Matt D

Who's more physically awkward? Greg Gagne, 1993 Erik Watts, or Brett "Hack" Sawyer?

How DID we define that? That they're all too obviously pretending to have a professional wrestling match instead of having a professional wrestling match? You can see the strings?

That Will can still mark out to that level for Cena thanking him silently during a match despite being the wrestling version of Peter Lorre from Casablanca is pretty damn adorable. Rick, you need to hide this comp of wound-biting wrestlers for me.

Yeah, but also boring as fuck considering who will likely have it (and I like Cena as much as the next guy and would think that he'd be the right choice). I was a bit cooler with the idea when there were territories.

I'm hoping for some BS finish where they switch belts. I love the World Title. It doesn't mean much anymore, but I doubt Bryan gets elevated without it. Mark Henry sure as hell doesn't get a "world" title run without it, likewise Christian, and those are three of my favorite wrestlers right there. If there's only one world title it's going to be held by just a handful of guys over the next few years. I'd be curious to have Chris do an analysis of who was in main events before and after the titles split and the level of variety. On one level it'd be okay if they could use this to really make the IC/US titles meaningful, but you know that's unlikely.

A point that Bix made that I agree with is that the ending segment, while doing a fine job building up Cena vs Orton, with even the pandering helping, made the handicap matches with Bryan and Punk feel like afterthoughts.

If they have every Mania/All American/Spotlight, that would interest me. Some of those you can't even find results for.

I think I posted here that not being the case after was my greatest fear when he got signed. I hope his long term prospects with WWE become clearer soon. As ambiguity can really weight on a person. Wrestling is a terrible thing to be good at in 2013. If Naylor was an Accountant or Marketing man he could just walk down the street to the next firm. But then he'd have a hugely unfulfilling professional life like the rest of us.

Definitely lots of appreciation for Naylor for his optimism and enthusiasm. I'm not going to go all "woe is us" or anything but as a community, we had a pretty hard 97-09 or so from the death of Pillman to the death of Misawa, with the death of WCW and ECW and the monopolization of the industry in the middle. It's part of why there's more business talk than anything else a lot of the time. Moreover, I think one reason why we do better than other places is because we so thoroughly escaped back into the past. I'll be honest: for those years I didn't stray far from DVDVR, but it actively surprised me when looking at something from the mid-00s on an rspw archive recently to see DVDVR referred to as a "mark board," which isn't even a term I was familiar with. We've sort of pushed against so much of what we found enjoyment in ten+ years ago and found other things to like to the point where I can only imagine what outsiders think of a place like this now. Anyway, that Naylor could not only live through all that but experience the seedy underbelly of the industry firsthand in a way that I doubt any of us has and still be Rob Naylor is pretty impressive and he's probably a happier guy than I am so more power to him.

Well, this time they'd be ready for Hunter. He can only turn heel once. He can't turn Heeler. You obviously feel very strongly about this but I think that there's at least an argument the other way and you're not meeting anyone half way on it.

Cena highlighted that if he, the good guy, won this Sunday in the unification match, then justice would prevail and all would be right in the world as opposed to what's been happening currently with the corrupt bad guy in charge.

You have an insane crowd. Why not use it? One of Cena's "Merits" is that he chose to make Daniel Bryan the #1 contender even though he was untested in that role and the Company didn't want him there. It was a valid point for him to bring up and it actually sort of elevated Bryan by saying that he ought to be the #1 contender again. I'll agree with whoever said that Michaels was really good at doing basically whatever he wanted to last night. It's one thing I don't give him enough credit for. He's really good at understanding how to move a crowd, both in ring and out. I think the issue is that he used it in ultimately nonconstructive ways over the years at various points.

WWF @ Springfield, IL - Convention Center - October 26, 1992 (4,500; 3,300 paid) Television taping: Included an untelevised podium interview with Jimmy Garvin who insulted Randy Savage & the Ultimate Warrior and predicted all the heels to win at Survivor Series What the heck was this about? EDIT: Ah, I found this (http://wccw2001.tripod.com/id11.html) JG:I only said ten words to Vince. I dont like him and he dont like me. Vince asked me in 1992 to tryout. Ive been in the business so long I didn't have to tryout. I was always a rebel,a outlaw. It was a stage in my life and it wasn't my life. I went to the WWE one time to vist and see friends. He never called me back. Thats because I looked at him and he looked at me and he knew we wouldn't get along. They asked me to change my name. What about Doc Hendrix? Who the hell was that. That was bullshit. I never had to kiss ass too much. We all have to kiss ass within reason. Tell me to change my name "Go fuck yourself"! All the NWA went up North and worked for Vince. Dusty wore polka-dot trunks. Ronnie Garvin with 2X4,Michael Hayes become Doc Hendrix. I wasn't gonna change my name.

