artDDP

I think during this time Hogan was only appearing in taped promos because then WCW didn't have to pay him his additional appearance fee.

It's nice to see a WWE angle based around two guys who just want to prove they're better than the other. Match was ok, good to see a clean pin and no goofy bumps or run-ins. I've been conditioned to expect every major PPV match to end after either of those or some overly dramatic bump. I told my brother, "If there's one person you know is going to put CM Punk over clean it's Chris Jericho." WWE has mangled the booking of Ryback. As a face he couldn't win the big one and as a heel he's already been neutralized by John Cena. Shit, he got beat clean by Mark Henry in a meaningless match at WrestleMania. What fan is going to take him seriously now? I don't see anything remarkable about Dolph Ziggler that makes me think he'll go very far as a face or heel. I get a feeling Daniel Bryan is just being built so that he'll have come credibility when he starts putting over people Vince/Hunter actually want to main event. I'm trying to get back into WWE the same way I was thirteen years ago. I think if I just watched a condensed version of the major stuff each week it might be easier. Do they still run that 90-minute version of Raw on Hulu?

Next is that god-awful SuperBrawl where Tank Abbot pulls a knife on his opponent and Tony has no idea what the fuck to say. The next night would be the last time I saw WCW live. I don't remember what the tickets cost but they were pretty cheap.

My post originally ended with me concluding that Mick was a piece of shit. I erased it because I didn't quite want to jump to that conclusion yet but I've thought Mick was a big piece of shit since the Rumble match.

I seem to remember Wade Keller saying that Foley's original ending for this match was to have his family in the front row and after taking a beating (still with the chairs) and seeing his kids cry he'd say "I quit" and take some time off. I also remember Keller saying that sometime before the show Foley decided to make the finish even more brutal and Rock was to keep hitting him with the chair until he rolled outside. Since Foley took forever to roll outside Rock just kept whacking him. Foley did this knowing his kids were in the front row. Are those stories correct?

The people I know that give me a hard time about my love of professional wrestling are usually the same people who obsessively watch every episode of those cable TV shows about finding treasures in someone's garbage or buying hot rods cash on the side of the road. They'll insist that everything about those shows is real, too.

WCW was starting to look somewhat cohesive again and the WWF was doing it's best business yet with a toned-down "crash TV" format and longer actual matches on TV. During that period Vince Russo gave some interview where he said the WWF product was stale because they were still pushing guys like Kane. I think he was trying to say the boom wouldn't last because he wasn't there to create new stars.

The tables and ladders are there in case something a few feet off the ground breaks or they need to replace an announce table quickly. End kayfabe. The kendo sticks? No idea.

They were regularly missing stuff like this on taped shows.

I think with Hunter, when it comes down to it the fans generally like him and respect him for who he is, but he isn't really beloved. He isn't held with the same reverence that, say, Shawn Michaels or Taker are. Those guys are living legends to fans, whereas Hunter is just...not quite there. But they try to book as if he is at that level, and it doesn't work. Maybe it is because he was always a heel and pretty ineffectual as a face outside of DX. Maybe it is because everyone knows about his relationship with Steph and can't help but feel he hasn't earned everything he's got. Maybe it is because he has been constantly pushed down people's throats for 15 years now without respite and it feels artificial. Maybe it is because he is booked so strongly all the time and has a hard time showing the vulnerability that makes people empathise with you. I don't know. But it seems they will never stop booking him as Hunter The Living Legend in these big angles until people start giving them the desired reaction, without realising that the way they portray him as such an infallible badass means they are never going to get it. When he first got a world title push he had to deal with the number one face of the company burying his long-winded promos week after week. I'm sure that didn't help his aura much.

This is around the time Scott Hall held up a Thunder taping for an hour or so and threatened to kill Terry Taylor leading to some sort of lawsuit, isn't it?

I tuned in at the women's match and thought what I saw was pretty good. I've never actually watched a TNA PPV live, just assorted matches via YouTube. I was very impressed with the video production after seeing this company show up on Botchamania videos time after time. I thought exposing the ring boards for the piledriver was a cool idea. When my dad was alive and we'd watch wrestling when weapons became involved he'd ask, "Why doesn't one of them just bring a gun to the ring and shoot the other guy?" When Bully Ray pulled out his knife I imagined my dad asking, "Why doesn't he just stab Sting since it's no holds barred?"

Can someone explain why it took WCW until 1999 to finally do a show in Canada? Why did they only hold two televised cards there when it seemed like a place they could actually make some money?

WCW came here to Sacramento in February 2000 for a "Nitro" telecast. That night was headlined by Hulk Hogan and Lex Luger in a cage match. I remember the section I was in screaming for Hulk to blade. Anyway, I was hanging out with a few guys in the parking lot afterward. There was one ribbon of security tape separating us from the wrestlers loading their cars and heading out. Arn Anderson helped load Ric Flair's bags into his limo and then Flair left without him. Arn took off in what I think was a rental car. I really thought Flair was a dick and that was when his image began to fade in my eyes. Anyway, I also remember Dustin Rhodes loading his car and some guys were really laying into him, taunting him about his divorce, daughter, dad, the Goldust character, among other things I'm sure I'm forgetting. Dustin had a look on his face like he was ready to either cry or snap and beat them all up. I remember being seventeen and this probably being the first time in my life I told a group of guys to knock it the fuck off.

It also could have had something to do with the then-booker being the central heel.

When covering the WWF taking back WCW's booking of MSG the Saturday after Thanksgiving 1994 Pro Wrestling Illustrated mentioned that that is usually a very strong date for the WWF.

If memory serves Tony Schiavone tried to prevent that tribute to Gorilla from making the air. I think this was the night Heenan told Schiavone, "I'm sorry, I can't hear you down here" and turned his back on him or something like that.

For some reason I can picture Lawler making the same joke on a current telecast, too.

I'm willing to believe it. Kurt Angle mentioned in his book that WWE has someone backstage recording everything because they never know when they may want or need to use that footage (I'd love to see some of this). I get the impression that WWE likes to own everything that's ever been associated with the company "just in case". And I'm also sure they wouldn't want any of that stuff being pawned off by fans or employees.

Austin would mention being captivated by World Class when he was a kid and having to fight his siblings to watch it each week.

That.

He was an eccentric with a pronounced midwestern uncoolness that went all the way around to being somehow cool. The clueless fiftyish republican uncle you could root for -- kind of a Second City Foghorn Leghorn. Compare his endearing know-it-all act with Mark Madden's obnoxious basement dweller version of the same thing. Jesus, this post is absolutely beautiful.

Does anyone know why WCW didn't pipe David Penzer's ring intros through on TV? If they accidentally left the house mike on during one Tony Schiavone would act completely offended.

I never really understood what Larry did to get so over in late-90s WCW. I doubt most of the fans remembered him being in the WWF in 1980 and he wasn't much more than a mid-carder in the early 90s yet by 1997 fans were chanting his name and he was booked into a feud over the future of WCW. Larry comes off like a complete prick. I remember him bitching about Chris Jericho during one of those off-brand PPV cards in 2002 or thereabouts. To hear him complain about Jericho's height and Backlund being "too small" is just...I don't know. It's not like Larry was six-foot-five.

Shawn Michaels was wearing galoshes and looked like a Walmart customer, not a former WWE superstar. Considering Shawn did almost nothing I have to wonder if Triple H set this up just so his buddy could get another WrestleMania payday.