Hunter's Torn Quad

I wonder if either of them will talk about Wesley Snipes not doing press for the movie anymore.

Here’s a novel concept: don’t insult the audience’s intelligence. The casual audience is smarter, not necessarily in terms of insider wrestling knowledge, but in terms of sensible and logical thinking, than a lot of people give them credit for. The casual fans will get into an angle if they can credibly suspend their disbelief and let themselves believe it. They know wrestling is not real, but, just as they know movies and tv shows are not real, they will still lose themselves in a storyline or angle if it’s believable. The difference between wrestling and movies or TV, though, and this is a difference that a lot of people don’t get, is there is a different internal logic in wrestling than in movies or TV. The Lita pregnancy angle didn’t get over, not only because it was something that just shouldn’t have been in wrestling (fans will not get into any angle that doesn’t ‘belong’), but also because it was filled with so many holes and logic gaps that it wasn’t even possible to suspend your disbelief, even if you wanted to. The Arab angle isn’t getting more than the standard “USA” chants because, for one, there is no backbone to it. Sure, Arab American have been discriminated against since 9/11, but has this Arab American been discriminated against ? We haven’t seen it if he has. It would be nice to have something that shows him being discriminated against, because so far, he just comes across as a moaning bitch, and that doesn’t get anything but the most limited of heat. In any event, I don’t think any angle that capitalizes on 9/11 would get over a lick, regardless of how well it was executed, simply because, once again, it doesn’t ‘belong’. If marks were still marks, they’d be disgusted with what happened, but not in the ‘right’ way. They wouldn’t want to tune in or spend money to see Snitsky get beat; they’d tune right out and wouldn’t pay one cent to see the guy. Why would they ? He just killed a baby, and, logically, would any mark spend money to see someone who had killed a baby ? And why would they feel for Kane’s loss ? He raped Lita. That’s one of the biggest holes in the entire deal; we’re meant to feel sorry for a rapist. That fact alone, that the rapist is being pushed as the face, is enough to make people unable to suspend their disbelief. Have you been to any events at all where a chant as started out small, then gotten huge ? Judging from that, I don’t think you have. If a section of fans, no matter how small, keep chanting something for long enough in a crowd like the one in MSG, rabid and wanting action during a match that is boring, then the chant will slowly begin to get picked up by the rest of the crowd. They might not know what’s behind the chant, and they might not even care, but with a match that is boring them silly, they’ll get behind the chant, just to get some excitement. There are less smart fans out there than you think. I keep trying to get the point across that they make up a tiny percentage of the audience out there, but it doesn’t seem to get through. There might be a lot of smart fans in terms of numbers, but as far as their total audience goes, they make up just a minute fraction. And that is why they were fad fans, and why they won’t come back. They were the crash TV type fans, looking for that immediate buzz of something cool happening right there and then, and weren’t the type to stick around for a long and intensive storyline. Don’t bother trying to get those fans back, because it isn’t going to happen. They tuned out long ago, and aren’t tuning back in. Chances are that any wrestling fan on the ‘net already knows about any one of a million wrestling news sites. And if they did, and went to that site religiously, then they’re into the product so much that they are no longer the fad fan that isn’t coming back. Actually, I said you can’t credit smarts to the wrestling boom. And you can’t. You seem to have this idea that smart fans were a creation of the Internet age, which just isn’t true. There were smart fans around long before the Internet came along. They just didn’t have a place online to congregate and share their views. They used newsletters for that. You can say that about any fan, regardless of their mark/smarkdom. If any fan, regardless of their level of inside knowledge, is loud and boisterous enough, they’ll leave an impression. You give way too much credit to the smart fans. That one was started, not only by smarts, but marks too, because Rocky was being shoved down their throats. People didn’t need to be smart to feel that he was getting push that they didn’t think he deserved. If you’re old enough to remember, check the reaction that Erick Watts got in WCW when his father was pushing him to the moon. WCW fans were still mostly marks back then, and even they knew when a guy was getting a push that he didn’t deserve and they didn’t think he warranted. They already talk about the product. And they do care about the show, when it’s good. Why are those points lost on you ? What will get the marks interested is a quality product, angles that don’t insult their intelligence and/or aren’t in bad taste, and people they can get behind and will pay money to see. You keep giving smart fans way too much credit, and I’m beginning to see why now. Which shows he already cares enough about the product to talk about it, something that you want to happen, but here it is, and you don’t seem to get that it is happening. There are so many faults with that idea. For one, if anyone did that to Hunter, they’d be fired right away. If they weren’t, then the smart fans that you seem hell bent on wanting to fool for no good reason, would think it was a work, and wouldn’t ‘believe it’, or wouldn’t care, because fake shoots lost their buzz long ago. Even if they were ‘fired’ to further the angle, for the angle to get over as a shoot means treating it in a way that wouldn’t get it over with the casual fans, and that doesn’t make the company any money with an angle that doesn’t get over to the casuals. And even assuming the angle is played out as a shoot, and does fool some smart fans, because it won’t fool them all, and they do want to see them wrestle, you’re still only fooling a small percentage of a segment of your audience that is very small to begin with, and whatever money you make from fooling them isn’t worth the time and energy that the whole angle used up. Angles and storylines don’t get over because they fool people, as much as they get over because are something that the fans, both casual and smart, are able and willing to let themselves suspend their disbelief over. Angles based solely on fooling people either don’t get over a lick, or get over to such a tiny degree that it’s a waste of time doing them in the first place.

I understand what you are saying but did you see this past Wrestlemania and how vocal that "small percentage of their audience" was during the Brock vs. Goldberg crapfest? I realize that we are talking a New York audience and that the Brock-leaving rumors did leak out to a few major newspapers leading into the show but I also believe that WWE under estimates the size of that "smart" audience. When I run into people that used to watch wrestling during the late 90's boom and no longer follow the product they aren't necessarily marks. They were on the net during the Monday Night Wars era. They were reading the insider wrestling columns that were popping up in regional newspapers at that time. They may still check out an online wrestling site from time to time to keep up with what's going on but they don't have the time or interest to watch the product. I think smarks grew out of the past wrestling boom more so than marks. They were the 80's kids that came back to the product when their childhood hero turned into a bad guy, a middle finger waving Stone Cold was beating up Vince McMahon, rumors about which WWF guy was going to join the NWO, DX, ECW, each show making shoot comments at the other and cruiserweight and hardcore action that was different than the wrestling they were bored with in the early 90's. I would agree that it's a smaller portion of their audience than the gullable marks but it's still a portion of the audience that deserves to have a bone thrown to them from time to time. Just say Brock really wasn't leaving for the NFL and it was just a storyline to play the media while giving the big lug a break. The media, Meltzer, etc. bought into it and Brock comes back at 2005's Mania. Is it a mistake for the company to devote time to have a few jollies at the expense of mainstream media, the Internet and "insider wrestling journalist"? It's the creative team being creative. The MSG chants weren't necessarily down to everyone being 'smart', as much as a small section of 'smart' fans started it, and it just caught on fire. I'm sure that 'smart' fans were the first ones to start the chanting, but the entire Garden wasn't made up of 'smart' fans, and I think a large portion of those chanting were doing it just because everyone else was. As for the fans from the MNW era, a lot of them were fad fans, and aren't going to come back, regardless of what WWE do. 'Smarks' were marks to begin with, and if they were into wrestling enough to become 'smarks', then I doubt they stopped being fans in the first place, so I think it's wrong to credit 'smarks' to the wrestling boom. It's stupid to devote that kind of energy into trying to fool a small percentage of the audience, when that segment of the audience is going to tune in anyway. What's the point in trying to fool the 'smarts' or Meltzer et al ? To prove it can be done ? Big whoop. Who gives a shit if it can be done ? They're going to tune in anyway. It's better to devote time and energy to trying to get the casual fans, who make up the vast bulk of the audience, to tune and pay money, rather than trying to fool the fans who will tune in regardless.

