QuestionMan

Taboo Tuesday. How's that a change? I know they haven't done if before, so it is a change. But when I think of a "big change," Angle and Eddie will be traded for Triple-H and Orton or whatever. Triple H will never go onto the same show wth Taker again. Triple H knows he has more backstage pull than he does, so he'll avoid ever being put into that position again. He also knows that they're matches together are absolutely horrible. If you ever get insomnia, check out their WWE Title match from King of the Ring 2002.

WWE UNFORGIVEN Thumbs up 70 (27.6%) Thumbs in the middle 97 (38.2%) Thumbs down 87 (37.3%) BEST MATCH POLL Chris Jericho vs. Christian 194 HHH vs. Randy Orton 32 WORST MATCH POLL Tyson Tomko vs. Steven Richards 226 Normally, one show, particularly like Unforgiven, is here today and gone tomorrow. There have been worse shows, although most WWE PPV shows were better. But there are some scary signs, and more people than ever before seem to be picking up on them. The product is stale. Without some badly needed switches of key talent, there are no new match-ups. On the Raw brand, they came up with the scenario in the summer of 2002 to build up HHH vs. Randy Orton as a top program. Orton seemed to be the most improved character of the year, with his superstar look and improving ability. He came off like a superstar in matches with Mick Foley, Chris Benoit, Edge, and Chris Jericho, in building to the big angle. The angle was rushed. The wrong guy turned face. The first match took place too soon. And the people didn't care. HHH, on his way to becoming a 17-time world champion, hit No. 9 on 9/12 at the Rose Garden in Portland, through a major outside interference ending and a pedigree on a chair, ending Orton's four-week reign as the youngest champion in company history. This tied Rock's record as the most world title reigns in the history of the WWE (this part of the story was never told). The match was flat and even dull for a while, with little crowd reaction until the run-ins. It wasn't bad, but there is a standard for a WWE PPV main event, and they didn't come close. Worse, it was that situation where once the ref went down, you could see the crowd turn its head toward the entrance, knowing the run-in was coming. It was such a predictable sequence of events, and the crowd knew it, since it happens on Raw all the time, and most of the spots have been the house show main event finishes. Like a lot of finishes, it's exciting when it's done the first time, or a few times, but it's been overdone. Chris Jericho became IC champion for a record seventh time as well (if you include the 2000 Royal Rumble where he went from a period as co-champion with Chyna, to winning a match and being the champion, as a new title reign), breaking the record of six he held with Jeff Jarrett (which naturally wasn't about to be acknowledged). The bad news was Portland, OR. Fans in that city tore the house down in the previous company shows, including the first show at the Rose Garden drawing one of the best house show crowds in the U.S. in years. This time, the first PPV ever in Oregon, drew 8,313 fans, which was 7,000 paying a little under $500,000. In another market, it wouldn't be so bad, but Portland had been considered an extra special market. It had a long history of accepting old-school wrestling. Unlike most of the new markets the company has started to go to in recent years, the return after a decade, caused by a strict commission, was huge. The feeling from one person in the company live was that they really were there to enjoy the show, but were killed by the show. Jim Ross even used the word "raucous" early in the show for the crowd, which may have acted like they were going to be before the show went on the air, but certainly weren't as it went on. Based on our volume of feedback, the PPV probably did a low range number. They were fairly hot for the Maven vs. Rodney Mack Heat match, and the first match, a Ric Flair & Batista vs. Chris Benoit & William Regal match, got a nice reaction, probably the best of any match on the show. The killer was Tyson Tomko vs. Steven Richards in a disaster of biblical proportions. It was probably the worst company PPV match in years, with the crowd violently turning on the match, and turning on the show. Still, the main event was nearly two hours later, and they saw some good matches in the interim, so even though a lot of people both internally and some fans said so, it's hard for me to believe the awful prelim match is the main reason there was no heat in the main event until the run-in finish. Everyone knows the problems. Many have seen it for years, but it's now happening right before everyone's eyes and is no longer possible to deny. The worst part about pro wrestling, as we've seen with TNA, and with other companies that have gone down, is what happens is, usually under pressure, the people in charge get more insular. Their customers at times become their enemies, because they are voicing disapproval. The wrestlers get blamed for things often out of their hands. There is the reverting back to the past, and you can always learn from the past, but the main thing to learn from the past is that you can't recreate it as it was. You can only learn lessons from it and apply them to improve the present. I don't even know if anyone has noticed this, but with the exception of Jericho, who probably only had the title because Edge is injured, every champion in both brands right now is a heel. The idea that chasing the heel champion is the right thing for business is often true, yet the WWF was built on the opposite. But right now, since they usually (unless Undertaker is challenging) do clean finishes in the key matches, it means the audience is going to be disappointed with almost every house show title match finish. The idea of leaving the house show with heat to get the people back next week from Southern style wrestling in another era isn't applicable, because they don't come back for months. People need heroes they can identify with. They probably don't have to always win, but in the end, your emotional attachment with the fan has to pay off. When it doesn't, the fan will drift away. The unexplained Jonathan Coachman run-in wearing a ref shirt in the HHH vs. Orton title match was because of a communications snafu. It was scheduled as something on the PPV where Eric Bischoff would order Coachman to the ring. Nobody told Bischoff. People were looking everywhere for him for most of the PPV. Finally, when they realized he wasn't there, he was reached on his cell phone. When told he was needed back in the building, he said he was already two hours away, saying that since he had no more spots on the show, he had left to get a head start for Seattle. Probably the most important thing took place on Raw the next night, as Vince McMahon showed up and announced there would be major changes to Raw on 9/20 in Tucson, although nothing that major is scheduled. Some different ideas have been thrown out, including top talent trades, but nothing for sure. All the big names on Raw are already paired off, so at least as of Monday there were no immediate plans. They had a screw-up in Canada. The commercial for Taboo Tuesday played and it listed the main event as HHH defending the title against an opponent chosen by the fans, which was scheduled to be the big surprise. Given how screwed up internet polls are, even doing things like they are, focusing everything on Orton as the contender, doesn't guarantee he'll win the polling. The audience they are aiming contains enough people who will get their jollies by voting a million times for something screwy, such as the WWE web site poll where 40% of the voters picked the Tomko match as the best on the show. I guess they can always fix the poll if too many people decide to vote for Ric Flair or Val Venis as the challenger as a joke. The show on 10/19 in Milwaukee, they are leading the fans to voting for HHH vs. Orton in a rematch (which is the planned main event at this point), Edge (if he's healthy) vs. Chris Jericho, Christian vs. Shawn Michaels (which may be a TV match for a shot at Jericho if Edge isn't ready) and there was also a tease of Benoit & William Regal vs. La Resistance for the tag titles. The idea is believed to be fans will vote for some