artDDP

This is one thing I don't understand. It's as if WWE is willing to pay whatever royalties Jesse wants for a set where his commentary is absolutely essential, like the "Saturday Night's Main Event" set. But then, his commentary is included on the Starrcade set when he's only there for a small handful of matches. And then on this set, and dozens more, he's edited out? I also never understood why Jesse is the only announcer who sued for royalties?

One thing I liked about Bischoff was the night he described Lex Luger's forearm as the same one that "knocked out Yokozuna." I though it was kind of cool that WCW didn't act like it was its own parallel universe.

I'm drawing a blank: Was there a time where Jim Ross was blatantly saying whatever Vince told him to? Cole seems like he is consciously doing everything he can to sound like the total opposite of Ross. I seem to remember back in the "Attitude" era that both Vince McMahon and Vince Russo resented Ross because they thought he wasn't "New York enough" to be their lead broadcaster, or some such nonsense.

I think the Apter mags were the biggest reason I was so into tag team wrestling as a kid.

Foley mentioned in "The Hardcore Diaries" that there was someone within WWE who was very much opposed to Randy Orton feuding with Foley in hardcore matches. Foley said that person didn't seem to mind when it was him getting over by having hardcore matches with Foley. We used to have a thread full of mentions of Hunter cutting guys off at the knees on live TV. Why wouldn't he do the same in a production meeting?

I always thought Triple H had something against Orton. Maybe that's just because he books himself to demolish him pretty regularly.

From reading Punk's Twitter I think he is pretty douche-y. I probably would be, too, if I could say I slept with each and every WWE Diva. I remember there being stories about how pop culture-savvy Vince McMahon was for most of the last thirty years.

I think that the perception of a pro wrestler looking like a bodybuilder is still there but you can be accepted as long as you look athletic. I also think the fans are more accepting of athletic-looking wrestlers over enormous Ryback/Otunga types.

As a kid I couldn't get into the Warrior at all. He seemed way too "out there" for me. I don't think he ever did anything to really turn me off, I just remember being much more interested in Randy Savage.

There was the time Kevin Nash was booking and said he could put whatever they wanted in the first hour because nobody cared and wound up just running pre-recorded NWO vignettes.

One of the wrestling biographies I read a few years back said that HTM used a real guitar for that angle and it was then that sports-entertainment learned it might be a good idea to use gimmicked guitars.

I remember Ted DiBiase's Corporation being fed to The Undertaker during the year 1995, probably just to keep him busy during the Diesel experiment.

This was back in 2003 but on WWE's first Rey DVD there's Rey showing the viewer his "kick-back" room with some sort of wink-wink mention of the ashtrays inside.

I never thought of that. Leslie wore the face paint and outfit during the opening scene of "Mr. Nanny", where Hulk has a dream of being attacked in the ring by a gang of heels. I always wondered if that was were WCW got the Dungeon of Doom idea.

What I don't understand is how Triple H is considered the heir apparent to the WWE throne yet he is such a mark for the 80s-style NWA product, a product which was very much not sports-entertainment. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who hammers home the "it's entertainment, stupid" company ideology. Also, I'm tired of everyone calling it "this business" within the context of their storylines. I get that they aren't supposed to treat it with any legitimacy but my involvement is almost completely muted when it starts coming off like an episode of Smash.

When did Bruno drop his "I don't know about today but when I did it we didn't fix matches" gimmick? Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't the first six months or so of the year 2000 the result of Chris Kreski? I remember he was mentioned as keeping detailed storyboards with each wrestler's relationship to each other so he could keep continuity in storylines and had been an "episodic television writer" back before WWE coveted them.

He also created the Gangstas, so it might be fair to say he was. It was probably as simple as turning on the TV or picking up a magazine once in a while. Time had cover storys on both grunge and gangsta rap, you had to be living under a rock to be unaware of those cultural zeitgeists. WWF had some relevant ideas in the 90's, but the execution was too cartoonish,; Men on a Mission, Rad Radford, Man Mountain Rock all came off as bad parodies of those scenes. I would say Goldust was pretty relevant for it's time, and the start of WWF being more in tune with popular culture leading into the attitude era I was a wide-eyed teenager during those years and I remember how both the WWF and WCW seemed to exist in their own parallel universe at the time. Aside from a President Clinton impersonator a time or two and some NFL references both leagues were completely detached from anything happening in the world. This was a time when films like Clerks and Clueless were becoming cultural milestones and the wrestling business was still giving us John Hughes kids stuff.

I remember reading this when I was 10 and wondering, "What the hell is this?" This was when I wasn't sure if ICOPRO was steroids or not. Re Cena divorce. I don't imagine anything too damaging will come out. About the worst I've heard of Cena was he was a teetotaler until he met Ric Flair but he hasn't sank to Flair's level yet. And Cena cheats on his wife. The Rock got divorced after a decade and I don't recall anything career-threatening coming out of it.

Try calling it "the WWE" like everyone else does, that might help.

In typical WCW fashion, they never said it was a title match or a non-title match until SECONDS before the match began in order to bait-and-switch people into ordering the PPV. Also, the angle was that Piper demanded this match and chose the stipulations - meaning he apparently requested a non-title match. Wasn't the storyline at the time that Piper just wanted the one match to prove he could beat Hogan? I do agree that waiting until the match itself to announce it was non-title was typical WCW.

When I was in school everyone insisted everything but the title matches were fake.

I love that about pro wrestling. Instead of just beating the guy up backstage or at the gym you're willing to risk losing your championship to give a guy you just beat cleanly a rematch with some wild stipulation that usually doesn't favor you. I would just smash the guy's head in in the parking lot. I wouldn't be a very good professional wrestler.

I hate thigh-slapping for effect with kicks. If your kicks really made that sound it'd be your shin breaking, not someone's face.

It seems like it was a hundred years ago that they were using clips of and mentions of Dan Severn and Ken Shamrock's UFC feud to hype their WWF debuts.

I love this quote.