Then I see this: Tenzan pins Choshu Chono pins Choshu Choshu pins Tenzan Chono pins Choshu Chono pins Tenzan, and wins it. If it's non-title, it sets up Chono as the number one contender, and also sets Choshu up for a possible title shot.

If WWE changes plans because they get out on the 'net, then they're stupid, because the 'net makes up such a small percentage of their fanbase. By the same token, because the 'net and sheet reading fans make up such a small percentage of their audience, spending any time at all in trying to reduce whatever influence they have is stupid, because it won't have any affect at all on their business. Why make an ass out of Meltzer et al ? Assuming they ever do such a thing, the only thing it does is allow them to fool themselves into thinking they did something special by making a fool of the big names in inside reporting, when the only ones made a fool of are the people who actually spent time trying to mess with such a small segment of their audience, while neglecting the majority of their audience, just to get a few jollies.

I predict Hunter to win EC, with him getting involved in eliminating Batista in such a manner as to build towards a match between the two at WM XXI. I don't think Hunter v Orton is on the cards for WM XXI anymore, because everything on tv is building towards a Batista-Hunter split, and I think they'll face off at WM XXI, with Batista probably beating Hunter for the Raw title.

Meltzer would never knowingly run a story that was fake.

Trying to work the sheets is pointless, because it won't draw a dime. It doesn't mean people don't try it from time to time, just to try and get their jollies from it, but it doesn't draw one dime. Any effort spent trying to work the sheets, just for the jollies of trying to fool them or the fans that read them, who are usually the most ardent, should be spent on trying to produce a better product.

"SHE LIKES IT TONY, SHE LIKES IT!!!"

In the same vein, Hogan's loss the Warrior saw Hogan get over more than Warrior, who won the match. Instead of the focus being on Warrior pinning Hogan to win the WWF Title, all the attention was on Hogan being a gracious loser (and his actions after the match weren't entirely scripted, if you know what I mean), and Hogan gained more with the loss and how he handled it, leaving Warrior's big moment in the shadows.

If it's a series matches like the Misawa-Kobashi-Kawada deal from '97, then I think it'll go like this: Tenzan beats Choshu in a hard fought match Chono beats Tenzan, capitalizing on Tenzan's exhaustion from his match with Choshu. Chono will then beat Choshu, thus making him the number one contender for the IWGP Title, and setting him up for a title shot.

Armageddon was just an extended Smackdown, with nothing at all to make it seem special whatsoever. The only thing that I enjoyed was Funaki's upset win, which I happily marked out for. And while that was great fun, it wasn't enough to make Armageddon special, and within a few weeks, the whole event will have slipped from memory.

Maybe a tour of Japan is in the works.

I'll say 170,000 buys, and JBL pinning Booker to retain the title.

Raven kind of kills his point when using Ricky Morton's mic skills as part of his reasoning for the RnR's v MX being a big draw. 99.99% of the money Ricky Morton drew was because of what he did in the ring, and nothing to do with his mic skills, which even Ricky himself admits were never that good. Ricky Morton drew because he sold his ass off in the ring, and was such a great babyface, that he had fans jumping the rails to help him out. Ricky Morton didn't draw with his mic skills, so using that to promote mic skills is weak. Same thing with Shawn Michaels. His drawing power, was down to his charisma, personality and flamboyance, and nothing do with his mic skills, which were, at best, good, and then not often. If a guy can't talk, then give him someone to talk for him. You don't get anywhere by emphasising someone's weaknesses, and I'd have thought someone of Raven's intelligence would know that. Does that mean giving Ultimo a strong mouthpiece could make him a draw ? Maybe, maybe not, but unless you try, and not just with him but with anyone who can't talk, then you could be missing out on something. As for the TNA PPV poll, is it any wonder that the two most anticipated matches were the two matches given the most hype.

So, a wrestling promotion should move away from wrestling ? And they’ve been making less and less money, as opposed to more and more. The goal of wrestling is to make money. Building new stars is a key part of that, but it sometimes isn’t the primary part. And what is this mythical code of ‘ethnics’ you’re talking about ? If you’ve followed wrestling for any real length of time, you’d realise that it has no ethics. The fact that WWE’s newest heel act is exploiting 9/11 should tell you that. No one is saying the wrestlers have to be happy about a potential return for Brock. But if you need to get a boost, and a big one, and one that will definitely create interest, and make money, you welcome him back, regardless of any feelings that might get hurt. If the business only made money that could be made by not creating hard feelings, no money would get made. I’m not arguing that Brock didn’t handle his departure the wrong way; he did. I’m just not pissing and moaning like a lot of people over him making a choice he had the right to make. If anyone is being delusional, it’s the person talking about wrestling having ethics, and talking about things being reasonable within the wrestling business. Do you even have clue one about how the wrestling business works ? Or even how the WWF expanded its operations in the 80’s ? I’d hardly call what went down ‘reasonable’ Thank you for proving you don’t have a clue about wrestling. If handled right, and booked in a manner that can make money and build up someone for the future, then it’s reasonable to bring back any wrestler. And if a wrestling promoter wants to do that, build to the future, then sometimes he has to ruffle a few feathers in his locker room. Brock never ‘whined’ about the ropes hurting his ‘precious knees’. And by the way, it’s nice to know you care so much for the people busting their necks to entertain you. If Vince didn't want open up such a path to people refusing to job, etc, he would have kicked out practically every top star he’s ever had, as pretty much all of them over the years has refused to do a job at one time or another. I will correct you, because you are wrong. Lesnar’s beef was with being fed to Undertaker, and being made to look ineffective, as he’d not only be looking weak in the angles, he’d also be doing the clean jobs in the matches. With Holly, despite looking weak in some angles, he was still coming out on top with the clean wins in matches. And Brock’s problem wasn’t looking weak with either matches or angles but coming out on top in angles or matches, but in looking weak in both matches and angles.

And it's all over, at last. From the commentary, Williams' corner should have pulled him out of the fight a couple of rounds ago. Williams was totally out of his league here, and got exposed as a mediocre fighter.