I refuse to actually order these, but I've come up with a working list of 50. The order is "when I thought of someone." Nick Bockwinkel Buddy Rose Terry Funk Jerry Lawler Steve Regal Bobby Eaton Dustin Rhodes Mark Henry Daniel Bryan Ricky Morton El Satanico El Dandy Mocho Cota Sangre Chicana Bill Dundee Rick Martel Bill Eade Eddy Guerrero Barry Windham Arn Anderson Bret Hart Greg Valentine Tito Santana Tully Blanchard Jerry Blackwell Rey Mysterio, Jr. Fit Finlay Brian Pillman Big Van Vader Ricky Steamboat Ric Flair Too Cold Scorpio Billy Robinson Steve Austin Randy Savage Mr. Saito Jim Brunzell Curt Hennig Roddy Piper Stan Hansen Tracy Smothers Rip Rogers Andre the Giant Ernie Ladd Mick Foley Antonio Cesaro Christian Larry Zbyszko Chris Masters Bobby Heenan The only guy on there that's really dubious is Hansen because I really just haven't seen enough, so if you want to, you can sub him out for Chris Colt. And yes, like I said, my only Japanese guy is Saito.

I hook up my laptop to the TV with a HDMI cable if I want to watch something off of it, generally. That said, we just cancelled our premium channels that we only got because it was basically free due to a gift card from Verizon two years ago, just to save $15 a month. I don't think we spend much of anything for "entertainment" on a monthly level past cable. Granted, we use my father-in-law's netflix occasionally and visit the redbox maybe once a month. I'm not sure how many people in our boat. When I was in college I would have jumped at $10 a month though.

If Cena does win I could see him getting his win back against Bryan at the Rumble.

Well the most important part of working, to me, is getting the story across, and I think he listening to him talk about specific matches is always interesting because of that. He's probably as good as anyone at the sort of overbooked, overdramatic, Shawn-Michaels-making-funny-facial-expressions sort of matches WWE loves to kick out now and again.

To me, Foley was a very good storyteller. He was able to get to the heart of a match conceptually and then try to figure out how to get there through his work. He's one of the better big picture guys I can think of and I don't think he gets enough credit for that.

We should start a pool about how successful or not this will be.

What would have happened if Lawler turned in 93 when he went to WWF and he feuded with Jarrett as the top face? I can't imagine the fans would side with Jarrett over Lawler, but he's a good enough heel that maybe? Jarrett's push in 93 was heinous, with the whole "new fabulous one" stuff and all of his celebrity friends.

One thing about NXT is that you could easily toss oh, say ten of those guys and four of the women on the main roster tomorrow and it'd be fine. Even when the in ring isn't quite up to snuff, the characters are. Another brand split would be fine across the card except for on the very top.

Saw a Terry Fargo vs King Parsons match from Portland and I thought Fargo was a very fun stooging mid-card heel. I want to see some of his All Star stuff as Terry Adonis now.

Inclement weather means I get to write this up instead of toiling through my 1.25 hour commute to work. There's a great talk show segment that was posted too, where they have Borne and Buddy in. Buddy's great saying that he really wants to team up with his brother in law. They also show footage of a six man from the week before with Borne/Hack Sawyer/Regal vs Stasiak/Oliver/Buddy which has a blistering rope running segment with Buddy and Borne and a fun machine gun arm drape spot by Buddy. It's too bad we don't have that. The best part is when it comes back from commercial break with the show's elevator music in the background of the action. $1500 Battle Royal - 8/29/81 Let's see, Stasiak, Oliver, CHRIS COLT, Tiny Anderson, Destroyer, Buddy. That's who I hear announced. King Parsons is in there. Matt Borne is in there as is his dad I think. Hack Sawyer, who apparently wrestled Buddy at some point because he rushes right at him and starts kicking at the leg. Regal. The VQ on this is really rough for a battle royal, so I'm depending on Bonnema for the most part. Oh good, Colt is a member of the army now. Buddy sells a headbutt from Parsons by almost going over the top. Great stooging bump. There goes Colt. He never lasts long in these. Parsons has Destroyer pretty much on top of Buddy and it's pretty funny. There's a headbutt war going on with Destroyer (And the loaded mask) and Parsons. Hack Sawyer is patently ridiculous. Buddy rolls out and hides in the corner of the ring. At this point it's Oliver/Destoyer/Rose and Matt Borne/Regal left in. Buddy sneaks back into the ring, but Regal ducks a punch as Buddy hits Oliver. They've been keeping Rose away from Borne for the most part. It was built up big when they got in during the six man the week before. According to Meltzer that is because people didn't think brother-in-laws would fight. They get Regal out, but then Borne drops Sawyer and Oliver, so now the two are matched up and the crowd is into it. Tony Borne comes on down to ringside to keep an eye on them. They glance at him and only after he nods does Matt chase after Buddy, who runs around the ring before rolling back in. he immediately starts bumping all over the ring for Borne. Regal stays at ringside to watch too. Borne gets Buddy up in the airplane spin, but keeps punishing him instead of tossing him. This lasts til he misses a high knee in the corner. Buddy starts on the leg with butt drops with the leg draped over the bottom rope, but after two of these, Borne shifts his foot around and shoves Buddy over the top with it in a pretty novel spot for the win. It sure looks like kids swarm the ringside area to celebrate post match. Anyway, this was fun, but the VQ made it pretty rough. It's one of those signs of how protected booking (Even with real life reasons) can make a match up really pop a crowd in a situation like this.

I could honestly see them doing Bryan vs Kane.

Anyone strong enough to carry Memphis to that level would have gone to Vince or Turner. It had to be Lawler since only he had the incentive to stay.