Category: Wrestling Musings

Another point that has been brought to my attention: Today in wrestling history; ten years ago, Shawn Michaels beat Bret Hart in a 60-minute Iron Man match for his first WWF World Title. I’m bringing this up because a lot of other wrestling sites are doing it, but if you’re reading this post, do me a favor and don’t complain to WWE for driving the Montreal screwjob to the ground. And don’t tell them to move on, because you know they’ll milk it for all it’s worth when THAT tenth anniversary comes around.

I’ll see you in eighteen months.

According to RAJAH.COM, SNME did a 3.4 national fast rating, thus indicating that showing wrestling on a major network did nothing to increase interest in the product… well, it would have helped if the show was actually, you know, any good. Unless NBC is in a happy mood, don’t expect another episode of SNME to air anytime soon.

I mean, come on guys. Just because your currently crappy shows are getting “huge” ratings on lowly networks like USA or UPN doesn’t mean they’ll fly on a major network like NBC… Of course, you can always blame it on the NCAA tourneys, but you can just as easily blame it on the crappy weather.

This doesn’t bode well, but if they get another shot, maybe they’ll do a better job… or not.

So yeah, for anyone who cares, NBC is airing the return of Saturday Night’s Main Event, the old WWF show of the 80s and early 90s that has become a token WWE TV special. As much as I enjoy the prospect of catching a WWE show, I felt not much has been done to give people a reason to care about this show other than the fact that it hasn’t been on the air for thirteen years.

So for the sake of clarity, there’s only three matches that I’m covering here. I ain’t going to do the beer-drinking contest because that’s an Austin thing that always goes the same way… and let’s forget the women’s match, which had a hot angle going before it dragged and became usual WWE diva fluff that I really don’t care for anymore. So let’s begin this thing – raw and unformatted:

Booker T versus The Boogeyman
Hmm… on second thought, make that two matches to commment on, because we all know Booker is going to lose this one.

WINNER: Nobody. The match never happened.

Shawn Michaels vs. Shane McMahon – STREET FIGHT!
So Shane McMahon gets his bumpfest match this year. Let’s not kid ourselves – if it wasn’t for the fact that he’s the boss’ kid, Shane-o-Mac would have been a top contender for the World title. Not a seasoned wrestler, but he’s sort of like Mick Foley-lite, but with more teeth. But because he’s the boss’ kid, he gets to fight and bump endlessly before losing the match to HBK – just so he could contribute to Shawn’s feud against Vince… who has to get in yet ANOTHER Wrestlemania match.

WINNER: Nobody. We got a re-enactment of Survivor Series 97; HBK as Bret Hart, Shane McMahon as HBK, and Vince as himself. Time-honored tradition my ass.

John “Boring” Cena and Triple “Vince Jr. Jr.” H vs. Kurt “You Suck” Angle, Rey “Eddie-lite” Misterio, and Randy “Resthold” Orton
Actually… ah crap. I’ve got nothing today, guys. Sorry. Let’s go with Boring and Vince Jr. jr. and call it a day, alright?

WINNER: Boring and Vince Jr. Jr. Hey, somebody had to win a match on this lousy show.

Man, they should have kept this show buried.

Later.

Apparently some people have had problems getting access to the Blog. Truthfully speaking, so have I. I don’t know what the problem is, but the fact that I’m posting and you’re reading means that whatever was wrong has been resolved.

Since I AM here for the moment, I’ve decided to comment on a few things of random nature.

As much as I don’t want to include any references to that so-called self-destructive former wrestler and current motivational speaker whom everyone hates, I can’t help but comment on Warrior’s recent post, where he entertains the idea of TNA signing both himself and Goldberg to let them beat the crap out of each other, thereby creating tons of heat and money.

