Sean Liska

This is pretty fantastic, Lawler warming the crowd up at a Grizzlies game: http://youtu.be/y5I8dZ4q2FM

I'm working through the 1985 Worldwide season and it's awesome. You can't go wrong with how hot the company was back then and the level of talent they had. Do not do the AWA or Smackdown seasons, the other stuff is much better.

Vince has spent his entire adult life getting lower than expected ad rates and sponsors due to the stigma of pro wrestling. But changing the terminology obviously isn't going to fool anybody. I'm surpirsed wrestling didn't make any sort of positive steps in our culture during the late 90s boom. Wrestlers were crossover stars, you had someone like the Rock presenting a great image to the public, it was cool for teenagers to watch, etc. And yet as soon as the boom ended, wrestling went right back to it's same old place as something no one can admit to liking.

Didn't he suffer a pretty bad injury on the night of their first tag match? I think it was something involving his legs.

The note about HHH starting a new talent department is interesting. I think people worry too much about the terminology that WWE uses. It's still booked like a pretty simple pro wrestling company. The UT-HHH build as as basic as it gets. RAW featured a 20-minute tag match with Rey Mysterio doing great stuff. They are as much of a "pro wrestling" company as they've been in 15 years.

You don't need to turn Rock or Cena. They will both have passionate fans at the show and the atmosphere will be tremendous. Before both Mania and RAW this weekend, there were loud "Let's go Cena, Cena Sucks" chants with people screaming at each other. It'll be great.

No, but then I've never used slurs at work either. I don't think something you have to do because you screwed up should necessarily be entertaining. Exactly, and that's why it's his punishment. I think that's all Meltzer was saying.

Has anyone ever been to an entertaining work seminar?

So Wade put up a bizzare follow-up to the Cole deal on the Torch site: "There have been reports of Cole having tremendous locker room heat. One WWE source today gives us his opinion on Cole behind the scenes. "Is Cole getting a big head? HELL YES," he says. "Ever since he was reading the GM e-mails he started begging to become GM (he doesn't know who it's supposed to be) and walks around like his sh-- doesn't stink. He has an opinion on everything." He also has mouthed off to writers who hand him scripts, saying that he'll say whatever the hell he wants. Sources say Cole's on-air character has gone to his head and what you see on TV is what he has become behind the scenes." Wade was taking personal shots at Cole years ago, so he's always disliked him for whatever reason. But I love the idea of Cole telling the writers to screw off. Great visual.

Yeah, I don't get the point of working a capacity number. I guess it's not impossible since all of this attendance stuff is so shady, but I wonder if this is a case of Dave getting confused like thinking the NFL schedules Pats-Colts every year.

I don't know that I agree with this. Jim Crockett/NWA was largely critically acclaimed from '84 to '89, with periods here and there where smart fans complained about the booking, but generally liked the in ring quality. Mid South/UWF was generally a fan favorite. World Class and Memphis had their fans for sure. They might have complained long and hard about WWF wrestling, but I'd say American wrestling was pretty universally liked until the business contracted, with the early 90's really being a period where smart fans did not like American wrestling much, with WWF being WWF and WCW having their litany of problems. There was still so much animosity, though. While there were things people liked, most still hated the way the industry was heading and saw disaster loomong. My point wasn't as much that there weren't things that people liked, but that we were always depressed about the "state" of the industry. I see it this way: 84-86: Unbelievable hatred aimed at Vince for expanding nationally with his terrible circus show. People were disgusted with what he was doing to the industry. Everyone depressed over the fall of the AWA, Dallas, Florida, Watts, Memphis, etc. I remember an Observer from this era where Dave said he may give up on watching wrestling. People hated the changes. 87-88: More hatred towards Vince coupled with a massive turn on Dusty, with him becoming the most hated figure in the industry. Now everyone was depressed the one true challenger to Vince was done. 89: People loved the main event wrestling in the NWA, but the company was still headed the wrong way and Herd was hated. 90-95: The dark days. 2001-2011: Everyone depressed about the WWE monopoly and no one being as good as Austin or Rock. The fall of WWE has been predicted for the entire period once things catch up with them. Vince is generally regarded as an idiot despite having $50 million in profits last year. WWE actually had a pretty great run with Cena from 05-09 but most missed it because they were sad that things aren't as fun as 2000.