matches, and other matches will be announced and fans will vote for stipulations on those matches. A. Maven pinned Rodney Mack in 4:42 with a schoolboy. The finishing sequence saw Maven, who was a school teacher in the Portland area when he signed up for "Tough Enough" (but was never promoted with the local tie), missed a bulldog off the top rope he was supposed to hit. Mack sold it anyway. They had a bad match. Jazz tripped Maven. Maven went after her, allowing Mack to schoolboy him using the tights. Maven powered Mack out, collided with Jazz, and fell back into the schoolboy with tights for the pin. 1. Chris Benoit & William Regal beat Ric Flair & Batista in 15:05. This felt like a Raw match that went too long. Work was fine and Benoit is always good. Everyone in the crowd went nuts when, after lots of teasing, Flair did the face-first comedy pratfall. Flair and Benoit chopped the hell out of each other. They went to the spot where they got heat on Regal, to set up Benoit's hot tag. Flair actually did a somersault tag to Batista at one point. Benoit did three German suplexes to Flair and one to Batista. He did the diving head-BUTT to Batista and went for the crossface, but Batista picked him up from the position and slammed him, which was a good new power spot. Finish saw Benoit counter the figure four and make Flair tap to the crossface. **1/2 They broke up the Christian/Trish Stratus romance without any teasing or problems. Christian came back and wanted Tyson Tomko for himself in the divorce settlement. Stratus wanted him as well. Since Stratus had the ability to sleep with him, she won out, leaving Christian on his own that night. Christian called her a slut. After all that, Christian and Tomko were back together again the next night on Raw with no explanation regarding the PPV. 2. Trish Stratus retained the women's title over Victoria in 8:21. Fans were chanting "slut" at Stratus, which was the idea. Victoria did a press-slam into a gut buster. Victoria was on top for a plancha, but Tomko pulled Stratus to safety. Finish saw Victoria distracted by Tomko and Stratus using the stratusfaction (springboard bulldog) for the pin. Tomko had a chair and was threatening Victoria, when Steven Richards in drag showed up. This led to the worst segment on a PPV in recent memory. *1/4 3. Tyson Tomko pinned Steven Richards in 6:24, but it felt like six hours and 24 minutes. There's nothing worse than comedy that nobody wants to see. It was largely Tomko beating on Richards the entire match, and he looked so green that people were booing this and chanting "You suck," "Boring," and worse. When Richards came out in drag, fans were chanting "Stevie." Ross and Lawler said the identity was the worst kept secret in wrestling, but that they would play along. They did the mock surprise when the wig came off. Richards was wearing a bra with falsies and Tomko was beating on him with the falsies. Richards did the match wearing granny panties and dress socks after his dress, sports bra and wig came off. Richards made a brief comeback using a testicular claw twice. People didn't even get off on that. As Richards went to retrieve his bra, Tomko beat him up again and gave him the neckbreaker off the torture rack finish. This is an easy worst match of the year candidate. Mere words cannot describe this crime against humanity. -*** 4. Chris Jericho beat Christian to win the IC title in a ladder match in 22:29. They had to come out when the show was in the toilet. They worked real hard and took some big bumps, and got the crowd at the end, but it wasn't easy. Fans finally chanted "CLB" at Christian after all these months. They didn't involve the ladders early. Christian did an unprettier on the floor. Christian catapulted Jericho into the ladder. They were then doing the climbing and taking the bumps off the top of an eight foot ladder. Jericho used a form of the walls of Jericho on the top of the ladder. Jericho's big bump was having the ladder knocked from under him, and he came down and his BUTT landed from eight feet on the ladder. I thought he may have broken his tailbone in what is now the famous ladder enema spot. Christian brought out a ten-foot ladder. Both were climbing to the top of their respective ladders, when Jericho used a facebuster off the top of the ladder, climbed back up, and got the belt. They didn't do any of the really psycho bumps of some of the famous ladder matches of the past, except the facebuster. But a very good match that really saved the show. ***3/4 Edge confronted Jericho after the match, reminding him that he never won the title from the guy who had it. The next PPV is Taboo Tuesday on 10/19, and the idea is the fans pick the matches using internet voting. I guess they wanted to tell fans a match to pick. 5. Shawn Michaels pinned Kane in 18:02. Michaels looks to have gained some weight since he left in June to be with his wife. It drives me crazy how badly this was botched. He could have done the interview about how his wife was scared to death while she was seven months pregnant, and how he couldn't talk to his son when he was born. He should have made the big comeback unannounced, instead of appearing and talking fine at the convention. This was set up with such a great angle, and because of follow-up, to the fans, this was a cold match. Funny line was Lawler noting Kane had big feet when Ross talked about size 18's, and said, "You know what that means," and Ross said, "Big socks." Michaels was rusty and seemed to get tired in his first TV match since June, and lacked his usual spark. Even not at his best, it was a good match. Michaels used a pescado. Kane slammed Michaels on the table on the side instead of the center, which had to do wonders for Michaels' back. Calling an audible, he then suplexed Michaels through the Spanish table. Michaels juiced heavy as he was taking a beating. He tried something new, stomping his feet ten times like Jim Duggan, and getting the people to count, before doing the sweet chin music. Kane beat him to the punch with a high kick for a near fall. Kane did a clothesline off the top for another near fall. Michaels blocked a choke slam by using a low blow. Michaels then clocked Kane hard with a chair. Later, Kane went for a chair, but Lita got it away from him. Michaels went for the superkick, but Kane stopped him again and snatched him with a choke slam. Michaels escaped and hit the superkick for the pin. ***1/4 6. La Resistance retained the World tag titles over Rhyno & Tajiri in 9:40. They were put in the death spot. There was a USA chant when Tajiri was in with Robert Conway, which caused some announcer bickering. Tajiri threw some good kicks and match was good, even if people weren't going to care. Rhyno gored Sylvain Grenier, but Conway put his foot on the rope. Tajiri threw a hard kick at Conway. Grenier hit Rhyno with the flagpole and pinned him. **1/4 7. HHH pinned Randy Orton on 24:44 to win the World title. Spots early were designed to get Orton over, as he'd slap HHH around, and beat him to the punch on every spot and even spit all over his chest. They did everything you'd think was smart to get him over as the face, but the crowd wasn't buying him. Orton battered him with the old European uppercuts. HHH got the advantage with a chop block. Crowd was dead. Crowd got into it when HHH used the figure four, but it was more the move being over and the "Whoos" than the match being over. He held it for a long time to continue working the leg. HHH juiced. Orton kept selling the left knee. Ref Earl Hebner was bumped. Orton blocked a pedigree and hit the RKO, but no ref. Everyone looked to the back, and here came Flair and Batista. Orton nailed Flair, and sidestepped Batista as he ended up hitting his shoulder on the post. HHH hit a low blow and Jonathan Coachman ran out in a ref shirt, but Orton kicked out of the pin. Orton knocked down Coachman, and Batista hit a spinebuster for a near fall. Orton back dropped out of a pedigree, and in the same move, hit the RKO on Coachman. That was pretty cool. He gave Flair, the bumping machine, a thumb to the eye and hit the RKO on him, and then gave Batista a low blow. HHH cracked Orton with a hard chair shot, and followed with a pedigree on the chair. Batista threw Hebner into the ring and he made the count to win the title. **3/4