I'm listening to it online, and Williams is getting the shit beaten out of him. Vital is owning Williams.

Anywhere online to see this ?

Neidhart was being released, so they wanted the tag titles off of the HF. The decision to let him go was changed, so the title change was nixed, and they explained the ropes breaking up to explain to the fans who did see the match why the titles didn't change hands. It's called attention to detail, and that such an important thing is being critcised is sad.

And if you want to see what someone pushing themselves too far does, take a look at Kurt Angle's arms on SD. Those things freaked me out. It's great that Angle has so much drive, but to do that kind of damage to himself ? No thanks. But of course, I'm sure that doesn't matter to people who just want Angle to come out each week to entertain them.

ROH returned to the Rex Plex in Elizabeth for the no time limit Samoa Joe vs. CM. Punk match stemming from their 60:00 draws in Dayton and Chicago. They drew 750 fans, with Joe retaining the title in 31:33 via submission with a choke. A lot of people were expecting both a title change and another 60-minute match, so they weren't ready for the finish, but it was another great match with great reactions. It also hurt that Joe and Punk didn't even get into the ring until 11:40 p.m. Punk was busted open early and bled heavily. The match had the same super heat as the prior match. After winning, Joe challenged Mick Foley (who was advertised as attending but didn't, and it was said he was making an appearance at a hockey game), to come to the next ROH show and come face-to-face with him. Ricky Steamboat ripped on Foley for not being there (he wasn't scheduled as he had an appearance scheduled at a minor league hockey game). The Bobby Heenan-Jim Cornette debate saw Cornette at first put Heenan over, but then turned heel on him, saying he's sick and tired of being told for his entire life that he was the second best manager of all-time, but he wasn't as good as Heenan. Comette said ROH had felt like home to him, and Heenan coming in ruined it for him. He even said that even though the WWF. WCW and cancer couldn’t kill Heenan (that's actually a funny line), that he wished Heenan would drop dead. Jack Evans and Roderick Strong went after Heenan, but Colt Cabana and Jimmy Jacobs made the save. The segment was said to have been tremendous. Fans gave Cornette and Heenan standing ovations when they came out. The whole segment went 16:00. This led to a tag match where Heenan managed Cabana & Jacobs and Comette managed Evans & Strong. Cabana & Jacobs won, and at the end, Comette, who had hit Cabana with the tennis racquet, had the racquet taken away by Heenan, who used it on Comette. Cornette bumped like crazy for Heenan. The crowd loved seeing this, which was the first match ever where Heenan and Cornette were involved in the same match. Cornette's work at ringside was said to have been unbelievable by people who never saw him live in his heyday (and even by those who had). The semifinal saw Bryan Danielson beat Homicide in 25:29 of a great match. The entire Rottweiler group (Homicide, Low Ki, and the Havana Pitbulls) all attacked and beat down Danielson. They did a unique finish in the Pure title match, as both champ John Walters and Jimmy Rave had run out of rope breaks (three allowed each). Walters got Rave in the sharpshooter. Rave made the ropes, but it meant nothing. Rave then pulled himself out of the ring, but Walters kept the hold on. The ref counted both men out, but Walters released the hold and jumped into the ring to beat the 20 count and retain the title. Low Ki and Austin Aries did a 20:00 draw. Gary Cappetta then announced, as the crowd chanted for five more minutes, that ROH management approved five more minutes. Low Ki then walked off. Crowd hated this, and some blamed it for killing the next match, where Ricky Reyes & Rocky Romero kept the tag titles over Nigel McGuiness & Chad Collyer in a good match with no crowd reactions. Slash Venom from Puerto Rico, who is also known as Flash Flanagan, worked the second match under a mask using the name Weapons of Mass Destruction, managed by Prince Nana, putting over Jay Lethal. Crowd wasn’t into the first half of the show, but largely was into the latter half and super into Punk vs. Joe. Next show is 12/26 in Philadelphia with Steamboat and Foley continuing their angle, plus Joe vs. Aries for the title and Low Ki vs. Danielson. While not confirmed, they are trying to get Spanky to return for the 1/15 Boston date. From this weeks WO

Another Brock Lesnar topic, and another series of comments from people who either have no clue about what they’re talking about, or are incredibly selfish and don’t give a shit about anything but their own pleasure. Do you people have a clue about Lesnar, or his passion or his ability or what he’s risked just to entertain you ? Clearly, many of you don’t know or don’t care about that, and just want Brock to do whatever it takes to entertain you, regardless of what he wants to do, and regardless of the risks involved. Seeing as this thread is filled with idiocy and selfishness, let’s go through some of the ‘best’ of the bunch: Other people have pointed out the stupidity in jobbing Lesnar out the minute he comes back, so we don’t need to go over that again. Suffice to say, the object of the wrestling business, and it is a business, is to make money, and you don’t make money by having someone who can make money if he’s treated as a threat treated like a joke. And money, clueless one, is what gives a wrestling promotion its future, because without it, it has none. And we’ve seen what happens when WWE ‘makes an example of’; it invariably hurts business. Do you want that ? Or do you even care ? This one is rich in idiocy: Lesnar can do an SSP. So he’s just supposed to continue to damage his knees and lose future mobility because ? You want him to keep coming out week after week to give you your jollies ? Get a grip you idiot. Why should he be humiliated when such a practice invariably hurts business ? Lesnar has earned his dues, and if you had clue one about what he’s been through, you’d realise that. Yes, fuck a guy who can make the company a ton of money. Much better that he be humiliated and embarrassed so you can get your jollies. Idiot. The roster won’t revolt. They might not like Lesnar coming back and getting a huge push, but if they care about their long-term future, and most of them do, they’ll suck it up, and realise such a push could put money in their pockets that currently isn’t there. No, the best thing to do is push him to the moon from the get go, and after a while, then slowly begin to have him show weakness. Cutting his legs out from under him right away is death as far as being a big money player. The only thing he did wrong was not giving enough notice so that he could put someone over on the way out. Other than that, I have no complaints. What’s he meant to do ? Keep doing something he hates just to entertain you ? He did the SSP flawlessly in OVW, but didn’t do in WWE bar WM XIX because he didn’t need to, and because it was just doing too much damage to his knees. Is he meant to keep doing it just because you get a kick out of it ? Because it entertains you ? And is he supposed to just keep dealing with that pain when he doesn’t have to ? If he can go out there and work **** matches without doing damage to his knees with the SSP, then he shouldn’t have to. You expect more out of a wrestler ? Seems like you expect him to not give a shit about his short-term or long-term welfare just to entertain you, which this comment bears out: Brock has great offence, bumps like crazy for a man his size, has great agility, and is darn good on the mic. He’s more than average. Way more than average. Brock was more than good enough to carry his end of all of his good matches. So, you’d rather piss away the money he could make just to placate a bunch of ego’s, who, incidentally, will make a lot less money without a big push for Brock ? It’s pretty obvious that a lot of the hate for Brock doesn’t come from any rational thought, or careful evaluation of the facts, but rather from the fact that Brock didn’t want to do something he hated just to entertain a bunch of ingrates, who clearly don’t care about anything but their own immediate gratification. Do you really know what he gave up ? He gave up a high six-figure to low seven-figure income, guaranteed, to make about a tenth of that. He might have made something approaching that, but not for a few years, and only if he really hit it big. Would any of you give that up to do something you cared about more, but paid a whole lot less ? And look at what the guy risked for you people. He came damn close to killing himself for your pleasure and enjoyment, and all you can do is piss and moan about him ‘turning his back’. The only ones turning their backs are the people who are selfishly criticising Brock for following his dream, just because it didn’t involve entertaining them. I hope whatever Brock does makes him happy, and if that means doing something that doesn’t involve risking his neck, literally, to entertain me, then so be it.

