Diamonddust

My thoughts on this one since I couldn't do the chat: Wrestlemania VI: This is, in my opinion, the true successor to Wrestlemania III in that it was a major spectacle show, held in a massive arena, and had a dream-match main event with Hogan vs. Warrior. "Hulk Hogan vs. The Ultimate Warrior" definitely passed the marquee test, as Jim Cornette would say. I remember all the older kids in my school thinking Warrior would win because he was the cooler of the two, while all the younger ones were still behind Hogan. I was on the fence, but I think I was a lean towards Hogan. It's also kind of fitting that this show was also Andre's swan song, but it was good to see him go out to the cheers of the crowd. Wrestlemania VII: The only thing I really like about this show is Savage vs. Warrior and the angle with Liz afterwards. Great drama all around. Wrestlemania VIII: One of the best: Taker squashing Jake and officially becoming the cool "dark" face, An awesome Piper/Hart match that had tons of emotion, Savage vs. Flair, and the return of the Warrior at the end of Sid vs. Hogan. The fact it was also held in a major stadium site (The last until Wrestlemania XVII) helps it a lot. Wrestlemania IX: The less said about this, the better. Trying to make sense of the ending makes my head hurt, but I did dig Taker coming out with the vulture. Wrestlemania X: One of the best as well, even if it's all on the shoulders of two matches. Bret vs. Owen is all kinds of awesome, while Shawn vs. Razor is one of the most influential matches of all time. And has anyone brought up the fact that the reason there seems to be a lot of filler on these shows is that the company tried to give as many of the workers a Wrestlemania payday as possible?

Garvin debuted as the "new" Freebird member at the June '89 Clash of Champions (VII). From what I've gathered, they hyped that the Birds would be getting a new member (Gordy was still with NWA/WCW at the time), and out came Jimmy Garvin with Hayes and Bam Bam. They went on to win the World Tag-Team Titles at that show. Yup. Garvin started going by "Jimmy Jam." He and P.S. clicked pretty well as a tag-team, actually. I'd venture to say they were more cohesive as a team than either Hayes/Gordy and Hayes/Buddy Jack. Garvin being the unofficial "4th Freebird" in World Class helped that a great deal.

That's awesome. The story also comes from Jake, so... Jake also no sold Muhammed Ali punches in 1985 in the Superdome, so Jake had some nuts And/or he was on some real good drugs at the time.

As a kid, Sid being eliminated by Hogan was the first instance of me getting really ticked off at Hogan. I was so sure Sid was going to win that match... I was furious with how Hogan was acting like such a sore loser and then expecting the crowd to be behind him. Going back and watching it now, though, I get a kick out of Sid "crying" at Hogan after he dumps him.

Austin's first title win HAD to happen at Wrestlemania. There was no other way around it.

A no-brainer but the West Texas Rednecks vs. No Limit. I think EVERYONE sided with the "heels" in this one.

I had forgotten why they didn't do Owen vs. Shawn since, up until that point, it was the logical way to go at the Royal Rumble.

I hate that this is what booking a wrestling show has become. Fucking Hollywood. What are you referring to specifically? My guess is scripting things out word for word. Where as any television show needs a script/format sheet for production purposes, scripting out promos and such on a wrestling show has not been for the best. It's fine to layout what a promo needs to talk about, but writing out line for line, word for word is too much. I mean look at it this way: The "Austin 3:16" line was not scripted or thought of in a booking meeting. As a result, Austin's good interview skills allowed him to come up with a line that turned him white hot.

Steamboat himself thought as much (Returning the favor to Savage). He talks about it in his shoot interview.

With Dusty as the booker, costs were never going to be low. They were spending money like a drunken sailor at that point.

Especially after Mr. T turned them down.