Nice pink boots on Val there. Nice.

Douglas doesn't? He was the one talking about "This is how wrestling was meant to be: ass-kicking, beating the hell of whoever is in front of you." But this DVD is going to be interesting. I read in a recent Observer that McMahon was trying to coax the former ECW guys they interviewed for the DVD to bury Heyman as much as possible. I wonder who complied.

That's like trying to justify drinking piss by saying, "Well, shit tastes worse."

If you're wondering why long-term planning and storylines usually aren't done, it's because of this style of booking. Every week, talent relations head John Laurinaitis books the house show cards based on the direction of that week. At the same time, the writers pitch their ideas to Vince McMahon. Vince approves, disapproves, and gives direction. After that, the writers are instructed to write the show based on Vince's direction and guidelines. The show goes to the agents over the weekend. On both Monday and Tuesday, they have agents meetings. Often things change again. The show airs, at which point programs are dropped or changed, so talent relations then has to book new cards. The Minnesota Vikings completed their roster, including their practice squad, and Brock Lesnar didn't make the squad. At this point, he's a free agent. It's kind of doubtful anyone would pick him up for regular season play with his lack of experience. Most likely the next move would be to try NFL Europe in the spring, although there were reports out of Winnipeg that his agent would be talking to Blue Bombers General Manger Brendan Taman this week. When Winnipeg claimed him, it was considered something of a Hail Mary pick, but with Lesnar as a free agent needing experience, the best thing for him is getting playing time, even if the Canadian game differs from the American game. Lesnar was on ESPN 2's Cold Pizza, and never brought up playing in Canada. He said he's going to hang out with his daughter and go hunting for a while, and probably go to NFL Europe, which plays in the spring. He said he thought he left on good terms with Vince McMahon (evidently nobody told him about Shane McMahon at WrestleMania chanting "You sold out" like a mark at him from his ringside seat), but did note he could understand why Vince would be upset since he walked out on a contract. He didn't rule out a return to wrestling. The thing with him that I'm disappointed with is he had to realize that there was a very good chance he was going to wind up back in wrestling, and he's said some things that didn't endear him to the wrestlers of late, and served no purpose. He can come back as a heel, so getting wrestling fans mad at him is no biggie. But even if he made the NFL and played a few seasons, there was still the chance to go back to wrestling after football, and it'll probably be far more lucrative than real fighting. After NFL time, he could get big money for a fight or two, but his body will be beaten down from football and wrestling by that point, even though he's far more athletic than virtually any heavyweight out there. He also now has longer hair. Steve Neal, his prototype (1999 NCAA champ who never played in college but ended up making it with the New England Patriots), who just two weeks ago was talking about quitting football due to his chronic shoulder injuries and trying WWE, wound up playing most of the game as first-string right offensive guard for the Patriots in their season opener. Neal spent several years having to learn the game, but ended up becoming a starter a few years ago before his last year plus was taken away due to shoulder problems. Neal was a lot better high school player than Lesnar, however. John Cena left for Australia after Smackdown this week for filming of "The Marine," the WWE Films vehicle for him. I believe Match No. 5 of his series with Booker T will be on the 10/3 No Mercy PPV. Carmella DeCesare turned herself in to police on misdemeanor assault charges related to the 8/20 incident with Kristin Hine. Hine, 32, pressed charges against her, and police put out a warrant for her arrest on 9/9. She was making a public appearance that night, and was going to be picked up, so she went in voluntarily and was released on bond. Hine claimed DeCesare, 22, kicked her in the head after a skirmish between the two was being broken up at Tramp's Night Club in Cleveland's Warehouse District. Hine also filed a restraining order against DeCesare, claiming she had threatened to kill her. The two got into a fight regarding Browns quarterback Jeff Garcia, who is DeCesare's boyfriend and who Hine had apparently recently dated. Believe it or not, this was carried on the ABC radio network news as one of the lead stories on 9/11 (of all days). In that story, they highlighted it as the girlfriend of Jeff Garcia starting a fight over him with his ex-girlfriend. Garcia was living in San Jose (he trained at the same gym as my wife and was there up until two months ago, as he played for the San Francisco 49ers before going to Cleveland when camp started, so these aren't exactly long-term relationships). Garcia & DeCesare were out on a date that night when Hine was there at the same club. Hine claimed that DeCesare saw her, and unprovoked, attacked her, and kicked her in the head when she went to leave. DeCesare, who is a yellow belt in Hapkido, pleaded not guilty on 9/10 in Municipal Court and was freed on a $5,000 bond. Magistrate Lynn Loritts also granted Hine's request for a restraining order against DeCesare. DeCesare's lawyer, Patrick D'Angelo, termed it a minor incident where nobody was hurt, and claimed it started when a friend of Hine threw a drink on DeCesare, which led to pushing and shoving. He claimed Hine started it by being crude and profane. I wonder if she said she had a gap wide enough to drive a truck through it. A Cleveland TV news reporter happened to be at the club when it happened and reported that DeCesare was the aggressor. Garcia has stayed out of the situation, refusing to talk about it and a Browns PR person said that the legal matter doesn't involve him, so there is nothing for him to talk about. Hine didn't receive any medical attention. DeCesare's "Playmate of the