Comments that don't warrant a thread - Part 4

[The Thread Killer]

4 hours ago, JerryvonKramer said:

I'm still convinced that if you added up all the ticket sales nationwide that the aggregate revenue for pro wrestling in America was likely higher in 1978 than in 1988.

 

Look at the crowds WWF or NWA were drawing in formerly solid towns and in many cases the gates are less than half what they were at peak. St. Louis is a banner case, but it's the rule rather than the exception. And by the end of the decade almost none of these places were being run every month either.

I agree. A lot of the territories were consistently drawing big houses every single week. I really believe the whole myth that wrestling didn’t consistently draw big crowds or TV ratings until the 80’s was just rewritten history from Vince and the WWF.

[sek69]

29 minutes ago, The Thread Killer said:

I agree. A lot of the territories were consistently drawing big houses every single week. I really believe the whole myth that wrestling didn’t consistently draw big crowds or TV ratings until the 80’s was just rewritten history from Vince and the WWF.

Even the WWF was drawing big crowds before Vince,  look at the Shea Stadium show in 1980. Bruno, Pedro, and Backlund were selling out MSG every month for decades.

[Ricky Jackson]

Go back even further to the early 70s and almost all the major territories were drawing huge. Many were doing stadium shows. Places like LA, SF, Detroit and Montreal that dropped off considerably in the late 70s were on fire. No doubt this was a hotter period than peak Hogan WWF for ticket sales (on average) and probably TV ratings too, but then the amount of true drawing cards was much greater and ignorance was bliss in many territories as far as not being outclassed by a more major league presentation on TV, like with cable in the 80s 

[JerryvonKramer]

I compiled this a few years back, of possible interest to current topic.

[El-P]

Been enjoying The Wrestling Revolver (Sami Callihan's promotion) lately. With lots of TNA talents alongside people you'd see in MLW, and the Ohio crew (Jake Crist, who is terrific, Fulton, who is quite ok), and some AEW people popping up (lately Billie Starkz, Marina Sharif, even Jon Moxley earlier this year). Easy to watch, relaxed, indy feel but with some ace talents, with a touch of old ECW chaos, Gia Miller playing "classic" ECW valet for Ace Austin, in very different babyface roles that they have in TNA, Alex Shelley being great as a small territory douchebag heel world champ. Fun stuff.

[Blehschmidt]

I recently watched several matches of Ross and Marshall Von Erich and I know that the overall perception is that they aren't very good, especially for as long as they've been in the business, but I wondered if folks think that is just because they really haven't wrestled all that much despite having 10+ years in the business, because they are coasting on the last name, or if it's some other factor.

From what I could see, Ross seems to be the weak link on the team, with poor looking offense and bad bumps. Marshall had a decent looking dropkick for a big guy, showed more fire, and came off as the more polished of the two.

[El-P]

13 hours ago, Blehschmidt said:

I recently watched several matches of Ross and Marshall Von Erich and I know that the overall perception is that they aren't very good, especially for as long as they've been in the business, but I wondered if folks think that is just because they really haven't wrestled all that much despite having 10+ years in the business, because they are coasting on the last name

Both. Per Cagematch, they have less than 130 matches over the last 12 years, and they worked most regularly the first two years. So they're at this point where they only get booked thanks to their name, despite not being very good, and since they don't work a lot because they don't have to, they don't and won't get any better. 

[Dale Wolfe]

Shayna Baszler at Bloodsport was a good laugh 

[JRH]

Butcher needs to grow his hair out again. He had a cool scuzzy 70s heel look to him when he first showed up in AEW (and it made a good contrast to Blade's look), but now he just looks like another tough, tattooed bald guy.

[RazorBladeKiss]

2 hours ago, JRH said:

Butcher needs to grow his hair out again. He had a cool scuzzy 70s heel look to him when he first showed up in AEW (and it made a good contrast to Blade's look), but now he just looks like another tough, tattooed bald guy.

He looked like a guy you'd see in lockup with the hair. It fit him really well. 

[BigBadMick]

Did US Express have any matches with Hart Foundation? And if so did they make tv?

