MARTYEWR

I kept watching Smackdown until GAB when the JBL push became complete with the title win. At that point, I either only caught a bit of the show or missed it altogether, with some weeks not even bothering to read the spoilers. As for Raw, it lasted a little longer, as I kept watching until Orton's title win, but during the summer months, my interest was fading, with Benoit, in spite of being the brand's champion, not receiving nearly as much spotlight as the top champion as a HHH would. These days, I might catch a segment or two of either show, but that's about it. I mainly just watch a WWE DVD every now and then if I feel like watching a certain match, whether it's good or bad.

I got the latest edition of SI Extra in my e-mail this morning, and Michael Farber had an interesting idea as far as salvaging the season goes (if a new CBA deal is done before March). The article is as follows: The NHL and the players' association will meet today (sans commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow) in an effort to create some headway in the current lockout. The sides have not met since Dec. 14, when the league rejected the union's proposal—and don’t expect a new collective bargaining agreement to come out of this meeting. “Conversation is better than entrenched silence,” says SI senior writer Michael Farber. “But I think it's pretty much too late to have a season. If they settled on Sunday, for instance, you would have to get people back from Europe and get a ton of free agents signed. The season could not start until about Feb. 2. Then maybe you could think about a 36-game season or so.” Farber says there is a better way. He calls it April Madness. Under Farber’s plan the league would forego an abbreviated regular season in favor of a 30-team Stanley Cup playoff beginning in April. The first round would consist of best-of-three series followed by a best-of-five series in the second round. Then he’d have best-of-seven series all the way to the Stanley Cup Finals. Farber would give opening-round byes to the Stanley Cup champion Lightning and the runner-up Flames and seed the teams based on last year’s final standings. “The advantage of this is it would give both sides another four to six weeks to work out a CBA if they are so inclined,” says Farber. “Is it any less legit than a 36-game season? Well, it’s different, for sure. But it would definitely draw attention to the league. And certainly every game would count. But most of all, it would be a great gesture to the fans.” What do you guys think? I definitely think it would be far more worthwhile to go this route than to try to force any sort of a regular season going. If you can get something sorted before March, you can still have some sort of training camp going before the tournament. And as Farber himself said, every game counts. Of course, this idea doesn't mean shit if there's no new CBA.

Ones that I never saw live (of course): "THE GIANTS WON THE PENNANT! THE GIANTS WON THE PENNANT! THE GIANTS WON THE PENNANT!..." "Havlicek's stolen the ball!" "...Henderson made a wild stab at it and fell. He's another shot! RIGHT IN FRONT! HE SCORES! HENDERSON!!!" Ones I've seen live: "Jordan....OHHH....a spectacular move by Michael Jordan!" "Now the 2-2....WELL HIT DEEP DOWN THE LEFT FIELD LINE....WAY BACK AND GONE!!!! ..... Joe Carter, with a three-run homer...." I'll leave what the events were as an exercise to the reader.

How about Chris Jericho's false WWF title win over HHH on Raw in April 2000?

Good. They should've kept it that way, then. I thought it was great when Bischoff actually, you know, STOOD UP TO HHH for once. It was the most fire his character has shown since the heyday of the nWo.

To those who have pointed out Batista's weaknesses (i.e. HTQ, RRRudo, etc.). Not arguing with you guys about them, but do you still think they should or shouldn't push him to the title at WMXXI?

I won't get into details now, but here goes... New England 42, Philadelphia 24. And yes, I do eat my words regarding the Atlanta pick.

First time: 80% 41 Miles 231 seconds Unfortunately started off with states that are in the centre of the country, but once I finally got some states close to the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans, things were fine. Second time: 86% 21 Miles 210 seconds

I'd go with McNabb. If he (and the Eagles) lose a fourth straight conference championship game, the offseason in Philly will be veddy interesting...

