The Tino Standard

Considering that when Vince was going to strip Cena of the title in September and award it to Kurt Angle and he had the traditional WWE title belt with him, I'd say it's a safe bet Edge shows up tomorrow with the real belt. The guys who dethroned Austin when he had the smokin' skull belt always reverted back to the regular belt within a week or two. If Edge wants a major face pop on Raw, he should take Cena's title belt and smash it in the ring with a hammer, like Mr. Perfect did to Hogan's belt in the locker room in the 80s on SNME.

I completely agree with you on both points. And, Evander, along the same lines of Kotz's first point, here is a tip for you (and probably another 60 or so members of this board): An apostrophe is NEVER used to indicate the plural form of a word. An apostrophe is used to indicate possession or in the instance of a contraction. Come on, kids (note: NOT "kid's"). They teach us this stuff in elementary school.

I think the highest profile wrestler he ever managed was Giant Gonzales. So the answer would be no. I gotta say Sid would be higher profile, if for no other reason than that Harvey was in Sid's corner against Hogan for the final match at WM8. I remember Harvey trying to do a big entrance spiel for Sid, but his microphone didn't work for the first 2/3 of the speech.

Dec. 21 ... Also the birthday of greats such as: Kiefer Sutherland, Samuel L. Jackson, Jane Fonda, Phil Donahue, Ray Romano, Andy Dick and ME, baby.

I wonder how many DVD sales they've lost by not going all out for the music rights. I know it's probably not many, but think about it this way: With how much that set costs, hardcore fans are most likely to buy it. Hardcore fans are also the people most likely to be the ones turned off by the dubbing. Had the DVDs not been dubbed and blurred to hell, I probably would've asked for it for Christmas. As it is, no thanks.

Love chicks that fire down heaters. Think phallic symbols here, gang.

Jeez, the way you guys talk about "how stupid it would be to have Taker job to a 40-year-old at WM and lose his streak that way" leaves me scratching my head. Ric Flair is 56. FIFTY-SIX. Do I think Batista is going to last that long? No, of course not. But I certainly think he has another 5 or 6 years in the tank, 3 or 4 of which could be in the main event. And if you've got a guy who can make you money in the main event for 3 or 4 years and he'd get a nice bump up in credibility by ending the Undertaker's WM streak (which is one of the most overblown sagas ever, by the way), then by all means, go for it. Seriously, what's the big deal with that streak anyway? How many of those matches was he ever actually in danger of losing? I WANT to see Taker-Batista at WM. Why? Because for once in a really long time, both guys really have something to lose. I'm tired of matches being restricted by "smart" booking, protecting guys all the time. Both guys really have something to lose there. That's a match I'd actually give a shit about.

Ted was hell-bent on having the greatest New Year's Eve ever, so he spends half his Christmas bonus on a limo (and in a cool call-back to earlier in the season, the driver is the cabbie from the pilot). Ted and Robin make a comment about how they'll have somebody to kiss at midnight. The group has like 5 parties to go to. Robin ditches out early because she's supposed to be meeting her boyfriend. Ted brings a girl from his office. Barney picks up a drunk Russian chick at the first party, but the rest of the group doesn't like her, so she gets ditched between parties. Robin gets stood up by boyfriend, so she rejoins the group. Ted's date ends up leaving because she senses what's going on with Ted and Robin. Group gets separated at various times for various reasons, there's a brief interlude with a crazy Moby lookalike (who steals Barney's favorite mix CD). Just when it seems like everything is coming unraveled, everything magically falls into place about 10 minutes before midnight. Group tries to floor it to party No. 5, but gets caught in traffic. They start to count down to midnight, when out of nowhere, Robin's boyfriend arrives. Ted is seriously disappointed, so he gets out and starts to walk down the street by himself. Robin tracks him down, and when Ted tells her to go back and spend the time with her boyfriend, she says "He can wait," then adds that they had a pact earlier. They kiss, she walks back to the limo and Ted keeps walking down the street with a huge grin on his face. As he walks off screen, you see a crosswalk sign go from 'don't walk' to 'walk' (symbolism~). And that's that. Kind of a helter-skelter episode with a ridiculous 'everything falls into place all at once' moment, but they're clearly trying to build to something and this was a step in that direction.

Didn't JD Roth also host a kids game show called "Fun House"? I vaguely remember that show around the same time Double Dare was in its prime. I think there was a show called "Finders Keepers" too. I got hooked on "Starcarde" when they showed reruns on G4 when I was in college. I'm a little pissed they don't show it anymore. That show ruled.