 

I noticed a photo of Neidhart in the ring with Barry and Mike on HoF....

[El-P]

13 hours ago, Dale Wolfe said:

Shayna Baszler at Bloodsport was a good laugh 

Bloodsport was quite the show. Usually the idea is better than the execution, although there always is a few really cool matches, but I thought this was the best and most fun Bloodsport show overall. The crazy part of it is that it actually had talent from both AEW and WWE, not to mention TNA and NJPW. Talk about a forbidden door. 

[Robert S]

1 hour ago, BigBadMick said:

Did US Express have any matches with Hart Foundation? And if so did they make tv?

 

I noticed a photo of Neidhart in the ring with Barry and Mike on HoF....

Cagematch has two matches between the teams, two house shows in the summer of 85 (one in Syracuse, NY and the other in Orlando, FL). They were also in two battle royals, one them aired on TV.

[NintendoLogic]

No-showing his own HOF induction might be the most Sabu thing Sabu has ever done.

[sek69]

6 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

No-showing his own HOF induction might be the most Sabu thing Sabu has ever done.

Him doing it the same weekend Paul E gets inducted is just *chef's kiss*

[El-P]

10 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

No-showing his own HOF induction might be the most Sabu thing Sabu has ever done.

This is glorious 

[El Boricua]

It's taken around three years since it was announced but the movie about Puerto Rico wrestling looks to finally be releasing later this summer. Here's the teaser trailer for La Super Estrellas de la Lucha Lubre.

 

 

[JRH]

If WWE is going to push this whole "New Era" thing, maybe they should give RAW, Smackdown, NXT, and even the WWE itself new logos/branding.

[Ricky Jackson]

Scan of hard to find and expensive Gary Hart bio from Internet Archive

https://archive.org/details/my-life-in-wrestling-by-gary-hart-2009/mode/1up

[JRH]

Lots of great wrestling-related stuff on IA.

The idea of Overruns, be it in WWE or AEW or any other company are terrible. What if there's another show coming on another channel that you want to watch that starts during the overrun (For NXT I usually have to DVR the end of it so I can watch Dark Side of the Ring)? Just book the show around the time limit, if you want longer main events just shorten or cut certain segments so the main event can fit in the time slot. 

[NintendoLogic]

The overrun is a relic of the Monday Night Wars when Raw and Nitro were in a dogfight for ratings. This was before DVR, so strict adherence to timeslots wasn't a concern. And there wasn't anything on other channels at 11 PM on a Monday night to be worried about unless the MNF game was going down to the wire. Even after the war ended, the overrun was usually the highest-rated part of the show because viewers had been conditioned to expect the major angles to take place then. That stopped being the case after Raw expanded to three hours. By that point, though, the overrrun had been around or so long that people who grew up on it entered the business and figured that was just the way things were done because it was all they knew.

[WingedEagle]

Have any wrestlers addressed any challenges in working with a mask as opposed to unmasked? I imagine those with larger eyelets aren't too difficult, but others seem like they'd severely hinder peripheral vision.

[Dav'oh]

3 hours ago, WingedEagle said:

Have any wrestlers addressed any challenges in working with a mask

Chris Jericho has talked about having a bastard of a time as Super Liger, although I think it was the costume as a whole and not exclusively the mask (?)

Edit to add: I believe long-term mask wearing leads to "cauliflower face", for want of a better term. It's all the squishing and compressing of the soft-tissue.

[NintendoLogic]

Steve Sims once wrote that more luchadores than you might think dislike working under masks because they restrict vision, make it harder to breathe, and are uncomfortable overall (and almost as importantly, make it harder to get laid). And I remember reading that El Santo's ears were pinned to the side of his head from wearing his mask all the time in public.

[The Thread Killer]

16 hours ago, WingedEagle said:

Have any wrestlers addressed any challenges in working with a mask as opposed to unmasked? I imagine those with larger eyelets aren't too difficult, but others seem like they'd severely hinder peripheral vision.

In his book, Dynamite Kid mentioned that a promoter wanted him to wear a mask, and he didn’t want to do it because wearing one made him feel physically ill.