Year" status was talked about, but WWE or the Diva Search was not mentioned in the local Cleveland Plain Dealer story on the incident, nor was wrestling mentioned in any of the major national stories. In fact, very few of the stories of late about her have mentioned her wrestling status, which really says something considering the story got national network attention and was in a ton of newspapers in football columns because of Garcia, about how few people are paying attention to Raw. If they were, there would have been a ton of puns that would have been made about it if just one person in the media picked up on it. WWE is gearing up for Canadian promotions in the event of an NHL strike or lockout. They are going to go after the advertisers in Canada that promote on NHL games. Carl DeMarco is claiming there is a big audience crossover. WWE is also getting TV, print and radio spots ready marketing that WWE puts its fans first and you can count on us to always be there. The ad campaign is expected to talk about major strikes in baseball and football in the past, while promoting that WWE isn't unionized, runs with no off-season, and there is never a strike. The ads were scheduled to run in many major Canadian newspapers before you read this. There is still a decent amount of talk about the company letting Undertaker get away with not doing a job at SummerSlam to JBL, even though they have no new main event ideas, and not doing the job led to them being able to do a rematch. I guess the rematch with the Hearse match rules (thus avoiding a pinfall again) are what brought it up. In hindsight, given what transpired after the decision was made not to go in the direction, I can't believe they dropped the ball on a heel Undertaker managed by Paul Heyman, where he'd feud with Eddie Guerrero for the title. There has been underlying heat with Heyman and Undertaker from when Heyman was head writer (Heyman was trying to faze Taker out of the main event and have him put over some upper-card talent that needed the rub), plus there is the realization that every time in recent years they've tried to turn Undertaker, it doesn't take long for fans to cheer him anyway. Rundown of the 9/13 Raw show from Seattle: The show started with an in-ring celebration with Evolution and a big cake and a bunch of women, confetti, and streamers. HHH wasn't watching Ole Anderson stuff this week, as "There's excitement in the air," was Lonnie Mayne's catch phrase in Oregon. He even got the crowd to chant RKO. He asked who got him the cake. Ric Flair said it was Batista, but Batista said it wasn't him. Instead of doing the old, "If it's not you, and it's not you," they all agreed it must have been Eric Bischoff. When HHH opened to cake, expecting a stripper, it was, of course, Randy Orton. They are booking Orton like Stone Cold, since he got the best of everyone. Orton nailed HHH with a belt shot and he flew upside down into the cake with his feet sticking up. I don't remember Terry Funk doing this angle, but for some reason, his antics were "What would Terry Funk do in the same situation." HHH came out with cake all over himself, and slipped and got himself caught in the streamers (that was Terry Funk in Japan) and kept falling down. When he went back to Bischoff and grabbed him, Bischoff did the rest of the show with cake all over his suit. Batista wound up with a broken nose out of this. Chris Benoit beat Robert Conway in 8:10 with three German suplexes and a crossface. William Regal and Sylvan Grenier were at ringside and it looked like they were setting up a title program. They announced the great debate, Mick Foley, representing John Kerry, vs. JBL, representing George W. Bush, on 9/29 at the University of Miami. Molly Holly, who may no longer have a last name, came out mad about the Divas getting the attention. This set up a dance contest segment. They tried this out at the house shows. Molly did some ballet and got booed out of the place. Stacy Keibler did some dancing in an incredibly short skirt. Molly jumped her. Before long, all the women were in the ring and Bischoff ordered a match. Victoria, Keibler, & Nidia beat Molly, Gail Kim, & Trish Stratus in 4:13. Nidia has got to change her shorts because they were not flattering. Don't they have wardrobe people who spot that before they go on TV before 4 million people? Or do they just get their jollies off watching people go out like that? Keibler pinned Molly with a schoolgirl. Kane was mad and grabbed Bischoff. He wanted Shawn Michaels tonight. This was not the last tease of a match that would have been good that they wouldn't give us. Bischoff said maybe next week. Kane then threatened Bischoff even more, so Bischoff said he could have a no DQ match with basically a job guy to tear up. Chris Jericho did the Highlight Reel with Michaels. Michaels challenged him to an IC title match. Christian came out and wanted a title match. He did a speech about being a tag team wrestler, who made himself famous by winning a ladder match at WrestleMania (that should have been the tip off, since Michaels lost his famous ladder match), got a bodyguard, and became a singles superstar, but was referring to himself. Michaels suggested a singles match with Christian with the winner getting a title shot Christian, who is calling himself Captain Charisma and the greatest ladder match competitor (how about King of all ladder matches). Jericho then had to come up with a way, after teasing good singles matches, to set up a tag. He went and talked to fans in the front row, and basically said they all knew if there was a singles match between the two of them, that Tyson Tomko would interfere. So they did a tag match, ending in 14:10 when Michaels superkicked Tomko. After the match, Christian laid Michaels out with an unprettier. They did a Simon Dean vignette, spoofing an infomercial guy trying to sell products, showing clips of people in shape and claiming they had lost 80 pounds and stuff. Funny thing is Mike Bucci himself lost a ton of weight in his quest to go from ECW Nova to someone WWE would be interested in. They even gave a phone number to order his products, which if you called, was him insulting you even more, and you got to leave