Dave Meltzer stuff

[S.L.L.]

SLL: i just mean that the emphasis on GAMES JOURNALISM in that whole mess may have gotten internet folks to notice these issues in other fields.

 

that said, i forgot that most of this forum probably wouldn't be familiar with it all anyway haha

Yeah, issues of journalistic integrity interested people before Gamergate, and will continue to interest them afterwords. And who are the most vocal critics of what Dave considered doing? Actual journalist Childs, politically attuned Dylan, various other very smart people...people who didn't need something like Gamergate to wake them up to issues of ethics in journalism.

[anarchistxx]

 

This is one of the better "Dave breaks down terrible angles" moments:

 

For those of you lucky enough to not see the most flawed PPV angle in history, it went something like this. The heels, mad because Sting & Smith didn't show up for a pep rally, went to a mysterious island where Sting & Smith were doing charity work. It's bad enough when wrestling people and other celebrities use charities simply to promote themselves in a positive light as a reaction to negative publicity, but at least in those cases they do donate time and/or effort to charity. In this case, the "charity work" consisted of playing volleyball with some child actors. Parker assured the rest of the heels that he had a plan that would keep Sting & Smith from appearing at Beach Blast. Little did he know that plan would only keep viewers from buying the show. It wound up with a dwarf wearing an eye patch swimming with a shark fin putting a bomb on a boat that Sting & Smith used to get to Gilligan's Island. Two very young girls saw the dwarf. The heels then took a boat ride to Gilligan's Island, and the only thing positive about that is that they didn't let Harley drive the boat. After a confrontation where the heels demanded the faces retire and the kids acted like they were going to cry if the faces would retire, one of the little kids told Sting about the funny man who was hanging around the boat. As Sting went to check, somehow one of the little girls told Smith about a ticking noise, and Einstein himself started sprinting down the beach, which was a sight in itself, and knocked Sting out of harms way just seconds before the bomb exploded and the boat blew up.

 

 

Incredible.

 

As Wikipedia deadpans:

 

Sting then teamed with WCW newcomer Davey Boy Smith to beat the team of Vader and Vicious at Beach Blast in a match that was set up by a mini-movie in which an evil midget blew up Sting's boat.

 

Only in WCW.

[iamthedoctor]

Not sure how you work that out. Smith was there around Feb time so not really a newcomer by Beach Blast.

 

Has Dave ever been on WWE's payrole as over the years he seemed like he knows alot in WWE or used to.

[C.S.]

Not sure how you work that out. Smith was there around Feb time so not really a newcomer by Beach Blast.

 

Has Dave ever been on WWE's payrole as over the years he seemed like he knows alot in WWE or used to.

 

He still felt fairly new by Beach Blast, from what I remember of my own impressions at the time. Remember, wrestling moved a lot slower back then. A big signing in February was still new and fresh in June or July.

[goc]

Yea, a guy who debuted in February of 93 was probably only starting his first real program by June or July after a few months of squash matches and interviews to get him over.

[tofu_chipmunk]

Davey Boy had already received a title shot against Vader at Slamboree.

[goc]

Ah I didn't take into account that WCW was doing more than 4 PPVs a year by 93. I think they had 7 that year.

[goc]

Dave's take on the finish of Undertaker/Yokozuna at Royal Rumbe 1994:

 

[...]and was either highlighted or lowlighted by the most unique finish of a title match in history. The title match featured someone purportedly dying, levitating in mid-air, and then going to heaven but vowing to resurrect one day. From a production standpoint, it was well above the norm and you can't say the show wasn't creative. Creative is often good, but not necessarily good in a business where some of the most successful promotions in U.S. wrestling history from a business standpoint (the old St. Louis office, the AWA and the 1970s WWWF come to mind immediately) have been the least creative and even today two of the most successful (All Japan and UWFI) are two of the least creative.

 

 

 

And Dave should show more respect for journalism!

 

 

Darryl Van Horn did a knock on the bible in his interview saying he reads from the Egyptian book of the dead, not the pack of fairy tales that people in the area read every Sunday morning. He never said the bible, so maybe he meant the local newspaper.

