El-P

Can-Am Connection vs Bob Orton & Don Muraco : filler Billy Jack Haynes vs Hercules : hot feud, really ? Hillbilly Jim & two midget vs King Kong GBundy & two midget : filler with midgets Harley Race vs Junkyard Dog : hot feud, really ? Dream Team vs Rougeau Brothers : filler to the point even the announcer don't pay attention to the match Roddy Piper vs Adrian Adonis : hot feud Hart Foundation & Danny Davis vs British Bulldogs & Tito Santana : semi hot feud, the focus was clearly on Santana vs Davis which kinda suck for the tag belts Butch Reed vs Koko B. Ware : filler Ricky Steamboat vs Randy Savage : hot feud Honky Tonk Man vs Jake Roberts : hot feud Iron Sheik & Nikolai Volkoff vs Killer Bees : filler Hulk Hogan vs Andre : hot feud That's 40% of hot feuds and 60% of fillers.

Not yet. I'm just at the second TV show post Wrestler War. I'm glad the Steamboat feud is over because man, Steamboat über sportsman babyface character just doesn't make things very exciting on top. The entrances at WW were ridiculous : Flair got 40 women, and Steamboat came out with his ugly (yes, I'll said it and would say it again, Steamboat's baby was ugly) brat on a poney with his soon-to-divorce-him-and-take-his-money wife. I was so rooting for Flair during this whole feud, and I think I would have done it back then too at 13 years old. You don't get much closer to "pure sports build" than that in modern wrestling, and it showed why it's not a good idea. That the matches are some of the greatest ever are the saving grace of this feud, because it wasn't very exciting on weekly TV after Chi-Town. Also, Steamboat really didn't came off like The Man at all, barely a legit world champion. The way it was done really made him look like the token transitionnal champ to get some more big matches with Flair before losing the title. I didn't buy Steamboat as the World Champ very much to be honest. And I agree, Center Stage made things better.

That Ric Flair vs Ricky Steamboat feud really was all about the matches, as the angles and interviews before Chi-Town Rumble were good, but the two rematches were just built on "well, we need a rematch". Not very compelling, but of course the matches are amazing. I still don't like the way they worked the ending of Wrestler War very much. Of course the transition toward Terry Funk makes you forget about it immediately. The Dynamic Dudes video with "Iko Iko" is something I'm sure Shane Douglas and Laurinaitis would like to see disapear from the surface of the Earth. The video promoting Flair vs Steamboat was pretty well done for its time, but really, "The Final Countdown" in 1985 ? Add to that the live concert from the Oakridge Boys at the PPV and wrestling appears so unhip it's not even funny. Man, WCW was so southern (but it's a part of its charm). Terry Funk appears on TV and automatically becomes the best thing in the promotion. Amazing. The first mark of corporate goofyness was the Dynamic Dude gimmick, complete with "oh, they are a fun loving duo, our young fans will love them" announcing which made them look even worse. The second mark of cororate goofyness was Norman the Lunatic. The first signs WCW was gonna try to out-WWF the WWF with stupid gimmicks instead of wrestlers, which was a bad idea. Dick Murdoch feuding with Bob Orton was a fun, old-school territory feud with guys working a style alread gone out of fashion. Orton could still go at his age, and looks better than during his WWF stint. Interesting to see the debut of Scott Steiner, not even throwing one suplex. Sting was way goofy at this point, and not very good or interesting in the ring if not working with good opposition. I'd argue that Luger was much better at this point. Luger was taking some serious bump too then, especially a "missed clotheline propelling him over the top rope to the floor" which looked great.

Hell, they used an Italian guy to play an Arab in the 00s. Tells you how much you need to know about how they view their audience (and I guess they aren't entirely wrong sadly).

Piper was pretty awful. Ray Rougeau was kinda dreadful too (in both language). I did enjoy HTM when he did it for a while.

Which makes me think : Slaughter the american iraki sympathiser was a turncoat, but Volkoff the russian american sympathiser was a hero. But yeah, Slaughter was still really good back then, he had Hogan's best match in years in WM VII.

Patterson was Patterson. But WWE has been as homophobic as any other wrestling promotion ever.

Which really should annoy WWE pro-Republican and homophobic nature a whole lot more when you think about it...

Disagree. Yoko was pushed as The Man to Beat from Royal Rumble 1993 up to Wrestle Mania 10. Luger didn't became the main face until Summer of 93, and by Royal Rumble 94 it's arguable that Bret Hart was more over than him (hence the double finish and burial of Luger after WM). From the time Bret lost the belt to the time he got it back, the focus was on Yoko more than anyone else. He pinned Bret Hart, pinned Hogan, didn't lose he belt against Luger, "killed" Taker, probably the strongest heel reign of WWF history up to that point. Yoko was seriously Da Man for a year and a half.

