Enigma

Dave Meltzer is reporting that Ashley was originally supposed to win the Women's Title tonight, but the plan was changed right before the show went on the air because they decided they didn't like Ashley's failure to get over and to improve as a wrestler.

Money in the Bank Ladder Match Jeff Hardy vs. King Booker vs. Finlay vs. CM Punk vs. Mr. Kennedy vs. Matt Hardy vs. Randy Orton vs. Edge -- **½ ... 8 people is just too much. And in terms of creativity with the ladders, it was pretty barren. It's hard to top the amazing stuff Shelton Benjamin did at WM21 and WM22. I felt it climaxed too early. Save for a few of Mr. Kennedy's spots, the match was all downhill after the big bump by Jeff & Edge. The Great Khali vs Kane -- ¼* ... The match didn't suck near as bad as I thought it would, which is what got it's meager rating from me. Kane's bodyslam of Khali was very impressive as well. I was confused at why Khali ripped down the turnbuckle and proceeded to do nothing with it. The "attack" afterwards was also very tame considering Kane's supposed to miss a few months with knee surgery. WWE United States Championship Montel Vontavious Porter vs. Chris Benoit -- ***½ ... This match was absolutely fantastic and by far MVP's best performance since coming to WWE in September 2006. His improvement has come so far and can only go farther. It was vintage Benoit tonight, but he didn't have to drag along MVP. MVP definitely brought the working shoes with him today. World Heavyweight Championship Batista vs. The Undertaker -- ****¼ ... This was the match of the night in my opinion. For the first time since returning from his multitude of injuries, Batista didn't look like a slug out there. Although he was clearly being led by the hand by Taker, Batista brought it tonight and shut up his naysayers temporarily. Tonight's crime is that this match wasn't last. 8-Man Tag Team Match Rob Van Dam, Sabu, Tommy Dreamer, & The Sandman vs. Elijah Burke, Marcus Cor Von, Kevin Thorn, & Matt Striker -- *¼ ... The match was short and the crowd was dead for every part that didn't involve Van Dam. It would have been acceptable wrestling, but do we really want just acceptable wrestling when guys like Sabu & The Sandman are involved? This would have been a lot better suited to be an Extreme Rules match. How lame does the New Breed look when the Originals beat them in a regular wrestling match? Battle of the Billionaires Umaga (w/ Vince McMahon) vs. Bobby Lashley (w/ Donald Trump), Stone Cold Steve Austin as special guest referee -- ** ... Another match where the crowd was totally dead without the involvement of one person, Austin in this case. This was the true definition of a sports entertainment match, although Lashley's dive to start the match was good. It was nice to see Austin sell the Samoan Spike as long as he did. It was a good thing that the stipulations were honored, considering the event took place on April 1 and everything. Austin's stunner on Trump was shocking, but looked terrible. I was also left wondering why Lashley escaped sans-stunner. WWE Women's Championship Lumberjill Match Ashley vs. Melina -- DUD ... Hopefully the news about Melina's job security depending on the quality of the match isn't true, or Melina could be looking for a new job soon. This was easily the worst match of the show and it wasn't Melina's fault. Melina busted her ass and attempted a solid rolling prawn for the finish. The problem is Ashley is so terrible in the ring, she is a vortex of suck for any talent that may be unfortunate enough to be working with her. Also, how embarassing and lame did Ashley come off crying and attacking Melina afterwards after getting beat clean? WWE Championship Shawn Michaels vs. John Cena -- ***¼ ... This one had the makings of a quality match early on with the molasses slow pace and Michaels attacking the leg to take the FU out of play. But Cena completely forgetting about selling the leg for the rest of the match completely lost me. I also thought the referee bump was very unnecessary. This match would have been better served to have switched places with Batista/Taker due to the crowd reaction. Having this match with the booked finish broke a cardinal rule for WrestleMania: you ALWAYS send the crowd home happy and the crowd was 100% behind HBK for this match. I felt the crowd reaction not being hostile afterwards was like a feeling of defeat, as if to say, "Well, it was fun to hope, but we knew he was going to win anyways, even though we're tired of his schtick."