1. Facial? Yes, facials. Picture Shawn painting Trish's toenails while they gossip about Lita being a whore and they're both in pink and purple pajamas and wearing braces. Facials just go with that. Hunter shows up on his bicycle and starts throwing pebbles at the window and they finally end up sneaking him into the bedroom. There are some close calls where the dad (played by Ric Flair) almost catches Hunter in the girls' bedroom, but he manages to hide. Shawn develops a crush on him throughout the night while Trish spends the evening trying to avoid Hunter's friend Eugene, giving them sort of a Kelly/Screech dynamic. I think it would be sweet and sentimental. I'm scared to ask, but what would be the payoff to all this?

They tend to be prejudiced. IIRC, there's only one kicker in the Hall (Jan Stenerud of the Kansas City Chiefs).

I meant to ask you about that. Forgive me for being under a rock on the subject, but when was the reserve clause in baseball that limited salaries?

I'd watch, but I don't really think it would be that great of an idea. Would an 8 game pre-season leading up to a bastardized Stanley Cup really be worth it? It just seems gimmicky. I don't know if anyone said anything about a preseason. Just go with the training camp, then the tournament. Personally, I don't know if they even need the entire month of March to prepare. Athletes at that level shouldn't need that long to get in game shape.

My guess is that they'd prefer to release it when Kurt is a face instead of while he's still one of the major heels on SD. Yeah, I know--the HHH DVDs--but that's HHH, who gets face pops often anyways and is booked as invincible and cool. EDIT: Oh yeah--and as Shadow pointed out, the F crap is probably a biggie. The HHH DVDs, like the Hogan and nWo ones, were released when blurring was a non-issue. That's why none of the above are available right now.

Precisely. If you're booking Jericho against guys like Goldberg and HHH (assuming you have the default relationships), his morale will drop pretty easily.

Off the top of my head: Ray Lewis, Troy Aikman, Darrell Green, Peyton Manning, Jerry Rice, Tim Brown, Brett Favre, Emmitt Smith, and Bruce Smith are pretty much all sure bets.

That's tough to do even in the NBA Live games...

I'm not arguing with you. I personally hate the "whore" labels myself, considering how contradictory they are when guys are encouraged by their friends to fuck as many women as they can. I'm just stating where the supposed "stories" are coming from.

blurrimania Blurring isn't the problem. It's removing whenever anyone says "WWF" and reproducing it so that it doesn't come across as awkward. Blurring comes across as inconvenient and distracting, but it's nothing the WWE production team can't do.

It's been pushed back to February 1st for a while now. I have it on my wish list at DVD Aficionado, and Feb. 1st is the date they've had there for at least a month, IIRC.

I haven't heard specifics myself, but there's stories that she's fucked most of the OMEGA roster during her time there.

The Graduate (Special Edition) for only $9.

New England and Atlanta will advance. I wanna take Atlanta, but New England's team effort as a whole showed me something yesterday. So New England over Atlanta.

No results the day I was born (June 27, 1978), but here's the closest: WWWF @ New York City, NY - Madison Square Garden - June 26, 1978 Stan Stasiak defeated SD Jones Chief Jay Strongbow defeated Baron Mikel Scicluna Jack Brisco defeated Butcher Vachon Mil Mascaras defeated Ken Patera George Steele defeated Tony Garea Andre the Giant & Ivan Putski defeated Luke & Superstar Billy Graham The Yukon Lumberjacks defeated WWWF Tag Team Champions Dino Bravo & Dominic DeNucci to win the titles when Bravo was pinned following a double chop (Tag Team Champions) WWWF World Champion Bob Backlund defeated Spiros Arion It's worth noting that my birthday (June 27) has seen a couple PPVs over the last 6 years. One, in 1999, is most remembered for a raised briefcase, and the other, 2004, is the day Bradshaw became champ. Sigh.

1. Joanie Laurer 2. Erik Watts 3. John Tenta 4. Lex Luger 5. Scott Steiner