With much of the talent recognizing the straits the company is really in, the TNA promotion pulled off one of the best PPV shows in wrestling history on 12/5 in Orlando, paced by an off-the-charts cage match with AMW vs. XXX wife the losing team having to break up. The show featured a spot that I pray is never done again, but will be perhaps the most memorable spot of the year, when Elix Skipper walked the top of the cage and gave a hurracanrana to Chris Harris back into the ring. What was scariest of all is that Skipper stumbled and had a hard time getting balance on top of the cage before he did the tightrope walk. He's done the rope walk hurracanrana in the past, but has slipped doing it on occasion. Even on the top rope, a slip to the floor has its risks. On the top of the cage, a slip could have meant paralysis or death, and it’s just not worth it. Apparently the wrestlers had talked about the spot beforehand, and it was tentatively in the match, but there was talk of not doing it, both due to risk, and if Skipper felt he was tired from 20 minutes of wrestling to where it wouldn't be a good idea. Rhodes booked the match for 25:00 (it actually went 21:01), and noted that it would be either be a classic or a disaster, and it was sink or swim for four guys who had a bad match on the PPV a month earlier. Fans live at Universal Studios gave both teams a lengthy standing ovation after a match that actually lived up to the standards set in the most famous match ever with the same stipulations, the 1983 Ricky Steamboat & Jay Youngblood win over Sgt. Slaughter & Don Kernodle for the NWA tag team titles, which was one of the biggest matches in the history of Carolinas wrestling. But it was hardly a one-match show, as there were only two bad matches. Unfortunately, the worst was the main event. In what turned out to be the smartest move of the night, new booker Dusty Rhodes put the cage match on last, as reversing it would have led to a flat finish of the show. The 1-2 punch of the cage match and the Petey Williams vs. Chris Sabin X Division match and this one were every bit as good as the top two matches at Backlash for WWE in April (Mick Foley vs. Randy Orton hardcore match and HHH vs. Shawn Michaels vs. Chris Benoit rematch). And this show blew away every PPV offering WWE has done since that time. While Rhodes' first show as head booker, if that s even the correct title, was a success, it was also noted that this show itself, as far as The key matches, were all booked by Dutch Mantel and Jeff Jarrett before The change. Right now there is an interesting company dynamic because Jarrett is already back as a key player in booking, if he ever really left. While Rhodes is the boss, and made it clear to everyone, Jarrett and Mantel are still in the game, and allies with each other. There was second-guessing of future plans, in particular Rhodes' idea to change the 1/16 main event from Jarrett defending against DDP to Jarrett against Randy Savage. The arguments, naturally, are that Savage is a far bigger name than DDP so it should draw more. The negative is the company was aware just how much of a joke Savage is at this stage, to the point they hid him with a kidnapping angle and only had him run-in for the finish, in street clothes including a long sleeve shirt. He's so physically limited that his pinfall over Jarrett to earn the title shot was on a blocked sunset flip, and simply, one punch from that position. To anyone who saw the show, even with Mike Tenay emphasizing that he pinned the champ and deserved the next shot, the idea of a Jarrett vs. Savage main event (which Jarrett himself was originally in favor of, for obvious reasons, since in his eyes, he gets a win over Savage provided Savage is agreeable to that finish) is nothing anyone would want to see., and the thought of Jarrett having to carry him to a credible world title match is a scary thought. Jarrett vs. DDP has no box office either, but at least it would be a good match. Of course, what ended up happening made it a moot point, as Savage once again walked out of the tapings on 12/7 in Orlando, where an angle was scheduled with Jarrett, Savage and Rhodes where Rhodes would announce the main event. The word was, when talking over the idea of the 1/16 title match, Savage refused to do the job when he found out that was the plan, and left again. Quite frankly, it serves them right because the result of the title match should have been told to Savage, and they should have something on paper with him so they could take legal recourse for screwing up their storylines, before they ever put him over on the show. Savage is not the bad guy here because he made it clear when he first was coming in that he wasn't going to put Jarrett over. Then, they booked his win knowing he'd already made that clear, and then were mad when he said it again. Instead, Jarrett and Rhodes did a confrontation, but Savage's name was never mentioned, nor was a main event announced, probably to avoid them committing to something in case Savage had a change of heart like the last time he walked out of a taping, and was back in the fold a few days later. There was no indication they'd come up with a new direction, although Hector Garza got a surprising megapush, pinning A.J. Styles on one hour of TV7 and then having Jarrett beat when Hall & Nash interfered on the second hour. They also could have gone to the Monty Brown, who was the idea for the main event on the December and January shows in booking plans a few-months ago, since DDP was already programmed for 1/16 with Erik Watts. Also planned for 1/16 are Harris & Storm challenging new NWA tag champs Eric Young & Bobby Roode of Team Canada. When Harris & Storm signed their new contract, one of the things promised them was a tag title run in the near future. Apparently they were led to believe they'd also get the title win over Scott Hall & Kevin Nash, who would beat 3 Live Kru. As it turned out, that isn’t what happened, and it would have been hard to believe it would turn out like that. There will also be an Ultimate X match with champ Petey Williams against A.J. Styles and Chris Sabin. While Ultimate X is TNA's best invention, they are coming off doing one on 11/10 on the BDSSP special. The match will be great but they've destroyed the novelty of the match by doing it so often. The show drew 650-700 fans. It looked full on television, except in the comers. The company was expecting 500 troops to come in from MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, and fill out the other 200 slots with the local die-hards. The company never pushed the PPV locally or even that hard at the tapings because they figured they would have to turn people away even without promotion, due to limited availability. Unlike the Victory Road show four weeks earlier, this was a free ticket. The bomb dropped was when only 40 or so troops ended up coming, but they were lucky that enough fans came, and those who came were super enthusiastic. In many ways, this PPV was