Who is the worst booker ever?

[C.S.]

Call me crazy, but I believe Russo over Meltzer on this one. Unless Lucha Underground is fucking stupid, they're not going to be hiring the guy that took a crap all over Mexican wrestlers/wrestling in that infamous interview from 15+ years ago.

[C.S.]

The hell?

 

TO ALL VISITORS OF PYROANDBALLYHOO.COM,

As of today I am no longer associated with the website, or brand, pyroandballyhoo.com in any way, shape, or form. I will not be posting anything---blogs, videos, podcasts, from this point going forward. I am no way any longer associated with the site.

Please know, that if you renew your monthly membership, you will not be getting any content from Vince Russo from this day going forward. I also ask you to not buy any Vince Russo merchandise, as I no longer have access to the orders.

I will keep you all updated of my future endeavors here on my Facebook page.

As always I have been and still am very thankful for all your support.

I'll keep you posted.

Peace,

Vince

 

 

 

VINCE RUSSO P & B UPDATE

I am fully aware that some of your monthly subscriptions rolled over today prior to my announcement that I was no longer a part of Pyro & Ballyhoo.com. This took place as a function of Paypal being that tomorrow is the first of the month. I want to assure you, that I will be looking into and addressing this matter on your behalf first thing Monday morning.

Nothing at all has changed---the BRAND ALWAYS HAS and ALWAYS WILL come first.

Peace.

 

https://www.facebook.com/officialvincerusso

[Jingus]

He booked himself outta his own website. Classic Russo.

[Johnny Sorrow]

If you gave him money then you deserve to get swindled.

[DMJ]

I'd be really curious to know how many people paid for his site. In this day and age, I find it really hard to imagine there is a huge demand for any paid wrestling site, let alone one like his, which offered very little in terms of content (from what I saw advertised) and didn't have the track record and reputation for quality that other sites (like the Observer, Torch, etc.) rely on so strongly.

 

I subscribed to one paid site in the past, for about 2-3 months, just to hear the shoot interviews (this was in 07'). I forget which one, but it wasn't expensive. I got to hear lots of cool stories.

 

But now? 7 years later or so? You can get stories on Austin's podcast, JR's podcast, Jericho's podcast, and Cabana's podcast. Austin's, in particular, is one I listen to weekly just because Steve is such an entertaining talker that just hearing him talk about India Pale Ales is good for the drive-in to work. You can get wrestling analysis, almost daily, from the LAW. I don't listen, but have good friends who really like Ring Rust. All of these are 100% free to download. There are also dozens of fan-made podcasts (and I'm probably wildly underestimating by saying "dozens"), many of them niche, but some quite good (I listened to Da Sharpshooters for a long time just because the hosts were funny). Whether you want to hear someone's thoughts on last week's Fast Lane PPV or Clash of the Champions 9, you could probably find an hour of talk devoted to it on iTunes. For free.

 

I hate to make the comparison to pay vs. free porno, but to me (and to, what I assume would be 99% of people), if you are paying for porn in this day and age, you're either a major porn freak that might need to seek counseling or you're not sure how to work the search function on google properly. For wrestling, it's the same. If you are so starved for wrestling content that you're going to pay Vince Russo for his thoughts, I don't understand your existence and recommend counseling.

[C.S.]

I didn't pay for his website, but he did apparently have a lot of unique shoot interviews with people who haven't really done any other podcasts or DVDs. Chyna is the obvious one, but he also snagged guests like King Kong Bundy, Big Vito, etc. Even though someone like Big Vito may not seem as "exciting" as CM Punk or whoever, I'd bet a guy like that has a lot of great stories to tell.

 

But like I said, I didn't pay for Russo's site, so I have no idea if the interviews were any good or not.

 

Either way, as the poster above me pointed out, there are so many free options now that it's hard to imagine too many people paying for Russo's site - even if he did (apparently) get guests no one else had.

[The Thread Killer]

So apparently Vince Russo has started his own pay site again. How does this keep happening, and who would actually pay to hear what Vince Russo thinks about anything? Now if there was a kickstarter campain to pay Russo to stay AWAY from Pro Wrestling and to pay him if he agrees to NOT share his opinions...that is something I could get behind.

 

So he posted a blog entry last week bemoaning the fact that whenever he points out what he sees as flaws in modern Pro Wrestling people get after him, but JR can say the same thing and people respect JR's opinion.

 

Early this morning I read a blog posted by JR about the state of the wrestling business today. Man, did his views sound hauntingly familiar.