[goc]

Dave does creative writing AND extremely dated references in the letters section:

 

 

I was watching an old film on American Movie Classics starring a young Fred MacMurray. He sure looks a lot like Vince McMahon. Same hair style. Even the same clothes. Check it out.
R.J. Dari Parts unknown

DM: Vince McMahon was the original son of Fred MacMurray who somehow disappeared early in the series which is why they had to adopt Ernie as the third son. He slightly changed his last name because he was so embarrassed that his father smoked a pipe regularly on television. McMahon detests cigarette smoke to the point he's using guys whose steroid-gorged physiques got them into the business as role models telling kids smoking is bad for you, or even showing videos of chain smokers doing public appearances telling kids not to smoke. Vince's introduction to wrestling came when Fred introduced him to his long-time golfing buddy, Fred Blassie. I don't know if Uncle Charlie was his real Uncle but please don't tell me that The Assassin in those days looked like Uncle Charlie and even dressed the same just because you've never seen them both in the same place at the same time. In those days, there was a tag team called The Assassins in Atlanta. I guess Jody Hamilton ate the other guy. (That joke was stolen from the Wrestling Chatterbox newsletter but it was so good I had to fit it in somewhere). Seriously, whatever happened to that third son? Must have been one of those Dusty Rhodes angles that's dropped in midstream. Maybe the third son was blackmailed by Baby Doll who had an envelope of incriminating pictures and was threatening to send them to Fred. Next thing you know, somebody will be writing that Eric Bischoff looks like John Davidson.

 

[iamthedoctor]

Davey Boy had already received a title shot against Vader at Slamboree.

 

What was that match like? I didnt mind the one they had at the Clash where Catus returned but figured a shame Davey never beat Vader for the title as he was strong enough to. Not many guys could do a standing suplex on vader.

[NintendoLogic]

After the situations with Punk and Del Rio, WWE has put in all performer contracts that if they are fired for disciplinary reasons, they forfeit all merchandise rights and can’t work in either pro wrestling or MMA for one year.

 

It really takes some astonishing hubris to classify wrestlers as independent contractors while pulling crap like this.

[Dooley]

 

After the situations with Punk and Del Rio, WWE has put in all performer contracts that if they are fired for disciplinary reasons, they forfeit all merchandise rights and can’t work in either pro wrestling or MMA for one year.

 

It really takes some astonishing hubris to classify wrestlers as independent contractors while pulling crap like this.

 

 

I don't think the no-compete would hold up in court. It would be like telling a TV actor that if they're fired from the show they're on, they're not allowed to pursue a career in hockey.

[BigBadMick]

 

Davey Boy had already received a title shot against Vader at Slamboree.

 

What was that match like? I didnt mind the one they had at the Clash where Catus returned but figured a shame Davey never beat Vader for the title as he was strong enough to. Not many guys could do a standing suplex on vader.

 

It's been a while, but a good, solid match as I remember. A bit plodding at times - Vader was probably the more sprintly of the two at that time.

[MikeCampbell]

 

 

After the situations with Punk and Del Rio, WWE has put in all performer contracts that if they are fired for disciplinary reasons, they forfeit all merchandise rights and can’t work in either pro wrestling or MMA for one year.

 

It really takes some astonishing hubris to classify wrestlers as independent contractors while pulling crap like this.

 

 

I don't think the no-compete would hold up in court. It would be like telling a TV actor that if they're fired from the show they're on, they're not allowed to pursue a career in hockey.

 

 

I think WWE is banking on the fact that the future endeavored don't want to spend the money to take them to court and duke it out.

[Loss]

I wanted to post that Dave has made some really interesting comments lately about wrestling psychology, prompted by him watching NJ World and the Cornette garbage DVDs. The January 1 WOL devotes the last 20-30 minutes of the podcast to this topic based on a listener question. Also, Cornette's last appearance on Dave's show is a MUST-listen. I don't even agree with everything he said, but I did agree with most of it, and I could understand and respect where he was coming from on everything he said.

 

After listening to a lot of this, I think many of us sometimes make too big of a deal of the gap between Dave's opinions and a lot of ours. Sometimes he truly does have a different takeaway, but much of the time, we're arguing semantics. So much of it comes down to him factoring wrestler and/or booker intent into his thought process when rating matches and that not really being anything most of us consider at all. Anyway, I think I agree with him just as much as (probably more than) I disagree with him. I do wish he would write more about this sort of thing in the Observer, but I also understand with everything on his plate why he doesn't.