reminiscent of The legend of ECW, with the small but rabid fan base, and the wrestlers who knew the company was in trouble and went that extra length to put on memorable matches. Our response level was down 29% from the Victory Road show four weeks earlier. If that show did 35,000 buys, which is the current estimate, then you could probably make an early prediction in the 25,000 range for this show. The show was also filled with comedy knocks at WWE. They had a guy (ring announcer Tim Welch) dressed up as Vince McMahon, coming in a limo with a supposed HHH (Johnny Devine of Team Canada) with a wig and sledge hammer. These were reminiscent of the Billionaire Ted skits that WWE put on its show when it was losing the TV wrestling war to WCW. They had Abyss bring the supposed Vince, called Vince McDaddy, with the water spitting guy using an HHH voice as his useless son. They had the Vince character wanting to see Dusty Rhodes immediately, but Rhodes blowing him off. It ended up with the HHH character getting a videotape and smashing it with his sledge hammer, only to find out it was a "Best of D-Ray 3000"tape. Vince later was mad there wasn't catered food, saying he needed protein every three hours, meat, fish, lobster, and then got mad when Tracy Brooks brought him a batch of cookies, and threw them on the floor. The skits concluded with Teo the midget beating up Vince, who aghast screamed that he would sue and as he was writhing in pain, said, "Where's my son-in-law, that idiot." He ended up being taken to the hospital. HHH wasn’t there, because he was at the gym. They eventually showed the relatively innocuous and almost useless footage they took a few weeks back when WWE shot its Royal Rumble commercial at Universal Studios in Orlando. Luckily, due to 3 Live Kru making jokes about stealing the WWE's catered Mahi-Mahi, it wasn’t a complete dud. They digitised the faces out, to avoid the threatened lawsuit, of bo1h Luther Reigns and Rev Mysterio. Mysterio and Konnan have been best friends dating back to the late 80s when they trained together under Mysterio's uncle in Tijuana, and were acting like best friends while B.G. James joked that Mysterio being nice to them is a firing offence. While Reigns' voice was a giveaway, ifs doubtful almost anyone would know he was there. With Mysterio, with his voice, and his arm tattoo, let alone how many 5-2 wrestlers there are in WWE, it was obvious. Overall, the skits were a lot funnier than most of the Billionaire Ted stuff, and even much of the ECW parodies on the big companies that were done in the 90s. When it was over, Mike Tenay made a joke about the threatened lawsuit saying ifs not like we brought a tank to their headquarters (in reference to DX coming to the WCW' headquarters in Smyrna, GA, and to CNN Center in 1998 skits). A: Andy Douglas & Chase Stevens beat Mikey Batts & Jerrelle Clark in a dark match when Batts was pinned after the Natural Disaster. 1) Eric Young & Bobby Roode as Team Canada beat B.G. James & Ron Killings, as 3 Live Kru (Konnan was working the AAA big show at the same time in Naucalpan, Mexico) to win the NWA tag titles in 8:30. Team Canada did a good job of bumping here. Most of the match was getting heat on Killings to set up James for the hot tag. He had the match won, but Scott D'Amore distracted ref Rudy Charles, who missed the count. With the ref distracted. Johnny Devine returned and hit James with a hockey stick and Roode got the pin. Fast-paced match. **1/4 2) Hector Garza & Sonny Siaki & Sonjay Dutt beat Michael Shane & Frankie Kazarian & Kid Kash in 11:01. This match was a total sprint of high spots, but it's what people wanted out of the match. Smartly, Siaki did almost nothing. Garza tried a monkey flip, slipped, and nearly landed on his head. That was the big snafu and brought brief you f-d up chants from what was clearly an ECW/ROH inspired crowd. It’s great because it meant the enthusiasm was so high, but bad because it also meant casual fans don’t have interest or knowledge of the product. Most of the match saw the heels work on Dutt’s injured left elbow. Garza got the hot tag and did a picture perfect moonsault on Kazarian for a near fall. About the only thing Siaki did was throw Dutt over the top for him to do a flip dive on the floor. Garza pinned Kazarian after a tornillo. ***l/4 3) Monty Brown beat Abyss in 12:17 in a Serengeti Survival match. Rules were you could win via pin, submission, or slamming your opponent into thumb tacks. Brown in a promo called Abyss, "Obese." Abyss went for an Earthquake sitting splash on Brown, who was laying on a chair, but Brown got the chair and smashed it to Abyss' groin. I wonder if TNA folds, if John Laurinaitis even has a clue who Brown is. Brown used an Oklahoma stampede on a chair. Abyss side stepped the pounce period, and used a black hole slam, but Brown kicked out. Brown ended up giving Abyss the pounce period sending him to the floor. Brown set up a table, but ended up going through it when Abyss sidestepped him. Abyss and Brown each pulled out bags of thumb tacks at the same time and filled the ring. Abyss then took off his leather vest, revealing his physique, and if you saw this, you'd realize he just took $80,000 off his annual WWE downside guarantee by trying to prove to people that he'd take the thumb tacks on his back rather than throw his shirt. His physique looked like a guy who had never trained a day in his life. Not that it should matter, but his possible next employers are such marks for bodies, and we are years past anyone giving a rat’s ass about being tough enough to take a slam on thumb tacks. Brown blocked Abyss and slammed him down with a spinebuster to win. **3/4 4) Johnny B. Badd & Pat Kenney beat Glenn Gilberti & Johnny Swinger in 7:50. Remember when Kenney, Gilberti and Swinger were all taken off TV to be repackaged? So they came back, as the exact same people except they gave Kenney an "Empire Saint" nickname that they do nothing to push him as being different(not even a new costume, for God's sake) instead of making him the brunt of third grade Irish jokes. This was supposed to be a six-person tag with Jacqueline Moore and Trinity and was not advertised on the show, so nobody cared about it. They hadn’t even run any angles to set these four up in a program and Moore hadn’t done any TV since the last PPV. Trinity called a few days before the show and told the office 1hat she had gotten a movie role (doing stunts for Steven Spielberg's remake of "War of the World's") and couldn’t do the PPV. Since the show was already written, They were pissed at her for the decision. The instructions were to act as if she didn’t exist, and at this point there are no plans to use her again. Moore ended up being the ref, wearing her old WWE ref outfit. Finish saw Jacqueline bodyslam Gilberti and Badd pin him after a TKO. *1/4 5) DDP pinned Raven in some sort of a no DQ match, since there was interference everywhere and nothing was called in 12:03. They had a good match, but in their fear of not