 

While both JR and I grew up wrestling fans, our backgrounds and experiences are vastly different being that we were raised in completely different parts of the country and influenced by regional wrestling and the personalities that represented that region. However, regardless of the differences in both our personalities and philosophies on the wrestling business, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that JR and I are sitting on almost the exact same page when it comes to the reasons behind the declining state of professional wrestling today. In his blog on his own site, JR sited many of the same things that I have been saying regarding the industry for the past year since I became active on social media.

 

However, regardless that JR and I share the same sediments, here’s the thing that is most fascinating to me. For whatever reason, when JR has something negative to say regarding today’s wrestling business, it is listened to with open ears, accepted and respected. Me, on the other hand, when I poise those same feelings, the haters come flying from the rafters ready to attack me, my wife, my kids and the family dog. I am met with so much hate and venom when it comes to my take on wrestling today, that you would think that I’m actually looking forward to seeing the total demise of a business I’ve enjoyed for over 40 years, opposed to actually trying to help find and offer the solutions to save it.

 

So why is that? Why can JR say the same exact things that I’m saying, but yet his criticisms are welcomed, while mind are ripped apart by those who read them? Why? The more, and more I look at my position in professional wrestling, the more and more it becomes obvious to me why the wrestling media has made me the most “controversial man” in sports entertainment history.

 

1. People absolutely just hate me having no idea who I am. They’ve never met me, never spoken to me, and surely have no clue of what I’m all about.

 

2. People hate the character that they saw in WCW in 2000, and have convinced themselves that that REALLY is Vince Russo, rather then somebody who was just embellishing what people outside of New York wanted to believe New Yorkers were “really” like.

 

3. People from New York are stereotyped, and there is a prejudice cast upon them if they happened to grow up in that part of the country.

Outside of those three things . . . what else can it be? A man from Oklahoma, who started working for the WWE about the same time I did, is revered over his comments concerning today’s wrestling, while I am crucified for those same sediments? Why? Because he wears a cowboy hat, and I say “Bro”? Because he comes from more of the south while I come from Brooklyn? Tell me, please.

 

The bottom line is this, no matter where Jim Ross comes from, or where Vince Russo comes from, we have both had ties with the WWE since 1993. We were both there for its biggest period in the history of professional wrestling, and we both follow it today at perhaps it’s lowest. From either one of our perspectives, we can tell you what the problem is, why it exists and what is needed to fix it. Regardless of who we are, and what we might represent to different people–we’ve both been there, done that, and are in a position to give an educated opinion based on our backgrounds.

 

In other words, whether you’re from New York, or Oklahoma, it doesn’t matter. Anybody, with any kind of experience in the wrestling business can surely tell you . . . Stamford . . . you’ve got a problem.

 

Vince

 

I think it's hysterical that Russo can't understand why people respect JR's opinion and not his. (They share the same sediments, dammit!)

 

Yes, Vince. It's because you're from New York, or that people confuse the real you with the character you played on TV. (Who you obviously must have been playing in your shoot interviews too. And I guess your television characters wrote your books as well.) The fact people don't respect you has nothing to do with the fact that you're the worst writer in the history of wrestling, and you helped drive WCW into the ground.

 

This week, he has posted an interview with Billy Corgan on YouTube. I was going to watch it, but I'm afraid that the combination of ignorance and ego would melt my brain.

 

Has anybody here been brave enough to watch the interview?

[Grimmas]

Wow!

 

He is more delusional than I thought. Yes, everybody only hates Russo because he was the most amazing asshole character ever in WCW. Yep, he was that good folks!

[LariatMMBOPPO]

So apparently Vince Russo has started his own pay site again. How does this keep happening, and who would actually pay to hear what Vince Russo thinks about anything? Now if there was a kickstarter campain to pay Russo to stay AWAY from Pro Wrestling and to pay him if he agrees to NOT share his opinions...that is something I could get behind.

I like the idea of Russo continually opening pay sites only to somehow end up constantly being exiled from them.

[clintthecrippler]

The idea of Vince Russo becoming the Teddy Hart of "pay for content" wrestling sites seems incredibly appropriate to me.

 

Though I admit, the idea of Teddy Hart and Vince Russo talking crazy person talk to each other might be worth a buck-forty-nine just to hear them misinterpret the other once each starts talking about how there should be more pussy in wrestling.

[S.L.L.]

However, regardless that JR and I share the same sediments

 

 

He must have gotten those from reading the dirtsheets.

[Strummer]

I find Russo's criticism of Owens rather peculiar since he once said that he could get anyone over with his booking. Regardless if they looked too much "like a wrassler" or not Well except if they were Mexican or Japanese...

