levels that I won't even go into it. Also probably the laziest build to a PPV main event ever. Nash's booking of the main event scene is putrid at this point. I forgot, it seems ike DDP is not really a heel after all, not yet at least. Sting ? Who the hell knows why he's back in black and why the hell he's getting a title shot. Macho Man helped Ric Flair defeat Bischoff in January, so by all acount he was a face by then, but now that everything is upside down, who the hell knows. As far as him making the match and being a guest referre, this is just booking at random. It's simply as bad and nonsensical as anything Vince Russo did. Godawful stuff. WCW really looks like it's totally crumbling from the top at this point. There's no direction whatsoever. The undercard stays fun thanks mostly to the tag team scene with Rey/Kidman, Raven/Saturn and Benoit/Malenko (Hennig is injured, so sadly no more him/Windham). The US tournament gets Steiner vs Booker T in the final. Way to make fuck up the TV title. They seemingly put Hak with Bigelow simply because they used to be ECW guys. The fact that Chastity turned on Raven had been forgotten. Rick Steiner is having a bad mini-feud with Fit Finlay (he basically squashes Finlay at every turn), and Buff Bagwell may be the candidate for "most degraded worker" this year. He's bloated and looks all stiff. Not a good comeback, I'm glad they took him away from Steiner.

The jokes write themselves. Ric Flair vs Roddy Piper at Mania.

Getting a plate of ramen from Kawada would be the most surreal thing ever to me.

I enjoy him more once I got to know the real guy behind the charcater. I've said it before, something that comes through to me is that he loves it so much and put so much into it.

If you ignore the fact he provided Richards with pretty much all the funny gimmicks and stuff he was doing at the time, maybe he wasn't... Richards had all the talent in the world to to it, but Raven came up with it. It's not like Richards did anything very notable post ECW either BTW. That's the only thing I really agree with.

He's got half the brain that you do.

No band T-shirt though.

He was talking strictly about the jeans shorts + T-shirt though.

You realize that people around him got heat *because* they were around him, not the other way around ? You'll argue that Van Hammer, Billy Kidman, Saturn and Reese got Raven over in WCW ? You'll argue that Stevie Richards is the one who got Raven over and not the other way around (especially when Raven was the one coming up with pretty much all of Stevie's material and goofy stuff, a fact Richards acknowledges himself) ? Raven really needed Peaches and Blue Meanie to get heat ? Come on. I know you hate the guy, but let's at least be fair. The character may not be for everyone, but to say he sucked at it is nonsense. The one time Raven let a more talented guy cut promos for him is during the short stint Cactus Jack did with him.

Blame BHL (Bernard-Henri Levy). Guys like him or Alain Finkelkraut are media attention whores. But I'm not sure you can call these guys philosophers. Not exactly an expert on that field. But Gilles Deleuze they aren't.

He took credit for it at least. The T-shirt wearing was to hide his flat chest.

Goldberg wins on every level, except for promos. Much more entertaining squashes and matches. Looked the part but didn't look like a giant wimp or clown when he got inside the ring. Plus his career is so much shorter.

Ok I wasn't sure. That being said, neither Saturn nor Raven were pushed in the WWF at that point.

If we're talking about the "flock disolves if Saturn wins the match" stuff, by the end of the match, the crowd was going apeshit. Don't let the facts got in the way of a good story when Raven is involved I guess... Anyway. I never said he was a great wrestler and had great matches, that would be outrageous (well, not more outrageous than some recent claim of greatness), but he was good, and he put together the most entertaining clusterfucks of I've ever seen. Loved his character, look and promos (the first depressed wrestler ever), loved his sense of humour (make no mistake about it, *he*'s the one responsible for all those hysterical Stevie Richards impersonations and angle in ECW). Could take a beating like no one else. Not the most athletic guy ever (and he pokes fun at himself quite a bit in those 40 hours of shoot interviews), was lazy at times, but he remains one of the most fun wrestler I had the pleasure of watching. Scott Levy is everything good and fun about wrestling.

That got a laugh out of me !

Agreed. The other thing is that they aren't just part-timers. They are, for the most part, nostalgia part-timers. Guys from the past.

Pez Whatley was still a pretty good worker when I saw him in WCW as a job guy in the early 90's so no, I wouldn't put him there. Patterson and Cash, yeah, not very good...