having one, so badly overbooked it that they took a lot away from it at the finish. At one point, DDP nailed ref Rudy Charles with a high kick. They went outside the ring with Page hitting Raven with a garbage can and a lid. Raven came back with a shot with his war helmet for a near fall and his drop toe hold on the chair spot. Raven used a low blow and small package for a near fell. Raven kicked out of the diamond cutter. Two masked guys in hoods came out. Erik Watts, who was doing commentary as a babyface, protested it was unfair. He choke slammed bo1h,and then, naturally, and this was so pathetic because it was a needless swerve that everyone in the building could see, turned on DDP and clotheslined him. He went for the choke slam, but DDP gave him a low blow. So not only was the turn transparent, but it made no difference because it didn’t even cost DDP the match. DDP used a diamond cutter on Watts, another low blow to Raven, and a third diamond cutter to win the match. The bout was considerably better than it reads, as it was Raven's best match in a long time until they got so cute that the finish was one of those fuzzy things that meant nothing. ***1/4 6) Petey Williams retained the X Title pinning Chris Sabin in 18:11. Just a super match with off the charts heat. People were screaming "Let's go Sabin" alternated with "Lets go Petey." Williams did a plancha into a hurracanrana on the floor. Sabin power bombed Williams into the guard rail. I hope they retire that spot. Big moves, near falls and innovative spots like Williams doing a mid-air spin into a Russian leg sweep. Sabin did a flip dive. They even did the Frye-Takayama holding and punching spot. Scott D’Amore kept interfering. With D'Amore distracting the ref, Williams pulled out Brass Knux for the pin. **** 7) Jeff Hardy & A. J. Styles & Randy Savage beat Kevin Nash & Scott Hall & Jeff Jarrett in 17:52. Nash & Hall & Jarrett before the show, being that they’re the Kings of Wrestling, dressed up like Elvis in jumpsuits and Elvis wigs. They also did this angle where a car drove away, and they acted as if they had beaten up Savage, threw him in a car and he was kidnapped. It was actually because Savage couldn't wrestle and they were trying to hide the fact. So when the match began, it was a 2-on-3. Hall & Nash wore the jumpsuits. So they looked like giant clowns. The jumpsuits were to hide their physiques (although Nash is in great cosmetic shape for his age), but it couldn’t hide their faces, as both, particularly Hall, have aged greatly. Hall looked like an aging wino, which is what he is. Nash, because of his grey hair, looked like a 55-year-old former NBA player like Phil Jackson or someone. They even came out to the old Flying Elvises theme music. Hall tried, but it was like an out of shape guy trying to keep up. Jarrett and Styles were there to carry the match. Styles worked for five people, but that wasn’t enough, although the match was more than decent when he was in, and that was most of the way. He made a cold tag to Hardy and the match fell apart from there. Hardy had Hall pinned when Nash pulled ref Andrew Thomas out of the ring. Hall hit Hardy with a guitar shot. Savage finally showed up and he made Hall & Nash look youthful. Backstage I was told Savage looked 100 years old. I thought on TV he didn't look more than a day over 60, although he did look older then Lou Thesz did when I saw him at a show in 1996 when Lou was 80. Savage threw a few punches and put Jarrett in a sleeper. Jarrett tried a sunset flip; Savage blocked it, punched Jarrett to the head, and got the pin. * 8) Chris Harris & James Storm beat Elix Skipper & Christopher Daniels in a losing team must split up forever "Six Sides of Steel" cage match in 21:01. Daniels juiced heavy after being slingshotted into me cage. They got handcuffs on Harris and proceeded to beat the hell out of Storm. XXX used the old Demolition finish on Storm for a near fall. Storm got the key and unlocked his partner. Harris juiced. AMW did 80s WWF tag team finishes like the Rockerplex and the Hart attack. XXX used AMW’s death sentence on Harris for a near fall. Storm power bombed Skipper while standing on the top rope while Skipper was sitting on the cage. There was a tower of doom spot where everyone took a huge bump that had the crowd going crazy. There was Skipper doing the ropewalk hurracanrana off the top of the cage. The crowd started chanting "Best match ever" while Mike Tenay acted like we were seeing history in one of the greatest cage matches of all-time, and that wasn't even a stretch by this point. The match ended with AMW putting Daniels in handcuffs and doing the powerplex XXX finisher on Daniels and Storm got the pin. The crowd gave both teams a standing ovation at the finish for several minutes. The heel dressing room then came out and gave a standing ovation to XXX as they got up to leave. This match blew away the match they had 17 months ago, and that may have been the best match in TNA history. There is little question in my mind this match now has those honors. ****3/4 ---- ---- ---- Jerry Jarrett and Bob Carter met in Nashville this past week with Jarrett trying to propose a new budget that would greatly cut back on costs in order to convince Carter to say in for the long haul. The company was happy with how the PPV did, which was a positive. They are claiming they have confirmed agreements for $3 million in ad sales for 2005, which, with other cutbacks, could see the company break even at 45,000 to 50,000 PPV buys per month, although that’s still going to be a very difficult figure for them to average monthly. But a $3 million figure sounds suspiciously unrealistic, like the ad revenue companies like World Class, Crockett and Watts expected to be able to sell given their ratings, but later found out that because they were wrestling, they couldn’t get ad buyers to pay the rates their ratings would seem to deserve, and ended up getting deep in debt because they were expecting that revenue. Most syndicated TV shows really cant make big money in ad sales until they hit the 2.0 rating mark. ECW didn’t make one-fifth of that in ad sales, and they had far stronger syndication and roughly five times the cable ratings of TNA. WWE will do maybe $40 million in ad sales this year. TNA's ad sales up to this point have been negligible. While they don’t get to sell Smackdown because of the UPN contract, that's still Raw, Velocity, Experience, Heat and syndication which combine to 6.14 ratings points last week not including syndication(admittedly that was a better man usual week, but 5.2 plus whatever syndication brings is a low end average). TNA right now averages about a 0.18, plus whatever Xplosion brings in (probably next to nothing) or maybe 30 times lower, plus WWE is a marquee name brand and TNA is unproven. While TNA wont be getting the 8pm. Monday night BDSSP weekly tie-in show they were hoping for, since the ratings didn’t come in they needed, they are talking with Fox Sports Net about doing some