[W2BTD]

To answer a question earlier in the thread, Russo's first attempt at a pay site (the one that involved Chris Cash which fell apart) had roughly 300 subscribers at something like $4.99 per month.

[Laz]

137 replies and no mention of Rob Black.

[Mad Dog]

I like to pretend XPW never happened.

[The Thread Killer]

I don't know if you guys have heard about this story...but it has now come out that Vince Russo contacted both Destination America and now Pop TV behind TNA's back, trying to con the networks into giving him a job, basically trying to write for TNA directly for the network, not TNA. Apparently he was telling the networks that only he could fix the problems with TNA.

The way this information got out? Russo admitted it himself! He hosted a podcast this past week, co-hosted by Disco Inferno. He admits that he went behind TNA's back trying to get a job, and even Disco called him on it, and told him it was a dick move.

The story gets out, and Russo figures out...maybe I shouldn't have publicly admitted that, since it makes me look like a total weasel. So Russo takes the podcast down, but the story is out and several websites reported on it.

Now...Vince Russo's arch enemy has the information and the shit is really on.

Jim Cornette has launched a scathing rant aimed at Russo. Now of course, Cornette doing a shoot or podcast going after Russo is not news, but this is slightly different because it fleshes the history of the heat between Cornette and Russo out for those who don't know the story. Also, this is a vintage Cornette meltdown, even by his standards.

 

This story and Cornette's subsequent rehashing of his history with Russo has brought a lot more about Russo out, that a lot of people who don't know him might not know. There are some interesting stories on this podcast which reinforce just how much of a backstabber Russo is. This is a guy who apparently has no issues going behind anybody's back (including his own "friends") when it suits him.

A hilarious Russo side note, after seeing and reading a couple of interviews recently, I discovered that allegedly, Vince Russo has the writing skills of a child. I don't just mean he's a bad writer (which he is) I mean he literally can't spell. I have used a quote from a blog entry by Russo as a joke around PWO several times, where he uses the word "sediments" instead of "sentiments." At the time, I thought it was just a typo or a spell check error, but apparently there is more to it than that. Apparently, Russo's written show outlines that he handed out during TV production meetings were so riddled with terrible grammar and spelling errors that they were almost indecipherable. According to Cornette, TV network executives would look at these scripts and ask what the hell they were looking at.

There is a saying among writers: "Writers read, writers write." Well, Vince Russo has gone on record as saying he hates to read. He doesn't read books, and doesn't even like to read the newspaper. He actually said in an interview that he didn't even like reading to his kids, that's how much he hates reading. So it's no surprise that in order to get his creative juices flowing when he was booking, instead of reading, he watched Jerry Springer for inspiration.

The funny thing is, as much as I detest Vince Russo, I don't care for Jim Cornette at all. I find some of his opinions as ridiculous as Russo's (on matters like Lucha Underground, or Sami Zayn, just to name two.) I could also give less of a crap about Cornette insane ranting about politics, religion and every other thing that crosses his mind. The only issue I ever agree with Cornette about is Russo, but on that issue the man is right, even if he is terribly biased. It sure looks like he has every right to be.

Point being, the more you find out about Russo, the more you see what a horrible person he really is. In my opinion, of course.

[El-P]

Nothing much is new, but it is the mother of all rant, the final promo is pure gold, straight out of NWA circa 1986. Russo's such a complete ballless dipshit.

[The Chief]

Hasn't Russo recently said numerous times SWEAR ON MY CHILDREN and SWEAR ON MY GOD DAMN GRAVE that he never wants to work in the wrestling business again? What a joke.

[The Thread Killer]

Exactly. Just like his epic meltdown (which is covered earlier in this thread) towards Dave Meltzer, when Meltzer reported that Russo was talking to Lucha Underground about a job. Russo went mental and denied it to the hilt, claiming he only went to the LU show to interview somebody for his podcast.

 

It has long since come out and been confirmed that when he went to the LU show he did ask them for a consulting job, but they wisely told him they were not interested. If somebody waved a booking job in front of Russo, he's jump all over it in a heartbeat. Thankfully, there is nobody that stupid.

 

It's like Cornette says, as scary as this sounds, writing for a Pro Wrestling Promotion is the only thing Russo is "qualified" to do. He has no other transferable skills, so of course he's going to make the rounds of every possible promotion asking for work. Since he can't really write, it's not like he can do novels (aside from co-authored autobiographical stuff) or scripts. He'd have to have somebody hold his hand and help him every step of the way. I'm starting to suspect that was Ed Ferrara's role in their relationship - translating Russo into English. At least Ed Ferrara has a college degree and experience writing scripts for television. As scary as this sounds, Ferrara actually teaches writing now.