a voice message. He did a good job, but this gimmick is prelim level. It was Diva Search time. Joy got bounced. They advertised on Spike TV all week, and even at Mania, a boxing match with the last two survivors. For a number of reasons, they didn't do it, most of which were covered last week. When the Washington department of licensing, which governs pro wrestling, boxing, and MMA, heard about doing an unsanctioned boxing match, they called WWE. WWE then told them they weren't doing a boxing match, but would be doing a pillow fight. From what I was told, the actual reason they didn't box each other, because the commission has no power to stop them (they could file a complaint and it's possible at a later time they could have been fined, but it probably wouldn't amount to much), was there was a possibility that if one was injured, since they have prospective TV and modeling opportunities, there was a chance the loser could file a suit if she didn't get picked. Before anything else could happen to get people to turn off their sets in droves, Vince McMahon came out with a world record exaggerated walk. He gave a speech about changes that need to be made and a big announcement next week. He then said there had been a change and told each girl she had 30 seconds to beat up Coach. Christy worked a lot harder, jumping on his back and trying to choke him, but he sold huge for Carmella, who was obviously pulling punches, and he was totally overselling and went down. Didn't matter, fans booed the hell out of Carmella. It's going to take some major fixing for her to win. Kane's surprise opponent was Gene Snisky (see Mean Gene Mondo in the OVW Fall Brawl report). In OVW, they bill him as 6’8’’, but at a legit 6’4’’ or 6’5’’, he didn't even come across as a big guy standing next to Kane. He's super green and it showed. They gave him a surprising amount of offense, which was a bad move because his offense is so pathetic. At one point he nailed Kane with a low blow, and Kane sold it for maybe a split second. It ended up with Snisky hitting Kane with a chair and Kane falling on Lita. They strongly suggested she was miscarrying, carried her out on a stretcher, and took her out in an ambulance. Kane went nuts and became protective of her and went in the ambulance with her. When this angle was laid out originally, it was to be a nine month angle and she was to carry to term, so if they do a miscarriage, it's because they realize the angle was a bomb and are trying to get out of it. I could see a hint of a Kane face turn, which makes perfect sense when you look at the Raw roster. Except for Evolution, who is really a group of faces, the top heels except for Kane are Christian and La Resistance. They played it up seriously. I got a lot of complaints that night about the angle. If you've ever lived through that one in your real life, it's not a memory you'd like to deal with watching wrestling. At the same time, they do it in soaps and movies all the time. If any family went through that and a husband watched this show with his wife, he's guaranteed spending the rest of the night being yelled at for watching that crap, and she's not going to forgive wrestling any time soon. The people writing this stuff probably don't think things out past "this angle is tanking so let's do a miscarriage of this miscarriage of an angle." The serious atmosphere Jerry Lawler & JR were trying to portray didn't come across because the crowd was chanting loudly, "Baby killer," as a comedy deal, at Snisky. All I could think of was what a great way to introduce a new guy for a feud, and instead, they picked the least ready guy in their system. They either didn't think things through if they aren't going to use Snisky more, or they did, and haven't learned a thing from Matt Morgan and Nathan Jones, both of whom were world's better when they were brought in prematurely and flopped. Match was a no contest, in a no DQ match. Main event was a Nitro special. Orton beat HHH, Flair, & Batista via DQ in 2:54. Orton was beating on all of them until they all ganged up on him at once for the DQ. Post-match saves were done by the returning Shelton Benjamin as well as Benoit. Benoit did a diving head-BUTT on Batista and Orton followed with an RKO on him as Evolution bailed. Notes on the 9/9 Smackdown: Smackdown is back to suffering more from a lack of direction than anything else. Unlike Raw, there aren't the crap segments, and the wrestling ranges from average to very good. But it feels like a treadmill with nobody going anywhere. Charlie Haas got a big pop because the show was from Tulsa and he's an Oklahoma boy. So, of course, he did a job for JBL sort of clean. The Billy Kidman & Paul London title loss to Kenzo Suzuki & Rene Dupree was a 10:00 match that told a story. It just boggles my mind that Kidman & London were rushed into getting the belts before anyone was ready for them at that level, and then it's like they gave up on them three weeks later. This kind of lack of patience is deadly. The story of the match was Kidman was on top for the shooting star, but hesitated, and then walked out. London had his right shoulder all taped up from the Heidenreich attack the week before. Usually in this situation, you work the injury to the left shoulder, so the guy has his good arm to make his punches and comebacks. By taking away his right side, and forcing him to do his offense on the left and weak side, it was a different dynamic. So he was a one-armed guy working by himself for the last 6:00 after Kidman walked out, before Suzuki got the pin with the claw STO. London took the bump on his head. There was an idea floated to have London get a bunch of near falls on Suzuki & Dupree, teasing he was going to pull it out, before losing, but it was nixed. Dupree, Suzuki, and Hiroko all sort of did the French tickler dance after winning the belt. London confronted Kidman after, but Kidman wouldn't give him an explanation for leaving, and then walked off again. I wonder if the Rockers or Rock & Roll Express that they tried to make these guy a copy of would have gotten over if they were did break up tease spots in their second month as a team. The Rey Mysterio, RVD, & Bob Holly vs. all three