prime time specials on the show. Even with the exposure coming out of the first show, the buy rate appears to be, well down for the second show, and that’s with a good first Sunday PPV. The January show will be interesting because you really can't expect to ever have a better PPV show then they did this past weekend. If buys don’t increase, then good quality PPV shows cant save the company by itself. Among the things being talked about now are to move the Friday Impact show from 3 p.m. to 4pm., which is slightly better, but really only slightly, as well as adding a Saturday midnight replay show, and adding Xplosion in a weekday afternoon time slot. If FSN gives them the slots, they are okay, but if they are paying extra for the additional slots, and I'm presuming that would be the case, the extra expense is nothing they are going to make back through advertising. They are also trying to come up with celebrity involvement ideas, since WWE was put on the mainstream map by Mr. T and Cyndi Lauper, and Mike Tyson was the catalyst of its biggest period in history. Of course, celebrities also in the long run hurt WCW more than helped them, so ifs hardly a guarantee. . . A funny story is, DDP is earning more money with TNA than he ever earned in WWE. . . Larry Zbyszko was upset because he wasn’t booked for either the PPV or TV taping this week. While he hasn't been on TV every show, he had been booked regularly since he lives in Jacksonville and ifs an easy drive. If you remember back to the interview in Orlando when Rhodes & Zbyszko were together and Zbyszko did a far better promo, upstaged him, and Rhodes pitched a fit about it, well if Zbyszko knew Rhodes would be booker in a few months, I guess he could have tanked his promo. For whatever this is worth, Rhodes was told he has six months to turn things around. Jeff Jarrett did one hell of a job in his TV bout for the NWA title with Monty Brown. It was the best match I've ever seen Brown in, and while Brown deserves the credit, you could really see Jarrett’s ability here, as they went 13:02, and if anything, it was too short rather than too long, and that’s saying a lot when we’ve never seen Brown in a good match past 7:00. Perhaps removing all the stress and time from booking and running things will get his work back to what it once was. He still needs to lose the title far worse than he can understand, but that’s a different issue. Crowd heat was tremendous, although that was a hot crowd even for a lousy Scott Hall vs. A.J. Styles match the week before, and the freebies in Orlando are getting very ROHish as in this match there were the alternating "Let's Go Jarrett" and "Let1 s Go Monty" chants, just like last week. The problem, and this won't be solved because Rhodes is the booker and people are so entrenched with how they used to do things to not realize people groan at the overdone stuff that used to work, is the match was just awesome until the ref bump. Then you had Jarrett use a guitar shot that Brown no-sold, which was a great spot because people are sick of the guitar finish. Then, Brown kicked out of the stroke and gave Hall the pounce. But that gave Jarrett the chance to hit Brown with a hard chair to the back and another to the head and get the pin. That finish undid his no selling of the guitar, which should have been an angle onto itself. Plus, when it was over, instead of having the emotion of it being a great match, that emotion was killed the minute the ref went down from the awful bump, and the emotion was "same old, same old" non-creative rerun. There is still talk of putting the title on Brown, as Rhodes likes him, and possibly going with Jarrett vs. Brown in February. But Jarrett and Brown had built such a hot crowd and damn good match where people actually cared about the title, and then they ruined it and in the end it had no impact other than a lot of insiders raised their stock on Brown quite a bit as far as future potential... The plan for Jim Mitchell and Abyss, which appears to be out the window again, was for Mitchell to play the role of a 60s circus carnival barker with a top hat and cane having a booth with "The Monster Abyss" all chained up behind the curtain. The idea was silly enough to promote as a new heel in the 80s for Hulk Hogan, but if s pretty much ludicrous for a character who has been a part of the TV show two years. That was largely the consensus among people who saw the top hat he was told to buy and he was asking around if it looked too campy. Mitchell told people he couldn’t understand why he couldn’t just manage Abyss as himself. At the last taping, with Rhodes having taken over as booker, Mitchell was told there were no plans for him. He wasn’t happy since he took a day off of work to come to the taping and then didn’t get paid since he wasn’t used. So the angle started looks to have already been dropped. The big emotional high coming off the PPV was already gone in a lot of wrestlers by the 12/7 tapings. A lot of wrestlers are coming to grips with the idea there is a solid chance this thing may not be around much longer. What hit home was doing two weeks of TV, and to save money, key people like 3 Live Kru, Sabin (who was scheduled for one of the big matches on the show), Sonjay Dutt, Pat Kenney and Abyss were all flown home, even though they wouldn't even have to fly them in, since there were either no plans for them or to cut costs. There were people, like Johnny Devine, Eric Young and Petey Williams, who also weren't booked to wrestle on TV, but at least stayed to do promos. We didn’t get much info at press time on the tapings, other than they had about 500 or so people there for the first hour, but lots of people left early. There were tons of empties sections right in front of the cameras by the second show, and they didn’t even take the time to move the crowd around so it would look good, which even WCW used to do. Besides the Garza push, to nobody's surprise, Dustin Rhodes was in with a big push. That led to a funny store that wouldn’t be evident. Rhodes was doing an interview and went way long. The woman floor director was giving him the signal to wrap it up, since it was going forever and he wasn’t saying much. He wasn’t wrapping it up and she was very expressive behind the camera that he should. Jeremy Borash ran out and told the floor director that this was the hooker's son and if he wants to go long, you don’t distract him. Spanky was also there, but wasn't used. Swinger and Gilberti were used as singles jobbers for Dustin Rhodes and Monty Brown respectively. Brown pounced Gilbert in seconds. . . Johnny Devine is back in the ring as well after being stabbed, with his first match back scheduled for 12/8 in Nashville working for USA Championship Wrestling in Nashville, as a tag team with Cassidy Reilly as the new Hotshots. . . Regarding Petey Williams and the Canadian Destroyer move, Amazing Red actually did a running version of the move on a 2002 ROH show is Wakefield, MA, so he did use it before Williams came to TNA.