 

I doubt we'll ever see Vince Russo fall back on writing scripts or teaching writing.

[Al]

I came out of this with a worse opinion of Jim Cornette. I know Russo is an incompetent booker. But Cornette was openly advocating his desire to commit assault. C'mon now.

[C.S.]

A hilarious Russo side note, after seeing and reading a couple of interviews recently, I discovered that allegedly, Vince Russo has the writing skills of a child. I don't just mean he's a bad writer (which he is) I mean he literally can't spell. I have used a quote from a blog entry by Russo as a joke around PWO several times, where he uses the word "sediments" instead of "sentiments." At the time, I thought it was just a typo or a spell check error, but apparently there is more to it than that. Apparently, Russo's written show outlines that he handed out during TV production meetings were so riddled with terrible grammar and spelling errors that they were almost indecipherable. According to Cornette, TV network executives would look at these scripts and ask what the hell they were looking at.

 

There is a saying among writers: "Writers read, writers write." Well, Vince Russo has gone on record as saying he hates to read. He doesn't read books, and doesn't even like to read the newspaper. He actually said in an interview that he didn't even like reading to his kids, that's how much he hates reading. So it's no surprise that in order to get his creative juices flowing when he was booking, instead of reading, he watched Jerry Springer for inspiration.

 

To be fair, George Lucas is apparently the same way. Now, you can all argue about Lucas's merits all you want, but you can't argue with Lucas's success - love him or hate him, he has been undeniably successful.

 

All of this makes me wonder, though, if Russo has dyslexia or some other kind of disability. That would perfectly explain everything you described.

 

Jim Cornette is like the meme "old man yelling at a cloud" to me. His bullshit almost makes Russo sympathetic. I said almost.

[Johnny Sorrow]

I'm no Russo fan and Cornette is one of my favorite guys ever but I'd love to see Vince Russo punch Cornette in the mouth.

[El-P]

To be fair, George Lucas is apparently the same way. Now, you can all argue about Lucas's merits all you want, but you can't argue with Lucas's success - love him or hate him, he has been undeniably successful.

 

And Russo hasn't. He's been a proven, gigantic failure everywhere for the last 18 years. So there.

 

And I don't see how Corny comes off bad. He's cutting a promo, people. An amazing one too.

 

As far as Russo punching Corny, well, considering he was in "mortal fear" in TNA, I don't see that happen anytime soon. Plus really, Corny would probably go into old-man berzerk mode, no-sell it and jump to Russo's throat even if it meant blowing out his knees again.

[C.S.]

And Russo hasn't. He's been a proven, gigantic failure everywhere for the last 18 years. So there.

Russo's booking was part (a part - not the whole reason) of one of the most successful money drawing periods in wrestling history, the Attitude Era. Cornette's booking didn't draw anywhere and lost money everywhere.

 

I wouldn't hire either of them at this point, but if you held a gun to my head and forced me to open up an unsuccessful start-up wrestling promotion with one of the two, I'd go with Russo. At least he never slapped any of the talent like a redneck idiot hopped up on caffeine.

 

For all of the talk of Russo going around to different feds and begging for jobs, well, places like Lucha Underground would want nothing to do with Corny either.

 

As far as Russo punching Corny, well, considering he was in "mortal fear" in TNA, I don't see that happen anytime soon. Plus really, Corny would probably go into old-man berzerk mode, no-sell it and jump to Russo's throat even if it meant blowing out his knees again.

This is really silly to debate. Two fat old fucks getting into a fistfight sounds about as entertaining as The Dicks being managed by Big Dick Johnson.

[El-P]

Russo's booking was part (a part - not the whole reason) of one of the most successful money drawing periods in wrestling history, the Attitude Era. Cornette's booking didn't draw anywhere and lost money everywhere.

 

Seriously, we got to go over this *again* ? In 2016 ? What about *all* the other stint that were disatrous failures, everywhere he went, everytime, for like 15 years ? Seriously...

 

As far as Cornette goes, he sure did good with SMW (in the worst era for drawing, when regional territories where a thing of the past), which was also a super fun promotion. And as a talent, Corny and the MX drew shitload of money.

 

I wouldn't hire either of them at this point, but if you held a gun to my head and forced me to open up an unsuccessful start-up wrestling promotion with one of the two, I'd go with Russo.