Well, if Trump was guilty of getting blinded by Rebecca, then so was I. Yeah, even as a Rebecca fan, I'll admit that if you're going to hire one, then Randal was the most deserving candidate in the field. And while I don't argue with where Randal was coming from (really, the mistake was Trump's for allowing that to even be a possibility on live TV), I think what Trump was trying to get at was that while Randal was deserving to be the winner of the competition, Rebecca was strong enough that she deserved a job too. Randal probably felt like offering her a job tainted his victory (a valid argument), but I don't think that was what Trump was going for (he was looking at it as tho the competition was over at that point). Unfortunately (for him), that thought process backfired. For us, it just made for a really entertaining finish.

In wrestling terms, Randal absolutely turned heel in the final 2 minutes. That was a dick move. You won the contest. Nobody was going to dispute that. Dumping on Rebecca like that was totally unnecessary. And what the hell was the deal with Alla? The way she celebrated, you'd have thought SHE got hired. And why was she such a big supporter of Randal anyway? He had a team of three employees for the final task and she wasn't even one of his top FOUR choices. Eh, I'm just bitter. As a fellow scribe, I was pulling for Rebecca. And what can I say? I'm a sucker for the underdogs. Especially cute brunette ones. Randal can go take his five degrees and stick them up his ass.

"Always" rebounds? They rebounded ONCE, you dumbfuck. And a lil something called WCW and the NWO sorta helped get things going too. OK, calling me a dumbfuck is both uncalled for and a bit hypocritical. Want to reference WCW as a point of your argument? You're failing to mention the fact that company was hemmorhaging money left and right, while WWE, even when at its creative worst can still turn a profit. Is it a boom? No, but as long as they can keep turning at least a small profit, they can stick around long enough until their next golden boy emerges. And they WILL continue to make money, even if the profits are small. There's a market for this stuff. Because for every longtime fan who gets turned off and/or frustrated and ends up walking away, there's a new fan just stumbling into this stuff. Remember the stupid NBC slogan for its summer programming a couple years ago: "If you haven't seen it yet, then it's new to YOU."

Oh, blah... Maybe the WWE will never get any better for YOU, but if history teaches us anything, it's that the company definitely will rebound. WWE always does. There was a boom in the mid '80s. There was a boom in the late '90s. There will be another. Now why exactly they can't sustain the things they do in these booms into making a quality product all the time is anyone's guess, but just when you figure they're F'd, they always stumble into something. For every jaded smark who has watched for years and gets burned out to the point of not wanting to watch anymore, there's a 10 year old just starting to watch the show who is also buying the Cena merchandise. Believe it or not, in 10 years, that same kid will be a bitter smark on the Internet who is dissatisfied with the current product and is longing for the days of when John Cena was doing his shtick in "the good old days." The truth is, things haven't REALLY dropped off as much as you think. You can only watch this stuff for so long before you've pretty much seen it all. Sure the faces change, but eventually it boils down to the same basic concepts. You either accept the show for what it is and live with it or you get bored with it and move on to other stuff. Or you become a smark on the Internet bitching about how things will never get better ever again like it was in the good old days when you started watching.

It amazes/depresses me how much of this shit I remember. I might not have started posting here until March '02, but I definitely remember a lot of this stuff. There are names being mentioned in this thread I haven't heard in years. Wow. I always liked CRZ's recaps. Incredibly detailed with good humor mixed in. He cared about the product, but it always seemed he never got TOO wrapped up in it or took things too seriously.

I'm not going to call Trevor Murdoch a lard ass, but he's still one ugly dude. And while I don't understand why he'd be getting pushed instead of Cade, what I'm even more confused by is why either one of them is getting a singles push in the first place. They were a decently hyped team coming in (vignettes and such) and they won the tag titles. Just when they were starting to establish their team as a commodity, the plug was pulled. It's not like there's a ton of other teams on Raw to work with, nor is there a big need for either of those two to fill the singles ranks. These two hadn't even teased a break up. For that matter, when they DID break up, there was no explanation of it (both still came out to the same music and TitanTron even after the breakup, btw). The whole thing just seems pointless.

Austin's wife at the time was an English woman (she lives overseas now with Austin's kids), I think Lady Blossom. She had little, if anything, to do with creating the character, but she accidentally gave Austin the name for it when she told him to "drink your tea before it gets stone cold."

You gotta want it!

Kane is always played up as a "beast" in any type of Battle Royal because he's so big and monsterous. Same with the Big Show although it's because of sheer size. For some reason, I see one of these two leading to the other's elimination, if they don't somehow eliminate each other. You can only have two giants working together in beating the shit out of the rest of the roster for so long before they implode. Friction starts with those two at the Rumble, builds for two months and leads to a battle of big men at WM, and hopefully it'll be better than the KOR '99 debacle. As for winner of the Rumble, I know it's been written that Orton is currently pegged to win it, but that could easily change (he was pegged to win it at this time last year, too). As for who I'd like to see win it... I'd like to see a heel win it or a midcarder. Just something different. The whole "upper card/main event babyface wins the Rumble and goes on the road to WM, where he wins the title" just seems like it needs to take a break for a year.

Totally did not see Alla getting dumped like that. Great save for the episode because the promos from last week all but wrote off Felisha without saying as much. Alla deserved it and probably shot herself in the foot in the boardroom with her bad-mouthing and constant interruptions. The visual of Trump walking down the hall to the suite at the end was pretty cool. Should be an interesting final two. The teaser for next week was kinda wishy-washy... Is next week the live finale or are they going to start the final task next week and wrap everything up the week after? Let's go to final showdown, chances of winning ranked 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest): RANDAL His whole demeanor this week just seemed to put him in a category above everybody. He seemed to take on an aura of "I've got my spot all but locked up, so now I'm going to pick and choose where I give the goodwill out," as he came right and said that he was going to get Rebecca a win "because she deserved it." That's a lot of confidence. Still, his acting in the Microsoft commercial was pretty passable (and way better than the "actor" they hired... what a stiff). So, he gives motivating speeches, he acts, he leads teams to victories, he even boosts his teammates just because "they deserve it." What DOESN'T this guy do? Verdict: 4 REBECCA She's the underdog, but she's still a strong candidate who would've been a very likely winner in season 3 (definitely) or season 2. Even tho Randal is the favorite, I still think she's got a better shot to pull the upset than Tana had last year or Jennifer did in season 2. Getting the win this week boosts her stock (even if she looked like she was about to laugh when she was supposed to be pissed off in the video... oops). I've liked her boardroom demeanor, even though we haven't had to see it in a few weeks. Out of anybody in the field, she definitely has the best chance of beating Randal. Verdict: 3 I'm curious to see what the surprise is that they're touting and how it affects the final task. Remember, in season 1, they brought back fired candidates and Kwame made the horrendous decision to bring on Omarosa, which probably cost him the job. Whatever the twist is this time, it could really set somebody up for a downfall.

THAT WASN'T HIS FAULT.

Double post. D'oh.

Was Murdoch's post-match victory promo backstage aired on TV or was that one of those WWE.com deals? He made some comment about how he's coming after Ric Flair next because he's tasted gold once as a tag team champion and now he wants the IC title. I guess this means Flair won't be vacating the IC belt any time soon, Survivor Series beatdown or not.

Best episode of the season. Storyline advancement, plot twists, good punchlines, and WINNIE FREAKING COOPER. We have a winner.

He knows how to work his Reebok Pumps. Thats about it <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Only because he's in main-event mode. His '02-'03 work disproves this statement. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> this doesn't matter one bit if he stays in "main event mode". He may know how to work, but he can't show it so what good does it do? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Since nobody else seems to understand, I made a shitty lil' graph in Paint right quick: As you can see, as a face's popularity goes UP, his wrestling ability goes DOWN (which leads to the reliance of crowd popping spots). This is more applicable to the brawlers but WWE pretty much sticks to this formula with every main event babyface they've had (for the most part). The problem lies in the booking, not Cena himself. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> To reinforce what Dogbert said, your curve would actually indicate the opposite of what you're saying. Try again.

That was a pretty fun show live, although that was the smallest crowd I've ever seen for a televised show, and I've probably been to about 6 or 7 of them now. I totally do not understand the reactions to Cena. I don't know how any of this came across on TV, but when he came out and saved Maria, he got a pretty good pop. When he had his entrance for his match, he got a great pop. When the bell rang, the crowd COMPLETELY turned on him. Just out of nowhere. Then, when he got the tap-out, everybody cheered again. Seriously, WTF is that? I think this was after the show went off the air: Kurt Angle was walking out, he turned to the crowd one last time when they were chanting at him. He gave them a double bird and screamed "FUCK YOU" right on camera. Nice. Was any explanation given on TV as to why Triple H being on the Edge interview segment just turned into a Triple H solo promo?