The 4/4 Raw show the day after WrestleMania at the Staples Center in Los Angeles is almost sold out. The only seats left are in the $35 (nosebleed) price range. It will end up being the earliest advanced sellout ever for a Raw show, but that's meaningless because it's also the earliest in history before an event Raw tickets were ever put on sale. . . .An update on Dwayne Johnson, who is still in Prague, Czechoslovakia filming a movie. He is planning on wrestling at WrestleMania in Los Angeles and hopes the company comes up with a good storyline for his return. He's been studying 70s and 80s wrestling videotapes during his down time, in particular the old Memphis, Dallas and Portland territories. "I absolutely love it," he said. "The ideas I'm getting from them are amazing. Creativity plus simplicity (for the fans to easily absorb) plus passion equals success. . . It should be mandatory for the boys to watch (70s and 80s tapes from all over the world). They have no idea how much that would help them. When the babyfaces sold, the people felt it. When the heels got heat, the people believed it." He returns to the U.S. in January after this current movie finishes up. He'll spend February promoting "Be Cool" with John Travolta and Uma Thurman. He's working on a daily for a Sony movie that he'd start shooting in May, and has a finalized deal for a big movie this summer... The 1/1 date for the ECW DVD version of the PPV may significantly hurt DVD sales. The PPV will be just under two hours edited down from the three hour DVD, but the key is, with so many stores backlogged getting copies, and even amazon.com backlogged to the point they are expecting delivery after Christmas, this may be the case where, for the first time, a lot of people will have access to the PPV of the DVD before even having a chance to get a copy of the DVD. .. The "Theme Addict" CD with all the new company entrance music songs debuted at No. 38 on the Billboard charts, with 35,952 sales. That was well under predictions of a 45,000 first week. It fell to No. 131, with sales of 14,888 during its second week. That number was a disaster. The record business was up 20% during that second week due to it being Thanksgiving weekend, one of the best weekends of business for the year, however this CD dropped 59% at the same time. Compared to previous WWE theme song CD's, this is alarmingly behind even the worst standards.. . Jesus was injured on the 12/6 Johnson City show, with either a strained abdominal muscle or a groin pull. He was wrestling Haas. He went for a running kick into the corner and somehow his foot got hung up and he went down. He couldn't move. Haas went for a springboard moonsault off the middle rope and Jesus stuck his knees up and rolled over for the pin. Jesus couldn't get up after the match. Nick Patrick, Fit Finlay and other agents came out. It was several minutes before they could get him out of the ring. He was protected at TV and didn't wrestle a match, but he's expected to work the PPV. . . The complete Armageddon line-up for 12/12: JBL vs. Undertaker vs. Booker vs. Guerrero for the title. Guerrero should win, but that doesn't seem likely to happen. People at the shows the past few weeks have noted how Guerrero is by far the most popular wrestler on either brand right now, even though he's gotten a mid-card push. Also, he's the only drawing card in the company, as even in the Carolinas and Georgia at house shows, people have noted that they've never seen so many Hispanics at wrestling shows in that part of the country. Smackdown is also outdrawing Raw in that part of the country and there is no logical reason for that to happen. Guerrero selling tickets won't last forever as at some point, fans will lose patience unless he's portrayed as more of a top guy. Also, Cena vs. Carlito in a street fight, RVD & Mysterio defending the tag titles (which they strangely won on TV on 12/7 in Greenville before the expected PPV change) against Suzuki & Dupree, Puder vs. Mizanin in a boxing match (this is a shoot match, but the only way Mizanin has a chance is if there is divine intervention), Show vs. Angle & Jindrak & Reigns in a 3-on-l, Jackie vs. Dawn with Haas as ref (this match has been stinking up the house shows) and Spike vs. Funaki for the cruiserweight title. .. On the boxing match, as much as Mizanin has made himself into a heel to where most viewers will be glad to see him take a beating from Puder, I hate the idea. I don’t hate the idea of a shoot on a wrestling show, because in this instance, its fine, because its been built up for eight weeks and people should care. I actually think more people care about that match than anything but the main event, and in some circles, more than the main event. But boxing, and all forms of fighting, are serious business. If you put trained fighters against each other, well, they know what they are doing and it is their sport. Even then, people always get hurt, but to me, that's a part of the sport, just like in football or any sport where there are going to be injuries from full contact. But a fighting combat sport is not for untrained individuals, or in this case, an untrained person against a real fighter. Puder is not a great boxer. Boxing is the weakest part of his game. But he has boxed amateur and his MMA training consists of kickboxing training, under world champion Javier Mendez and Frank Shamrock among others. Ifs not boxing, but it is at least training in punching people out. This is every bit as bad as Mike Bernardo vs. Bobby Oregon in K-l, or maybe worse. At least that fight is MMA, and if Oregon can take Bernardo down, Bernardo is nothing on the ground. Of course, Bernardo hits much harder than Puder, but Oregon has trained for years in kickboxing even though he's never fought and taking on an experienced pro. Mizanin got beat up on "Real World' by some guy who was not even a fighter or even a big or tough guy, and now you're putting him against a real 230-pound fighter. This is the recipe that can cause serious and needless injury. There have been real tragedies in Tough Man competition that never should have taken place because the boxing ring is not a place for untrained people. If Mizanin gets hurt, WWE is at complete fault, because they are aware of all this and not only let it happen, but really, forced Mizanin into it because you know of free will, if not for the fact he has to do it or get DQ'd from a million dollar contest, there is no way in his right mind he would do it. And the Georgia athletic commission should step in, because I'm told they are sanctioning this under boxing rules, and what are they there for if not to prevent horrible mismatches and the potential beatings that can come from them from taking place. The only possible saving grace would be if they used gigantic gloves, like they planned for the Diva Search before sanity prevailed and they pulled mat idea. But that would make the match come across as a joke, and at this point, that1 s not what the paying customers are expecting. It also, if he gets killed, basically forces the company to give Mizanin a developmental deal (and maybe they've decided to do so even though he doesn't fit their espoused size requirements and is not that great of a worker, only he can wrestle and has a minor celebrity name), or they're opening themselves up for a possible lawsuit because when he signed on, he clearly didn't sign on to face a trained fighter in a boxing match. I'd be a lot happier with a submission wrestling match or an amateur wrestling match, as even though ifs more of a mismatch as those are Puder's bread and butter, without striking, the chance of a serious brain injury, which is really the only thing that concerns me, is far less likely. I keep thinking in the same situation, I'd have no qualms doing a submission or wrestling match with Puder, even though I'd lose in seconds, because I'd get pinned or tap before getting hurt, but boxing, no way would I and no way should I even be allowed to if I was dumb enough to say I would. If this was on a boxing card, I'm pretty sure this match wouldn't even be allowed, and that tells you why it shouldn't take place. At least in the Divas search, it was two women with no fighting experience, and they weren't allowed to box by the commission, but with no punching training and the big gloves, the odds of anyone getting hurt from a 100-pound woman's punch are far less than a 230-pound man trained at knocking people out. This isn't even Brawl-for-All. which nearly ended Savio Vega's career and did end Mark Canterbury's career, plus injured half a dozen other guys. In that, you had big, tough and athletic guys who were real athletes that willingly went into battle, even though they weren't skilled. Even though a few even had legitimate backgrounds, they hadn't competed in fighting for many, many years. Puder is a guy in his prime who was in training with UFC fighters just over two months ago, going against someone who is not naturally big and doesn't appear to have any significant athletic background, but only has heart, great desire to be a wrestler, and is obnoxious enough on camera that people aren’t thinking things out in hoping to see Puder beat him senseless. . . The Smackdown crew will be going to the Middle East again to tape a show for the troops that airs on 12/23. Another strong Raw show on 12/6 in Charlotte based around HHH vs. Batista. It was the Jericho show as G.M. It started with Jericho bringing Vince out on the Highlight Reel segment to discuss the World title situation. Vince came out with the belt over his shoulder doing the Vince-walk. HHH came out. Vince put HHH over as being a best-selling author (his book, the next morning after a heavy push on TV was No. 1,900 on the Amazon charts and still behind Flair's book, released six months ago, in sales for the week, which is a very weak open and a far worse open than either of my books did with no comparable promotion reaching millions); and a movie star. Vince said he wouldn't make a decision regarding the belt, and it was up to Bischoff to make the decision next week when he returned. Nobody had said anything to me, but TV led many to think they would do either a tournament, or more likely, an elimination chamber match, with HHH, Benoit, Edge, Batista, Orton and possibly Jericho. HHH was mad at Batista once again. I was just hoping it wasn’t another two hour long swerve. Batista wasn’t there at the finish last week, and left with a smile on his face. Batista talked back to him saying he pulled the ref out of the ring when Benoit had HHH in the Crossface, so if it wasn’t for him, Benoit would be the champ outright, and then said, "You're welcome" and stormed off. HHH threw around some furniture and said "Thank you" in a sarcastic tone. Eugene beat Maven via DQ in 4:12 when Maven was choking Eugene as he was upside down in the corner. Maven did a good job as a cocky heel here. Regal made the save. Maven got one of the tag belts, and as Regal wasn’t looking, cracked Regal with it. Next up was a limbo contest with Keibler, Hemme, and women nobody knew like Candace Mitchell (wasn’t she the make-up girl last week), Melina Perez and Maria (who was an announcer two weeks ago) for a limbo dance contest. