DrVenkman PhD

I think it was No Way Out 2000, Faarooq pretty much killed Jeff Hardy with a bad looking Dominator.

Yeah, they all look alike now... GET IT?

Fair enough.. God bless you AKI, I love your spraking whale free wrestling games. Thanks for setting me straight Zsasz. I actually think DJV is a fun game, the Blazin Moves are pretty cool.

While it's true I'm not that great at video games, I've been talking with people and most agree the 3 on 1 match in def Jam Vendetta is a wee bit hard.

I had been led to believe he was only taking a hiatus, but outside of saying "you can't ever say a guy is done in this business", Meltzer called Austin "done" several times on Wrestling Observer Live.

Going by HHH being out from KOTR - SummerSlam with his elbow injury in 2002, I'm going to say Taker won't be at Backlash.

Ready to Rumble was on last night, yes.

I blame Red Wings hockey. Or whatever was on in Seattle. Without that, it would have maintained the 3.3. Yep.

I liked it. These days, as long as the show isn't ovelry offensive or boring, I'll accept an average - decent Raw as good enough for me. Anyway, good read. I'm a mark for historical columns, that's one of the reasons I like Keith's book.

I figure this, or General Wrestling, is the most appropriate place to start a thread to shill my column being up. Though the fact it's mostly about WWE could make it eligable for there too....

Nova

I'm glad you asked! It's up right now, so everyone can feel free to read it.

It was originally thought that William Regal had an infectous disease contracted in India, but now it could be something else. Doctors now think he has a blood clot in his Inferior Vena Cava, which is cutting off circulation to his lower body. Even on blood thinning medication, it will be about 6-9 months before the clot is totally cleared. It is unknown when he will return to in ring action. credit: Wrestling Observer Newsletter

I think it's ok, especially since it's a bargain game, but I think the people on GameFAQs who are totally bitching out EGM for hating the game are just being silly.

For those who care but don't care enough to get the Observer: Rey/Matt: **1/4 Taker/Show & Train: *1/4 Trish/Jazz/Victoria: **1/4 Team Angle/Los Guerreros/Benoit & Rhyno: *** Michaels/Jericho: ****1/4 Helmsley/Booker: ***1/4 Hogan/McMahon: *** Austin/Rock: **** Angle/Lesnar: ****1/4 And he said the show was "phenomenal" and probably the second best WM ever Credit: Matt on the DeathValleyDriver.com board

Late tonight / tomorrow morning. I would probably write it right now but I got a call and am going out in about 30 minutes.

If RVD and Jericho were on SmackDown, I can't even imagine how this could work, workrate wise. The casual fans will like the Raw PPVs because it has the "big names" like Trips and Goldberg. The problem there is that most casual fans are casual because they don't order PPVs. I think for the workrate fan PPV buyers, Jericho will save the Raw PPVs. It becomes "You want to see a ****+ Chris Jericho match? Order the Raw Brand PPV!". In theory, doing split PPVs should work out as the shows will need to have more angles to push more matches (from about 4 to about 8), but that remains to be seen.

Brock's spirit meter wasn't full.

Yes Doyo it was.

OK, being the hard working reporter I am, I made some inqueries and was given this answer: "I'm guessing first as legit, and him saying fraud to protect the guy at this point since WWE thinks they know who it is" - Meltz

But this means Meltzer got played too... OR DOES IT?

From WWE.com And there you have it. I'm really enjoying Edge's columns.

I've been thinking for years now that classic arenas should be in the game. It's cool to see that the Trump Plaza is in WM XIX. Anyway, maybe for WrestleMania XX, some of the better or unique Mania sets - ESPECIALLY WM IX. I think WrestleMania III, VIII, IX, X, XIV, and 2000 would look good as hidden, "Anniversary" Arenas in WM XX for the Cube. They did create an arena in Attitude, it was somewhat interesting. One of the things I sorely miss from SmackDown 1 was creating your own PPV that was rated. The create a PPV in SD!2 took forever to book due to loading and had no crowd rating, thus was a complete waste of time.

I found a SmackDown from 2001 (before the Rumble I think.. Angle was champion) featuring Jackie vs. Crash and Angle vs Kane (Angle did Buff Blockbuster.. it was neat). I also found a tape featuring assorted Superstars, Challenges, and Cavalcades (from CHCH here in Ontario) from 1993 that were a good trip back in time. The big surprise on that tape was Scott Steiner using a Dragon Fucking Suplex on an episode of Superstars. Rick followed it up with a sick looking release German suplex. Watching the opening video package for Cavalcade also made me realize how well executed moves looked on jobbers (where similar moves, like the Tombstone, are generally slowed down a bit on "real" wrestlers). Was the idea in the company "work as stiff as you want, they don't mind and they're expendable if they get injured"?

IIRC, HHH's music at Backlash was the generic theme Bull Buchanan later used around and at KOTR 2000.