The Tino Standard

Remember what company we're talking about here.

What the hell was that in the final segment? Did Stephanie side with Orton? She made that comment about them having "so much more planned for him" and smiled at Orton, then Shane came down. Was she referring to her and Orton working together or her brother coming out and attacking Orton? Generally, when your main event angle is open for as much interpretation as an abstract painting, something went askew.

YES. THANK YOU. The NFL made the same mistake with the Super Bowl a few years ago, touting SB 40 as "the 40th anniversary of the Super Bowl." Wrong, wrong, wrong.

I'm not sure what your purpose was for leaving the writer anonymous, but I had a pretty good idea of who it was about halfway through the piece. I think my suspicion was confirmed with third-person self-reference at the end.

You forgot BROCK LESNAR! No, it's going to be Bret Hart, leading 8 other guys in THE INVASION~!

I got Live '09 for Christmas. I know the general consensus is that more people like 2K (and for years, so did I), but when I downloaded the demos this year, I just liked the feel of Live more. Sue me. I'm off to a 7-1 start with the Cavs in my franchise. The slip-screen pick and roll with Z and either LeBron or Mo Williams is virtually unstoppable. LeBron is ridiculously good at getting to the rim too. Good times.

I've kinda wondered how they would've booked the end of Starrcade had the whole Montreal thing not gone down. Bret Hart was a goner from WWE after Survivor Series, regardless of how his match with Shawn Michaels plays out, but let's say things between Hart and the WWE end amicably. This changes a number of things: 1. WCW likely never gets the idea for the false finish in the Hogan-Sting match with the 'fast' count. 2. There isn't nearly the sense of urgency to rush Bret Hart onto WCW TV, forcing him into the Hogan-Sting match where he didn't really fit and wasn't needed. They probably still would have royally screwed up Hart's run with the company, but the booking for the Starrcade main event absolutely would've been different. And there's pretty much no possible way they could've booked a Sting victory any worse in that situation... right?

Plenty of points where you could say it began (personally, I vote for Survivor Series 97). As for where it ended, Steve Austin shaking hands with Vince McMahon at the end of WM 17 was a pretty definitive stake in the heart.

Anybody notice the "BABY BUMP WATCH" promo on the cover of Marshall's magazine. Nice 'wink-wink' to fans of the show who know about both main female characters being pregnant.

Michael Cole has something to say to you... Oh. My. God. Even without the language, if he was half that intense and genuine on Raw, he'd be the greatest wrestling announcer ever.

http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-Wireless-Networ...8710&sr=8-2 I bought the wireless adapter for the original Xbox, and after installing a software update, I've had zero problems using it with my 360.

If traditionalist/son-in-law of company owner Triple freaking H will wear that thing as champion, you can better believe Undertaker would suck it up and deal with it. If the belt at least said "CHAMPION" instead of "CHAMP" and it didn't still have "MON NITE RAW" on the one side, I don't think it would be quite as annoying. I'll say this much for that belt: It doesn't look cheap. Gaudy and ridiculous? Maybe, but not cheap.

Trish hasn't worked a WWE match in over two years and she still looked sharper in the ring than 75 percent of the women's roster. "You screwed Bret" ... It was 11 years ago. Let it go, Canada. ... but that was more than made up for by the Jerichoholics cheering their paragon of virtue on to victory.

I was reading about this on another forum. There was heavy suspicion that the guy was cheating somehow, but they couldn't prove it. There was actually a 45-minute delay between the time they introduced the showcases and the time they revealed who won while they looked into what was going on, so I'm sure that sapped a lot of the buzz over his perfect bid. The guy also had a perfect bid on his prize on contestants' row. My guess is that somebody in the crowd sneaked in an iPhone or something and was looking up MSRPs. I wish he would've had to bid on the other showcase, which was like 4 trips. There's no way in hell he could've scammed that with somebody in the crowd. The real shame is that the woman he beat, who DID have to bid on the trips, ended up being less than $500 off on her bid. 99 percent of the time, she'd have won in a landslide.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Hardy becomes the first guy to win the WWE title with a top rope move since Eddie Guerrero with the frog splash on Lesnar in 2004 and just the second since Randy Savage beat Ted DiBiase at WM4 in 1988.

How far along are they in their respective pregnancies and how far along are the shows in filming the season? Some women don't hardly show for months. They might have most, if not all, of the filming wrapped up for the year by the time either of them start really looking like they're having a baby.

I don't watch Smackdown or ECW very often, but happened to catch SD last night... When did the referees all start wearing the traditional stripes like the Raw crew? And are the shows sharing refs now? I thought Mike Chioda was a Raw ref.

Oh yes. Wouldn't be as good as a match, but the heat would be nuts. Love him or hate him, Cena is the modern day heat machine. Even the most dead of crowds go nuts one way or the other for him. Austin in what would be his first match in six years. In front of 70,000 people in his home state. Yeah, I think they might be able to get a pop from the crowd here and there.

Anybody notice that the elevator girl Ted hooked up with is one of the 'woo!' girls from last week?

Hey, nobody mentioned the best news of all tonight: The Big Gold Belt survives!

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/gaming/2008-1...ta-damned_N.htm Details on the downloadable add-on are finally unveiled: "The Lost and the Damned" is available Feb. 17.

Is there any rhyme or reason to the stuff behind each of the avatars on your friends list? On my list, some guys have what looks like a small skyline, others have a giant Xbox 'X', a couple have spaceships, and at least one has a guitar. I wonder what comes up behind my guy on their lists.

I'd like the whole avatar concept a lot more if you could make realistic-looking people (think GameFace in Tiger Woods) instead of the little pixie people out of a 6 year old's cartoon. If I wanted to look at pixie people, I'd have bought a Wii.

I agree, to a point. The problem with that is, and it's my main gripe with Cole who I don't think is as bad in general as most do, when Cole does it he tends to quote entire promos. I swear he repeated that Kane promo about Mysterio near verbatum 5 times in the run-up to Cyber Sunday. Just keep it to the point, there's no need to repeat word for word what somebody said three weeks ago. You can tell when Cole has McMahon in his ear on the headset. He'll be having a normal conversation, then reach a talking point about a wrestler or a feud that needs to be put over to the audience and he just loses all rhythm. He just sounds so forced sometimes. "Kane is so... CONFLICTED~! as of late." "John Cena... the CONTROVERSIAL~!!! former WWE champion!"

Jericho... getting help from STEPHANIE MCMAHON to retain a championship... I know it's not 2000 anymore, but that just seems so... wrong. By the way, 11 fucking years with the company and Michael Cole is still terrible. I had forgotten how awful he is because I generally don't watch SD, but seriously, it's the same stupid shit every week with him. Can a heel EVER win a match without "stealing one"? Can he NOT telegraph a close near fall? Christ. Oh, and him and Lawler bitching about Morrison not even being legal to deliver the superkick when Mysterio (also illegal) pulled off about three or four moves on Miz just 10 seconds before... brilliant work, boys.