Workers coming up with their own stuff used to happen. The process of the writers scripting out things word for word has now taken over. Some workers, Jericho and Michaels, for instance, have far more leeway in scripting their promos than others. The major/critical problem about totally scripting a promo or even a match (This was discussed when the TNA script was leaked and the matches were written out, move for move) is that it doesn't allow for the talent to improvise if the crowd doesn't react positively. If the audience starts to crap on a segment and the worker can't improv his way out of it, he'll either panic or continue to give a promo/segment that is already bombing.

I can see it now... Much like the Iron Sheik at the last Wrestlemania in Houston, Mae Young ends up winning the Battle Royal because they don't want her to do the over-the-top-rope bump.

Bockwinkle, only as a road agent, though he did have a match against Backlund in an AWA vs WWWF "title unification" match - ended in a double countout. Gagne definitely not. But even outside of those guys I think the WWE HOF has shown on many an occasion that they'd induct guys who weren't necessarily a part of WWF history in specific, so Kaufman could happen. The other thing is that if McMahon Sr. hadn't turned Kaufman down, he would have never done the angle in Memphis. He approached McMahon Sr. first. And yeah... the Hall of Fame has definitely shown they are willing to induct historical contributors to wrestling in general since, basically, the WWF is wrestling at this point and "owns" all that history. In terms of this year's class, I must agree... it is loaded when you look at just who has been announced: -Steve Austin -Ricky Steamboat -Dory and Terry Funk -Bill Watts That's four former World Champions, a highly influential and innovative promoter, and we haven't even had the official Von Erich announcement yet. It's a wonder who else they can and will add to this class.

I was wondering when that was coming up. Trainwreck is an understatement.

I almost forgot... In addition to the weekend TBS shows, you always had Worldwide in syndication somewhere on Saturday morning, you had the WCW/WGN show for a while, plus Superstars, Wrestling Challenge, and then All-American Wrestling on Sunday mornings. The weekends used to be loaded.

According to Sunny, the rumors started because Bret apparently dressed in Sunny's dressing room because he was being a loner or whatever the case may be. Anyways, she said her, Chris, and Bret spent a lot of time together that way. The funny thing is that her and Shawn had the relationship.

Good to see that Shawn will be playing the subtle heel in this one.

WCW Main Event originally aired on Sunday nights when it debuted in 1988, moving to Saturday mornings in summer 1996. WCW Pro was on Saturday mornings before they moved it to Sundays and placed it an hour earlier. In 1995 and 1996, Main Event was used as the live countdown show for PPVs, and they decided to do a Sunday Clash with the live main event format. It only happened this one time with a Clash (IIRC, Vader vs. Arn and Flair to set up Arn vs. Flair at Fall Brawl was the main event of the Clash.) I fondly remember the hey-day of TBS' weekend triple threat: -Power Hour on Friday night -World Championship Wrestling on Saturday afternoon -The Main Event on Sunday afternoon

They gotta have some old Big Boss Man merchandise they can reconfigure.

As bad as it would be, I could see JBL vs. Kozlov and JBL actually getting face heat since he'd be the home-state guy taking on the big, bad foreigner.

Apparently no one on creative has ever heard of "statue of limitations".

You can be one or the other or both. There is a lot of white trash out there that definitely wouldn't qualify as redneck.

Crash course of Watts' accomplishments: -Pretty decent star during the 50's and 60's -Had a hand in running Georgia and Florida at certain points -Turned Mid-South (Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Mississippi) into one of the hottest and innovative territories in the country. -Mid-South was the first promotion to have an African-American booker - Ernie Ladd -Mid-South TV is considered some of the best episodic wrestling television in history. -Helped give guys like JYD, Magnum T.A., The Midnight Express, The Rock and Roll Express, The Freebirds Ted DiBiase, Sting, etc. a big break in their careers -Specifically, JYD was in incredible draw for Watts during his time in Mid-South -Was Executive VP of WCW until office politics and what was thought to be racially insensitive comments nixed that deal -Was an executive for the WWE in the mid '90s

I guess next week we'll get the Von Erich announcement, and then after that... it's a toss-up of who else will get in to the Hall of Fame this year.