 

Anyway, check out the Cornette and New Year's Day audio if you haven't. New Year's is free even.

[Dylan Waco]

Interested to see how the Dome show attendance is covered

[Grimmas]

Interested to see how the Dome show attendance is covered

On VOW too, they were going on and on about it blowing away last year's and being a potential sell out on the preview show.

[MJH]

What was the early figure, 37k? If correct, that's up 35% from last year and must surely be considered a big success? I'm genuinely amazed anyone was predicting a sell-out. Going by how Dave normally answers such questions, I would assume his was along the lines of "they're hoping for 40, but anything 35 and over is a success".

[kjh]

Recent Dome Show (paid) attendance history:

 

2015: 36,000 (Tanahashi vs. Okada, Nakamura vs. Ibushi)

2014: 35,000 (Tanahashi vs. Nakamura, Okada vs. Naito)

2013: 29,000 (Tanahashi vs. Okada, Nakamura vs. Sakuraba)

2012: 23,000 (Tanahashi vs. Suzuki)

2011: 18,000 (Tanahashi vs. Kojima)

2010: 20,000 (Nakamura vs. Takayama, Tanahashi vs. Shiozaki)

2009: 27,500 (Tanahashi vs. Mutoh, Nakamura & Goto vs. Misawa & Suguira)

 

Meltzer predicted a sellout or near sellout in the Observer a few weeks ago, as he was told that the advance for the show was 50% ahead of the same period last year.

 

36k is a good number, but New Japan likely hoped for better given the more rapid attendance growth in past years. It suggests that the company's recent popularity spurt is plateauing off, which might be a slight problem as they move away from several iPPVs a month to an online subscription channel, and thus need to appeal to a wider audience to maintain their profitability.

[MJH]

Ah, my bad, I didn't see that the Tokyo Dome History piece wasn't updated to include last year, hence thinking 29k was last year not 2013.

[pol]

I'll just paste what I said in the podcast forum here...

 

The word now is that 36k was a sellout for the setup they had in the building. I don't see that there's any reason to believe that Dave got worked on the advance ticket sales. I do think you can argue that his enthusiasm for the product caused him to make more positive extrapolations from the available information than he otherwise would have, and maybe in that sense the NJPW front office managed to work him by withholding the one crucial detail about the max capacity of their setup. That said, to play devil's advocate, is it really so hard to imagine the same thing happening with a non-guaranteed-sellout Wrestlemania?

[Dylan Waco]

Soup made my point for me in the podcast thread, but really the best defense of Meltzer's reporting on the Dome attendance is that it was ignorant or lazy or based on house organ sources that were feeding him BS. Even IF I accept the argument that 36k was a sellout for the building in that configuration (and I don't buy that for a second for a variety of reasons), it doesn't change the fact that Dave's reporting claimed ticket sales were way ahead, the first sellout in ages was a possibility, et. None of that talk fits with them doing effectively the exact same house they did last year, and that's to say nothing of the spin being put out by Jarrett and other people affiliated with the show that they were shocked by the early numbers and it was looking like 50 or 60k might be there. New Japan's new gimmick of "selling out" buildings by configuring them short and/or claiming they are configuring them way short (they did the same bit in Sumo Hall late last year) does not mean they aren't doing well, but it is deceptive which should be obvious to anyone paying any real attention.

 

I will reserve further comment until I actually see what Dave reports in print on the matter.

[ohtani's jacket]

I don't believe that Dave was worked on the advance ticket sales. It doesn't make much sense for New Japan to stop selling the best seats for the purpose of working an attendance number. My guess is that the best seats sold faster than last year and they thought they'd fill out the stands more. The stadium isn't set up for 50 or 60k because of the stage and ramp. That number is a misconception of what constitutes a sellout. A sellout is closer to 42k. I don't really believe they got 36k paid given they were selling tickets at the door. When an event sells out the Tokyo Dome, it's usually in a matter of minutes. I've never heard of it selling out over a mattet of weeks.

[Loss]

The stage alone is the size of a 20,000-seat arena? Good God.

[ohtani's jacket]

That includes the seating behind the stage. For big musical acts, the stands to the right and left of the stage sell out, but New Japan doesn't bother trying to sell those tickets. Their Dome show set up (which they claim is 36k) is a cresant like shape facing the ring and stage.