Dudleys match was good, with Mysterio pinning Spike Dudley, keeping their title program alive. RVD got his nose busted up, which I guess is poetic justice in a sense. I don't even want to think about Paul Heyman vs. Michael Cole. The idea is getting Heidenreich over as a monster. Funaki was beating on Heyman when Heidenreich ran in and gave Funaki a backbreaker. Heyman and Cole started shoving each other until Heidenreich chased Cole into the stands. I think I saw 80 commercials for Kevin Hill during the two hours tonight. Hey, this time last year, they were trying to sell wrestling fans on "The Mullets," which ended up being one of the two or three lowest rated shows of the season. TV programmers are worse than wrestling bookers, because the entire idea of the show was to find something to get the Smackdown viewers to watch UPN. I can just see in the boardroom. We've got these 5.5 million viewers who have spent most of their lives insulted by friends for watching wrestling, so what we'll do is, we'll produce a show where the wrestling fans are Class A morons and all the wrestling fans will love it. Cole ended up coming back for the main event, a lumberjack match with Kurt Angle vs. Eddie Guerrero. It's so frustrating when even basic wrestling logic goes out the window. Because there was outside interference by Luther Reigns last week, we had a lumberjack match this week. But logic would say if there was outside interference, the match you wouldn't follow is a lumberjack match, which guarantees outside interference. The usual logic is the heel runs away and you have lumberjacks the next match to throw the heel back. Another logic gap is that Reigns, the entire reason for the lumberjack match, was one of the lumberjacks. The mind reels. The real reason was so Big Show would come up and choke slam the entire world. He looks heavier than ever, with longer hair to give him a new look. Match went 15:45 and was ***1/4. I don't think it's possible for these two to have a bad match, but they had another bad finish. Again, the company never protects key people so it's hard for anyone to get over to the impact level. Show could have choke slammed every Nunzio and Johnny Stamboli and 10 other guys and had the same exact effect this had, without making the key guys like Booker T, John Cena, and Guerrero look like mid-carders because they can't get any offense against him. Worse, with Angle, since they are going to an Angle vs. Show program (think about this for a second, we get two Angle vs. Guerrero matches free as build up to pay $34.95 for Angle vs. Show and Guerrero vs. Reigns), Show has now already choke slammed Angle, which is what people theoretically should pay to see. No point, they've already seen the end result and there's nothing left to care about because it was done so easy. Maybe if Angle was champion it would make sense for it to be booked like this. Given the nature of the angle from a few months back, Angle should either be the face looking for revenge, or he should do something to get heat on Show at first, and not the way it was done. Even if Show was going to lay out everyone, he should have stalked Angle and had Angle run away and escape, so at least there is something people should want to see. Guerrero was shaken up after the show. There was some concern in the ring as he blanked out. Quite frankly, there is a lot of concern about Guerrero these days as he spent an entire career striving for a certain level of stardom, and he's had trouble with the pressure of being on top that Steve Austin has noted nobody unless they've been in the spot can understand. Even though nobody blamed Guerrero, the fact he was replaced by JBL, probably the worst non-transitional champ in company history, doesn't help. Some of Eddie's friends have been told to watch out for him and let him vent his frustrations so he doesn't hold things inside. Other friends have suggested maybe he needs to take a couple of weeks off just to heal, but it's very hard for talent to ask for time off and there is the feeling that the company is struggling and needs the top guys out there now. Even though Vince McMahon and HHH paid $30,000 for Sean Waltman's rehab (he's now out), Waltman isn't coming back to WWE at this point. WWE sent out a release with some info on the Australia tour business, which was three nights of sellouts for the Smackdown crew in Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne. Sydney drew 17,379 fans, which was the largest crowd in the history of the Sydney Superdome. They also did $300,321 in merchandise sales, which has to be among the highest in company history (I believe the all-time record was at Wembley Stadium in 1992 and it was something like $1.4 million). Melbourne drew an $896,618 house and did $20.60 per head in merchandise. The tour in total grossed $3.4 million. It has been confirmed that even though it was the "Return of the Dead Man" tour, that it was the first time Undertaker had ever worked Australia. However, the Brisbane show was not the debut in the city, as they did a show there in 1986. Ivory was still among the ranks of the employed after her comments on creative, as she was hosting Heat and Experience over the weekend. WWE returns to Arena Monterrey on 11/6. The company's first show in Mexico, at the same building, on 4/3, set the country's all-time gate record, with $443,207 on a paid attendance of 10,850 fans, breaking the national record of $400,000 set by the Konnan vs. Cien Caras match in 1993 at Plaza de Toros in Mexico City. Variety ran an article about the decline in company popularity, noting the average age of Raw viewers has gone from 27 to 33, and they still have a younger audience than most prime time shows. They claimed industry observers (which in this case wasn't me) blamed the brand extension for speeding up the losses. It theorized that having seven days between shows with the same talent has forced attention-challenged younger men to seek out other entertainment. Mike Trager, a TV sports consultant blamed video games and the internet as taking people away from wrestling. After all the talk and negotiations started with legends of the past regarding the 24/7 deal with Jim Ross and others, several