Matt D

No, we're used to it

The in ring interview with Heyman where News makes him rap and dance is so funny. That should make an errata for the year. I still argue that the fans really wanted to get behind News but he was just atrocious flubbing his simplistic lines left and right.

Shawn says pretty stupid things about the MSG Demos match. Just saying.

It's a tough balance and I absolutely appreciate that and I think that, is in some ways, the main counterpoint to these podcasts. I think Dylan and I especially have raised that point. It's not necessarily that one way is better than another and Will claims the opposite of what you just claimed, Johnny, for the most part. And with him that may be true. I just think that some matches will do better in this setting than others and some matches will do better in the manner you just discussed. And some will do well in both but for completely different reasons. I'll say this. I usually watch most of this stuff while on the exercise bike, so I'm a captive audience and I wouldn't necessarily be using that time to do anything else. I'd be biking anyway and if not watching these I'd be watching something else.

To me, there's no or next to no logical progression on the front end from the first cage match to the second. It's not like they do call back spots. They do the SAME spots. It was them running basically the same match in two different towns like you'd see between Philly and Boston in the WWF at the time. What they did was tweak and tighten the match between the first and the second. There are differences but they're on the back end of the match, fixing the mistakes in the first match, not the front end having one lead storyline-wise to the other. It's the same match, just made a many times better. Edit: I might be wrong but obviously I feel pretty strongly. According to Wiki Doug Somers is 62 years old. If anyone wants to find him and ask him, I'd be open to what he said. Shawn or Marty less so.

I do think his music got a pop and the Crossface teases always got pops. In general, though, I just think Boston in 2003 is a bad example for a crowd that needed that sort of prompting. If he managed that in the middle of Iowa in 2006 I'd be more impressed. I'm not saying there weren't plants. I just think, having been there, that it may have happened anyway. If there were plants, that says more about how the company felt about things than actual reality, but ultimately, it's an important element to all of this.

All I can say is that I was up on my feet before any plant could have possibly been. And I was in the cheap seats. Boston is a smarky smarky town and it was probably a hell of a lot worse then. The guys who paid the money for the best seats were, in part, the smarkiest of the smark. They're the sort that'd be up on their feet before anyone else. I know I was at the time. That doesn't mean there weren't plants in there jumping up too, mind you.

I am glad you are watching both Rose/Somers cage matches at once

Either September or October 8, 1977. Buddy vs Cocoa Samoa. I'm watching this specifically with the little things in mind and he does pretty great with it. Lots of small things. Slamming his own head on the mat an extra time after taking a back flop. Grabbing hold of the hair to get leverage during a kick out. The way his arms move when he's in a headlock. Samoa actually does a good job selling the arm and Buddy's armwork is varied and interesting and he really grinds when he has a hold on and also sells the attempts to fight out of it by Cocoa. It's a simple little heel as protagonist match (act 1: Stalling. Act 2: face catching him and taking over. Act 3: Armwork, cut off come back, submission finish) but well worked, certainly.

That's kind of what i was saying before. I know anecdotal evidence is frowned upon for good reason on the board, but I remember myself and a whole lot of other people around me jumping up at the end of that match.

Was it jericho who had x # of Raw main events in his contract when he first signed with WWF?

Ragnar Ross with Ranger Ross doing a viking gimmick would have been the best thing ever.

What's strange is I felt the exact opposite sentiment, especially in relation to Brock Lesnar v. Chris Benoit. If I had to give a statement of essence to that match, it would be "One man's passion to become world champion." He was a wrestler's wrestler, and it's a powerful feeling to watch him between 2003 and 2004 in his struggle to become a world champion as even fans felt no one deserved it more. It's hilarious to see HHH, for example, try to connect with the audience in similar ways in failing each time. Benoit's style and persona commanded respect from the audience, which is why he got standing ovations. I know you're just expressing opinion, and I'm not claiming that you're wrong since your claim depends on your own experiences anyway, which is neither right nor wrong, but it's strange that your objection to Benoit's work would be based off of that given that the fans felt very much emotionally connected to him upon viewing an intense match of his, whether against Angle or Lesnar. What stood out most about Benoit's match against Lesnar was the amount of real emotional heat in that match in ways that no match in modern WWE can touch outside of a Wrestlemania main event like Cena v. Rock. The standing ovation after Benoit vs Angle at the 2003 Royal Rumble was worked. It was started by plants. I wasn't a plant. I was an asshole 21 year old.

And for those of us who don't care a whole lot about violence and nastyness, it told an amazing, consistent, wildly challenging story about the old veteran trying to keep up with the young lion but getting more and more frustrated until his true colors started to show despite himself. In reverting to his old self, however, his desperation unleashes something in the younger wrestler that is immediately apparent would be the veteran's eventual downfall. In light of that both wrestlers just try to survive the situation fate has put them in. It's a beautiful story and beautifully executed.

Finlay still hasn't been rehired yet,right?

For the sake of your sanity you should focus instead how it's the only match that has consensus and everything else is all over the place.

Genius!

There's only one match that comes even close to it and the level of difficulty on Hennig vs Bock is so much higher.

I like my say of saying it better

Basically Dave likes Michael Bay?

Buddy vs Dr. D David Schultz, Cage match, Maybe 8/21/82? Buddy just makes every heel a face, huh? Anyway, this is fun. If Buddy loses he's gone forever, plus Oliver is chained to Hack Sawyer outside the cage. Pretty simple stuff at the beginning with Buddy getting mauled, but he makes it look great. Gets color early. The transition is him hitting a low blow which I think is a great, straightforward, logical use of the no dq stip. That's what Buddy WOULD do all the time if given a chance. He uses the cage pretty well and Schultz starts bleeding. That's when Buddy attacks the wound again. He really good at this. Very fun come back as Schultz outsmarts Rose, landing on his feet on a top rope move and just takes it to him. Finish is a bit bullshitty. If there's an enforcer chained to the heel's associate, it's kind of weak to have him made to look like an ass so that the associate can toss his buddy a special weapon. It get that it ratchets up the heat. I assume they were building to some bigger match for the Tuesday show. Still, this was good past that.

There's a difference between hot moves and action

I think your telling is obviously more accurate. I just find it interesting what my perspective was as a kid since Bret vs Barbarian is actually one of the most important match-ups of my youth, a seminal one for reasons i've mentioned before. I was going to ask you when WWF had the Warriors signed, but I can look through the WON on that, actually.

I'm not saying I didn't know it was a work. I was just used to the bigger guy getting the push.

I should know this but I'm blanking right now: In 1990- April 91 or so, were there a lot of cases of a babyface Bret's size beating a guy the Barbarian's size? I know coming into that house show in 91 at age 9, i was really surprised that Bret held his own to force the draw and I think some of that was how I was trained by the WWF to see larger wrestlers and smaller wrestlers.