Maybe he was. I can't judge that part. But the feeling I get when I hear him call matches is a good one. Not speaking japanese, I can still tell you that the two goofballs calling FMW matches during the Direct TV era were two of the worst wrestling announcers I've ever heard. J-Taro is up there with Mark Madden has one of the most annoying guy in the booth ever. But I realize it's hard to judge only going with the feel you get from heaing the voices. I don't think any non-french speaking guy could get how great Guy Hauray (french announcer for Montreal wrestling then WWF TV in the late 80's and early 90's) was, very articulate, and a terrific heel, full of shit, indignant, arrogant and quite funny too. Funny fact is that he became somewhat a of coaching guru since leaving WWF in 94. By guru I mean "full of shit". The way he no-sold and made fun of Bob Backlund's performance at Royal Rumble 93 is just awesome.

A million times is a bit overstated, but I agree Tony at his best was better than Ross at his best to me, and Tony was really damn good up until 1997. Totally agree.

Akira Fukuzawa says hello. I don't speak japanese, and as it is I would rank him pretty much at the top along with Lance. Ross over excitement during finishes post 1999 just makes him unbearable to me during big matches, he sounds like he's having a panic attack and it's just as ridiculous as Joey Styles infamous screamed lines (and I like Joey as much as anybody). Basically Ross ranks that way to me : WCW Ross > WWF (1993-1998) Ross (at his best, really great, and excellent most of the time) >> UWF >>> WWF post 1999 (could be just plain terrible and annoying, oversells everything by gawd!)

Jim Ross in later days UWF : annoying, overhyped, overexcited, screaming way too much. Jim Ross in WCW, much better because he was not overselling everything like he did in UWF. The constant reference to college sports and "real" sport is annoying as hell and reaks of desperation attempt at selling wrestling as just another sport. I don't give a shit about college sport, just shut up about this already. Overall I find JR quite overrated and don't buy the "greatest wrestling announcer ever" stuff for a minute. He was mainly unbearable from the Attitude era and on to me, overselling everything, kissing HHH's ass and basically fucking up stuff like Schiavone at his worst.

That's right, that's exactly what I loved about Jesse. Agreed. Those moments were quite funny. Other moments I loved is when Dusty would go apeshit at Tenay's accurate mexican or japanese moves description which he didn't understand.

Monsoon was full of crap too, he would just bury the heels to no ends and really didn't put them over at all, which really was conterproductive I thought. Jesse was too smart to let himself get buried and actually pointed out intelligent things about the dynamics of the matches, and really, I would always side with his point of view. Heenan & Monsoon was just a comedy team like you said, which was funny and worked well, but in a way Mansoon & Heenan were more important than the in-ring product, which in a way was a good thing considering the crap they had to announce. But overall, not a huge fan of Monsoon. Great line.

I like Tony more than most. Agreed about what's been said about Tony & Jesse being really fun to listen too. FWIW, Cornette has said than Tony was a good guy, but when he came back from WWF, he was changed and had lost the love he had for wrestling. Heenan has said in shoot interviews Tony hated the fans, hated the westlers, and was only thinking about keeping his spot, to the point he would work Heenan and Tenay by not giving them the results in advance sometimes. I take Tony & Jesse over Jesse & Mansoon or Heenan & Mansoon any day. Never liked Mansoon bullying the heel announcers, it was just plain annoying after a while.

These are some of the stuff introduced during the Attitude era that I really hate, the show became just grand-guignol with people getting run over and "arrested by cops" every other week, to the point settling their differences in a wrestling match didn't made any sense. Remmeber when Austin was arrested at Calgary Stampede ? It was great because it was unique and meant something. By 1999, stuff like that happened all the time seemingly.

Rip Morgan was doing the haka in 1989 on WCW TV.

Who ? Why ?

What's the deal with tobacco, alcohol, lexomil etc then ? Alcohol is the most dangerous drugs of all and kills thousands of people each year, and it's perfectly legal.

You are confusing race with religion. You are confusing race with nationality. Races don't exist. "Black" or "white" is a social denomination based on previous false assertions that there were different human races. But there isn't. Always thought every skin colored people should be forced to have one kid with every other different skin color people, over three generations. At this point, there would be no black, white, yellow or whatever anymore on the planet, it would be a gigantic mess and racism would be forced to go away. Plus cross-bred people always look better, mixing the gene pool, the colors and the shapes only makes things better. Well, I guess people with different religions would still hate each others, and men would still oppress women...

That's strange, I used to live with two Jewish girls, and SLL or Bix can correct me if I'm wrong about this, but in the Jewish faith, you are considered Jewish if your mother is Jewish, which makes Rock a Samoan. Or Jewish, I'm not quite sure. Post of the thread, by far.

... Hoped someone would notice it.

So, when is the first TV taping ?

Mariah Carey is black ? Well color me stunned. I agree it is silly, but it's still how people thinks. I personnally couldn't care less. Just thinking about something, Ahmed Johnson, if not for injuries (his and the ones he gave other workers) and egos, could easily have been the equivalent of Goldberg. He was over like hell at one point.