of which ended in we'll get a contract out in a week or so, now that it's months later, I haven't heard of one person who has gotten an offer on paper. The biggest names known to have been approached were Bret Hart, Bruno Sammartino, and Bobby Heenan. We haven't heard much about the 24/7 deal of late after a lot of early excitement, but I believe none of those names even heard back something like, "we're working on what we're doing" and sorry for the delay. At this point they probably have the impression there is no more interest. I still can't believe TNA never did anything with Heenan. They approached him once more than a year ago, and even gave him a start date, but Heenan had other plans, and I guess they took it as him not being interested. It isn't like Heenan didn't prove on the Hall of Fame tape (which I'd recommend seeing just for him) that he can't perform with the best of them today. Maybe everyone just thinks TV is a young man's game or can't come up with a role for someone who can't take bumps, but even for WWE, I think there's a place for sporadic appearances by people, even if it's just to give a little rub to some of the younger guys through interplay or angles with guys that people remember as big deals. Gerald Brisco has been doing a lot of scouting of amateur wrestlers, and was looking to get tapes of MMA fighters from the American Kickboxing Academy team (which Frank Shamrock sometimes trains). There was a connection with AKA through Bobby Lashley, a top amateur wrestler who is in OVW but hasn't debuted yet, that Brisco recruited. The story we heard is he was looking for tapes of guys both for possible developmental, as well as Tough Enough, so they look to be recruiting guys as well as people who send in tapes for the show. The plan for Tough Enough is to tape the casting special on 10/15 and 10/16. They will set up a ring and an obstacle course on Venice Beach, California for the 50 contestants they are bringing in. They originally planned to do three cities like the Divas Search. Word has it that even though the deadline for entries is 9/22, that 20-25 contestants have already been picked. The totally worthless Viscera (Nelson Frazier) is being brought back to join JBL on Smackdown. You know the saying. When business gets bad, Vince McMahon always looks to the big guys. And then it gets worse until he lucks into a Steve Austin. Paul Heyman was at the PPV in Portland as well as Raw in Seattle, so Heidenreich is working house shows now without a manager, as noted last week. I'm not sure if this is due to everyone being overworked, or just so many changes that people can't keep up, but in Canada, the newspapers love to give wrestling good coverage. For the Edmonton preview, they had John Cena do an interview, since the original card idea, with Undertaker off, was Cena vs. JBL for the title. The company's web site is now way outdated when it conies to line-ups as they had Cena vs. JBL long after it was changed. The only problem was, Cena was given the weekend off because he was leaving for Australia a few days later, so they went with a three-way with JBL vs. Kurt Angle vs. Eddie Guerrero, as Undertaker also had the weekend off. In Calgary, they set up Booker T for the interview, but he also had the weekend off, and unlike Cena, was never booked in the first place. Luckily this was caught and at the last minute they got Angle to do the story instead. In the Calgary print ads, the photos featured were Guerrero and Torrie Wilson. Then, in the line-up given to the local media, there was no Wilson, although she did wind up appearing. Here is some more on John "Romeo" Roselli, the former WWE office employee who quit his job to pursue his dream as a wrestler in OVW (he lost to Ken Doane on the 9/11 TV show). Roselli was a photographer for wrestling magazines when in high school. He wrestled Northeast independents under the name Johnny Heartbreaker, when he took an intern job with the WWF working in live event booking. To show how badly he wanted to be in wrestling, about a year-and-a-half ago he paid $25,000 for surgery to repair his injured shoulder under Dr. James Andrews because he didn't have insurance. He gave up his office job to go to OVW, even without a developmental deal, because he saw it as his best chance of making it as a wrestler. He once worked as a druid for Undertaker at a WrestleMania. Although the Diva Search where they had all the swearing was eliminated from the tape in Europe, it aired in Australia. In Australia, they didn't bleep out the word “cum” yet they recently bleeped out the word "ass" in a John Cena promo. The Hurricane returned from nasal surgery on the 9/13 Raw tapings. He worked a Heat match, teaming with Rosey and losing to Rhyno & Tajiri. There were all sorts of reps in Seattle for Raw trying to get fans to register to vote. They did at least slightly better than Los Angeles, registering 20 voters. Regarding the Ric Flair book signing in Dallas that took place last week that we wrote about: as it turns out, one of our subscribers, Mark Harris, who works in promotions with KLLI, put it together with Borders. It was set up that you had to buy a book at that particular Borders to get an autograph. Flair would sign one other piece of memorabilia along with the book. Dave Hebner then told the people at Borders that Flair would only sign the book, and was telling people at the front of the line to open the book to the page they wanted signed. They could take a quick picture while Flair was signing, but they didn't want him posing because the line was so long. Hebner had to run the house show, which started at 5 pm, so it was a timing issue to accommodate everyone and still get to the arena. The 8/30 Raw in San Francisco at the Cow Palace drew 6,000 and 8/31 Smackdown in Sacramento drew 3,500. 9/11 Smackdown in Edmonton drew 1,400 paying $65,000. It didn't look that bad as they didn't use the Skyreach Center where they did the 4/18 Backlash show from, but a 2,300-seat smaller building, which they couldn't even fill. 9/12 in Calgary drew 1,100 and $50,000 at the old 7,000-seat Corral. That's a scary number when you consider how much wrestling is a part of the culture in that city.