UT/Batista should have closed the show.

WM23 will be worth the $50 to hear Slick's theme music. Hopefully they don't bitch out and use some stock music. And if Cena/Michaels is going last, HBK better win the title or they will have a disaster on their hands. And the news of that match being last is bad because it gives Batista more of a chance to beat UT.

It's basically where people who are being shitheads backstage are called out as shitheads.

Does anyone think that UT may pull a WM13 and show up dressed in his original gear or maybe even the purple gear? That would be awesome. It would definitely make up for showing up to WMXX for his big return dressed essentially the same as BikerTaker. The moment The Undertaker kicked Hulk Hogan's ass at Survivor Series 1991. Very true. A portion of that crowd popped like mad when UT beat Hogan for the title.

Team 3D (the former Dudley Boys) have opened up a Smoothie Bar in Melbourne, FL. It's located at 1882 North Wickham Road, right next door to Hawk's gym, which they also are part owners in. The Smoothie Bar has its grand opening on April 7. Originally, they had booked WWE World Heavyweight Champion Batista to appear but he was pulled last week by WWE. A conspiracy theorist would probably say that was due to the fact that WWE found out who the owners of the establishment were. But in any case, Team 3D has instead booked former WWE stars Chris Jericho and Maven to appear at the grand opening on April 7 instead. They will appear from 1 to 3 p.m.

Meltzer said that news bit about Mercury attacking Stephanie was never posted on his web site and that it's 100% false.

WWE RETURNING TO NYC'S HAMMERSTEIN BALLROOM IN JUNE World Wrestling Entertainment will run a Smackdown/ECW matinee house show on Sunday 6/10 at New York City's Hammerstein Ballroom. That was the original date and venue for the ECW One Night Stand event, which was later moved to 6/3 in Jacksonville, Florida so it appears WWE is honoring the booking. When the venue was booked for 2006, WWE decided to book it for 2007 as well. It should be interesting to gauge the crowd reaction at the show as one of the primary factors in moving the show was concern over how diehard New York City fans would react to WWE's dilution of the ECW brand since its relaunch in June 2006. Tickets for the house show are tentatively scheduled to go on sale in late April.

Assuming this quote is from Savage, this is hilariously ironic considering that when Hogan & Savage ran into each other backstage at a TNA show in 2003, Savage ran away like a little bitch and even tried to file an unsafe working environment lawsuit against TNA.

Isn't Gene Okerlund hosting the Hall of Fame?

Greg Gagne took over OVW for a while and totally tanked it after Paul Heyman came back to book ECW.

Well, he had to wear Daivari's gear this week because his luggage got lost at the airport.

He was signed to a 1-year extension for A LOT less money.

Cena got a WWE Title shot against Brock Lesnar on PPV within his first year of being in the company.

The following is an "open letter" from Tommy Dreamer to WWE Chairman Vince McMahon posted on "ECW.Com" on March 22: ========

What about that epic feud Foley had with Carlito? ...anybody?

Former WWE, WCW, and TNA wrestler Diamond Dallas Page will be a guest on ESPN Radio's Dan Patrick Show today between 1:40 PM EDT - 3:50 PM EDT. Patrick and Keith Olbermann will also discuss the steroid story between 2-3 pm.

Foley was just a product of being at the right place at the right time (WWF in 1997-1998). He was no more important back then than Cena or Batista is now. I don't really class Foley with Austin or Rock.

What happens if it rains?

There's a lot of speculation that the Wellness Policy is going to go back to what it was before they altered the rules.

They did. Orton explained that Vince was unhappy at Edge getting himself kicked out of ringside on purpose and thus, not taking out Lashley on ECW last week. So Vince revoked Edge's MitB spot and put it up for grabs in a battle royal.

If you go back and listen to Edge's promo on Eric Bischoff before he speared him during his return to Raw on the 2004 draft lottery show, he FUCKING HUGE (well, for Edge's standards anyways) and his voice sounds completely so different, it's scary. His voice got deeper like Big Show's. When Edge was doing those blogs on WWE.Com, he claimed the weird voice was a side-effect of the neck surgery, but that sounded full of shit to me.