Hunter's Torn Quad

Julius Smokes is in no way amusing. He's automatic fast foward material

If Flair was protected like a legend, then maybe 'smarks' would have done. But Flair has been so abused for the last ten years beating him doesn't mean anywhere near what it used to.

It's where the fans aren't booing the guy because they want him to get his ass kicked, but because they want him to get off the screen. What's worse? X-Pac heat? or Masters heat(none)? X-Pac heat. With X-Pac heat they don't want you there at all. At least with Masters Heat they aren't outright rejecting you.

It's where the fans aren't booing the guy because they want him to get his ass kicked, but because they want him to get off the screen.

If Edge and Foley lose at ONS, then no way is Edge doing the job.

It was simply them running low on time, so they rushed through the match. It didn't do Bomb any favors, so they should have just cancelled the match. I doubt anybody would have complained.

I have record of Candido working a dark match during that time but not the others. Henry doesn't make any sense considering he had to have been in heavy training at that time for the 96 Olympics. Spellbinder, and Candido, got tryouts on the same night, which I believe was the first Raw taping of the year. And Mark Henry did an angle at the same taping, but I don't think it aired. Lex Luger was wrestling Tatanka when King Kong Bundy interefered, and Henry ran in, took his shirt off and the heels ran off.

--Shawn Michaels will be having an MRI done on his knee later this week, which is why the Spirit Squad destroyed the knee last night. They are hopeful he will still be able to wrestle at Vengeance on 6/25, since the show is built around him. Da Meltz. The Heyman promo was classic old school in getting over the date of the PPV.

UFC drew a 1.9 rating on Thursday. Da Meltz.

That's a great point. Vicki and Chavo have the ultimate say so in this situation. . Unless she really needs the money, Vicki should put her foot down and stop this. Chavo can't really say no or he'll be given the usual punishment people get for speaking out.

I thought they were over that type of deal. Guess not. WWE almost never pass up the chance to exploit things that are better left alone.

--Johnny Nitro & Melina are being moved to Raw as opposed to being suspended. --Vickie Guerrero was asked to come to last night's show and was there going over scripts for possible involvement in the upcoming Chavo Guerrero storyline Da Meltz.

Cameras, lighting, etc. What makes this funnier is that Rey isn't getting the surgery for a while now.

Undertaker vs. Khali wasn’t bad as much as it was incredibly boring. Undertaker, to his credit, tried everything he could to get something out of Khali, but Khali is just beyond hope when it comes to trying to work even a half decent match with the guy. And after how strong Khali was put over Undertaker, where do you go with him? He can’t lose to anybody or that rare clean and decisive pinfall loss from Undertaker will have been wasted, and at the same time Khali isn’t someone you can push to the top simply because there’s no way, even more after Sunday, that the people will buy anyone having any kind of competitive match against him. Not only that, it seems obvious that when Undertaker finally gets his climactic win over Khali it’s going to require something special and/or spectacular, in which case how is anyone else supposed to credibly beat Khali? It’ll have taken Undertaker pulling out all the stops to beat Khali, so how are we meant to believe that anything less can get the job done? The Khali program makes for a harmless short-term deal for Undertaker, but it can’t be prolonged for long, because they’ll be booking themselves into a corner when it comes to what they can do with Khali until it does finish. And Da Meltz said on The Law on Sunday that when JBL was going over, the plan was for him to face Mark Henry, presumably on the next Smackdown PPV.

I asked Meltzer why Joe isn't using the choke as his finisher so much anymore, and he said it's simply that some people refuse to lose to it.

Here's a little more detailed recap: Bear in mind that the ECW stuff was written just before news came out that the Sci-Fi Channel deal was revealed to be the choice, and that the Judgment Day talk was written before the PPV.

JD Tease/Spoiler Da Meltz.

Whoa the possibility of ECW being live? It has to be more than one hour if it ends up being live, as it wouldn't seem justifiable cost-wise to only do an hour.... Doing more than one hour increases the risk of burning out the crowd before the stars come out for Smackdown. This is where taping on a third night would help, but that isn't happening for the time being.

--The final details of the ECW TV project will be hammered out tomorrow with a press release coming Tuesday morning to announce ECW on the Sci-Fi Network. It will be Tuesday but the time slot is not definite. It will either be live or on a few hour tape delay. These are just two of the many issues to be finalized tomorrow. Da Meltz

I haven't seen Andre vs. Hogan in a long time, and, to be honest, I have no real desire to see it again. I do remember being pleasently surprised by how it wasn't as bad as a lot of people said. It wasn't good or great by any stretch of the imagination, though it was clearly good enough that it 'worked' for the live crowd, For me, this is one of those matches that gets a little overrated simply because it wasn't as bad as a lot of people expected it to be. If you like this match, or even love it, and can explain why, then that's fine. If you disliked the match or even hated it, and can explain why, then that's fine as well. If you try to tell someone that their opinion of the match is wrong, then you're wasting your time, because a persons opinion is dependent on personal taste. However, challenging their reasoning for reaching that opinion, that's fair game.