It's obvious they only did this to erase Lesnar's mark as youngest world champion.

Remember when Sting and Lex Luger were murdered at a golf course in Atlanta but still managed to be on Nitro the same night?

No, that was Gordon Solie. And Solie was under orders to say that because WCW back then thought "foreign object" was offensive to foreigners.

Yeah, that is true. Mr. Perfect and Goldust were only supposed to be one-time appearances at the 2002 Rumble, but the WWF was so impressed with both that they signed them to contracts. I really hope Gangrel comes back long-term. Viscera I don't care for.

Trivia, I hate to be off-topic, but your signature shows that you have no knowledge of Sable having been fired by WWE.

The last time Gowen was on Smackdown was a week or two after No Mercy 2003 when he was attacked by Akio and Sakoda. He took their Double STO move and claimed he had a concussion, something that all the wrestlers thought he was faking. By that time, Gowen had so much heat with the wrestlers for being an arrogant prick that he was just never brought back to TV and fired early.

Tony Schiavone does the Braves radio show here around Atlanta, and I guess he'd need something to do during baseball's off-season. This reminds me of when Bischoff was threatening to fire J.R. in late-2002 and he said, "Don't forget J.R., I've got Tony Schiavone's phone number on speed dial."

Looks to be heading to a Orton/Benjamin/Benoit vs. Evolution feud.

Paul Bearer wasn't even fired. He was just taken off TV. He's got a contract until October 2006. He's working backstage now. And for Goldust: He was informed in November 2003 that his contract, that expired in January 2004, would not be renewed. However, in the middle of December 2003, they went on and terminated it.

Both Edge and Christian should join Evolution.

I remember when they advertised a WCW title change that occured in Japan and to call the hotline to find out details. The title was the WCW Women's Cruiserweight Title. ...

Gangrel's return reminds me of a time way back when Edge and Christian were absolutely horrible on the microphone. "Beware! Take care! The freaks come out at night!" -- Edge "There's no hope for you!" -- Captain Charisma

Yeah, common sense. What sense does it make to bring back Gangrel and Viscera to help Bradshaw against UT and have them drop off the face of the earth again? What do you think this is? TNA? ha.

Big Vis ruled when he was stalking Tori (who was with Kane at the time) and he had that soft rock beat as his theme music. With Gangrel, people seem to love or hate the fact he's back. I loved his entrance, his music, and he was really over before "creative had nothing to do for him".

Noble had to have done something to earn a firing, because wasn't he just in the middle of this Chavo/Kidman stuff?

I always thought it was ridiculous that WWE asked Gangrel to completely drown his arms in tattoos and then fired him after he did it. So, good for Gangrel.

Well, it is nice continuity. Undertaker, JBL, Viscera, and Gangrel were all once members of the Ministry of Darkness at the same time.

Heidenreich reads a poem and the return of BIG VIS! I'm watching this week. No questions asked.

VISCERA IS BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!