Not to sound pessimistic (or realistic, whichever you choose), but the last high-profile Warrior match (Halloween Havoc 1998 vs. Hollywood Hogan) was really, really bad… so bad that I almost swore off watching WCW PPVs. Also, the last high-profile Goldberg match (Wrestlemania 20 vs. Brock Lesnar) was filled with audience hatred and malice towards both guys… although it was probably due to the fact that both guys were leaving and that the audience were New Yorkers and would boo a poodle if they had the chance.

Having said all that, I would entertain the idea of a match-up between these two on a TNA PPV. It’ll probably make the usual 0.9 buyrate that most PPVs from the company makes. Intensity and charisma aside, these guys are older and in Warrior’s case, hasn’t been an active wrestler in years. If the match ends up being something watchable (as in extremely short, where both guys work best), it would be a modern-day miracle at best.

Strange purchase story: I’ve picked up a used copy of Capcom vs. SNK 2 for my X-Box. For some reason, though, the game came with the instruction manual for the GAMECUBE version. Go figure.

Gotta go. Later.

Tim White was a moderately successful WWF referee who had officiated some classic bouts (on both ends of the stick) until a shoulder injury ended his career while officiating a Triple H match. Mr. White shortly retired after, but the match had caused him so much turmoil that his entire family left him and turned their backs on him. Now alone with only the Friendly Tap bar as his drinking buddy, poor Mr. White has had enough.

One day, on a WWE PPV during an interview with Josh Matthews, Mr. White pulled out a shotgun and attempted to shoot himself, but he dropped the gun and shot his toe instead.

Some time later, Mr. White tried digesting rat poison, but the brand had proven to be ineffective against humans (hence the reason it’s called rat poison) and so Mr. White survived.

Mr. White tried to hang himself, but fortunately the rope broke. Mr. White even miraculously survived an attempt to die via dropping a plugged toaster into a bathtub that he was in.

Recently, Mr. White went for the old fashioned method of killing one’s self: slitting his own wrist. Despite the gruesome depiction shown on WWE.com, we have the utmost confidence that Mr. White will survive this latest brush with death and cornball sports-entertainment angles that don’t entertain that well… which explains why they’re ONLY on WWE.com.

You just CAN’T make this shit up, folks.

The sad and most disconcerting thing about all this is that eight-nine years ago, during the Attitude era of sex, drugs, and generic rock music, Vince once said there’d be no guns and knives – even shirts bearing this credo were sold at the time. Somehow, I seem to be the only one who remembers that little quip.

What did I write about Cena and Batista in Post 200? Let me see…

Both have held their titles since Wrestlemania 21, which is an already incredible feat. And in my opinion, they’ve done pretty well thus far. Despite what the general audience and “insider fans” think of either one of these individuals, I sincerely hope that they make to Wrestlemania 22 with their title reigns intact.

So much for high hopes… New champs on both fronts. John Cena lost the belt to Edge on the last PPV while Batista was forced to vacate the title due to injury… and the belt was won by Kurt Angle.

A quote from Wade Keller, a writer of PWTorch.com:

“There is a top wrestler in WWE today who is considered to be on the unofficial death watch, whose death, due to his credentials, would make the considerable news coverage of Eddie Guerrero’s death this week look minor by comparison. It’s no secret to most within WWE; if it’s not known by Vince McMahon, someone needs to tell him the system needs to be changed. It’s one thing to show how much you care about a colleague by crying on the air after he dies. It’s another to care enough about someone to do what it takes while he’s alive to keep him from dying – even at the expense of box office receipts, storyline interruptions, and being deemed pushy, nosy, or a nark.”

Now I’m not going to speculate who it is, nor will I speculate if there’s any truth to it. I don’t know the whole story nor do I claim to, but if a top wrestler is on the death watch, it’s time to do what it takes to keep him alive. The last thing we need is another wrestler death, especially that of a major star. While Eddie Guerrero wasn’t a huge star, he was and is still well respected and well admired by fans and wrestlers alike… imagine the shockwave a bigger name passing away will cause, mostly because of the ineptitude of a company who knew about his condition and did nothing to remedy it.

One is enough. And we’ve had more than that already.

We don’t need another wrestling-related death this year.