I was on the Observer board reading everyone complain about how terrible RAW and the Mania build are. And it occured to me that smart fans pretty much spent 1984-1996 complaining about the state of American wrestling (Damn you for killing the territories Vince!) and now 2001-2011. So we've apparently had about 4 good years in the past 26, but still keep watching.

Yeah, it's really odd. It's like they felt like they needed to say something bad about one of the Manias to seem objective, so they just decided to pick on 8 and use the Hogan-Flair story. Maybe they didn't want to use 9 since they had all of the behind the scenes footage, and 4 was too historicaly important.

Exactly. Screw the quarters. Sometimes you have to pick a guy and stick with it for people to buy him as a legitimate star. HHH wasn't over for months while they gave him a big heel push that crowds responded to with apathy. They need to do a lot more to toughen up Miz and make him seem like he belongs at the top level, and he doesn't feel like a WM headlne guy to me now, but it would be crazy to give up on his push because of his quarter hour numbers. That's what is wrong with wrestling now. If RAW's ratings were tanking and doing low 2's, and it started falling right after Miz got the title, then we would be talking about something different.

Yeah, I think it's mostly used nowadays as a tribute.

It would still somehow turn into a racial issue.

I turned the corner on Lawler with the Memphis set. I knew the guy was good, but the caliber of work he put in with a wide variety of opponents put him in the Best US Worker Ever dicussion with Funk and Flair. I thought the 85 LLT match with Dundee was like the 6/3/94 of the 80s in how epic it was. The Mantell and Funk stuff also stood out. I was also really surprised by how varied Lawler's moveset was and how crazy his bumps were. I wouldn't use the Express match as an argument for him, though, he was capable of much better "average" stuff in Memphis.

It's still odd on that front, since I've never seen anyone suggest that Bob Armstrong is one of the 100 greatest wrestlers ever. I rarely hear a WON HOF argument for him, and that group is 200+ now. Other marginal wrestlers you could at least point to a memorable WWE stint. But Bullet Bob just seems...random. They need a guy to "open" the show, I guess. You don't want to burn throught too many name candidates in a year. I'm just hoping I get to do the "Oh you didn't know" thing with Road Dogg.

Arn Anderson isn't being mentioned for the HOF anymore, which would suck. Although I'm very excited about getting to see Funk induct Abby.

I've had a lot of fun watching Jackson on my 1984 Mid-South TV set.

I don't think he'll be wrestling. But they'll probably hype up a "confrontation" with the two, which is the biggest money thing they can do with Rock not wanting to wrestle. So yeah, I don't have anymore doubts about whether I should head to Mania, can't wait.

Small price to pay if it's the end of his wrestling career. I always thought I would be excited for this day too, but he can do a lot more damage running the company than he can as a wrestler. I'm really scared of Vince retiring with this succession plan in place. But I don't know what Vince could possibly do with his free time if he retires, seems like he would go nuts. Except apparently HHH is the guy behind the pushes for ADR, Ziggler, Miz, Barrett, etc...go figure, right? Where is this info from? That's the first I've heard of it.

Small price to pay if it's the end of his wrestling career. I always thought I would be excited for this day too, but he can do a lot more damage running the company than he can as a wrestler. I'm really scared of Vince retiring with this succession plan in place. But I don't know what Vince could possibly do with his free time if he retires, seems like he would go nuts.

No, this is where Dave gets confused and we try to correct him. The Pats and Colts play every year because you play the other division teams that finished in the same spot as your team. The Pats and Colts get first every year, except for one where they both got second. Beyond that, I think we just enjoyed talking football for a little bit, it was Super Bowl weekend.

If we're talking revenue and success, then TNA would have to be doing pretty well with their licensing and TV money to be high, because no one goes to their house shows or buys their PPVs.