Booker T and Batista: It's a work, pure and simple. It's a nice attempt at trying to make a worked angle seem legit, but it's a complete work. That said, at least the resulting matches should be good. Rey's treatment as World Champion: This has been beyond horrible. Since just after the Rumble, they've booked Rey just about as bad as you could possibly book him, especially as World Champion. He was mistreated before winning the belt, being beaten just the week before he won the World title, and since then Rey has, outside of the match with Randy Orton, been treated as an absolute joke. His size, which can either work for him or against him, has been handled in such a terrible manner as to make it an albatross around his neck rather than something positive, which it could be. Worst of all, he's been beaten clean two weeks in a row, by Mark Henry and Khali, and it's not even to set up a future title match; Rey's next PPV match is against JBL, and he's set to lose the belt there. There is no way to credibly rationlize or justify this treatment of Rey, but it is, sadly, no real surprise when you consider the size-obsession of those in charge of the decision making process in WWE. The 'return' of ECW: With this being a pet project of Vince McMahon, this has every possible chance of succeeding, because Vince is going to put all of his muscle behind this. That said, there are still a number of pitfalls for this project to overcome. First of, while Vince is apparently gung-ho on making this work, the biggest chance of this succeeding is also the biggest chance it has of failing, and that's Vince. For this to work, and I mean really work, Vince has to think differently to how he usually does, but with the same drive. He can't use a WWE mentality to make an ECW (even if it's really WWE) project work. For this to work it has to be different to WWE in as many ways as possible, or it'll just be a third WWE brand, and we don't need another one of those. The return of DX: This will be a short-term success, but it has no legs if it's the same DX from 1997-1999. That DX, as hot as it was, was part of another era, and to try and recreate that success today just isn't going to work. Shawn and Hunter reuniting will get a huge pop, but for this to have any kind of lifespan, it cannot be the same DX it used to be. For one thing, Shawn and Hunter are now nine years older and, lilke it or not, fans just are not going to be buy people of their age, almost 41 and 37 respectively, playing at being young punks. They could, just about, get away with it during the original run of DX, but it simply won't work now. I'm not even sure Shawn and Hunter can pull of being punks, at least in the vein that the DX name will warrant, but for it to work they need to make this version of DX a new variation on an old formula, but if it's the same DX as from 1997, then it will be a bomb. Jim Cornette in TNA: This could have been a good thing for TNA, but it won't be, simply because for TNA to really hit it big the kinds of changes needed, especially taking Jeff Jarrett out of the main event scene, just are not going to happen. Whatever positives could come from Cornette being part of TNA are going to be more than offset by the simple fact that until TNA makes fundamental changes; Jeff Jarrett out of the main event scene, a proper structure to the X-Division, more believable/realistic angles,etc, then nobody who gets brought in is going to have any kind of long-term positive effect. TNA needs to change from within before it can anything other than a distant, and cold, #2. Matt Hughes versus Royce Gracie: I think time has passed Royce by, and unless something very strange happens, then Hughes is going to win, and I would not be surprised if he mananges to get Gracie to tap out. Hughes in the 4th round by stoppage. TUF 3: Ken Shamrock is either a bad coach or he's been edited to look like one. Add to that the fact that Tito is so much better at coaching, and Ken comes across as a behind-the-times old guy who seems unable or unwilling to modernize his approach to teaching the fight game.

If RVD wins the belt and gets stripped of it the next night on Raw, then I think it's more likely that Vince will just declare that Cena is still the champion.

I don't think Hulk vs. Andre is quite as bad as some have said, but it's way too much of a stretch to call it pretty good.

I think Vince will want that feel good pop to end the PPV, so I think we might see the WWE ref get bumped and an ECW ref make the three count and the PPV ends with Van Dam the WWE Champion. Then, the next night on Raw, Vince can strip Van Dam of the belt and they can segue into Van Dam walking out and joining ECW as the uncrowned WWE Champion.

The most recent match that I've given ***** to is Joe vs. Kobashi. I watched it again a couple of months ago, and I still have no problems giving it five stars. I also gave five stars to Joe vs. Daniels vs. Styles from September last year. I thought a lot of that was down the the excitement and the bang-bang-bang from all the great spots, but when I watched it again I was surprised to find that I thought it was still as good.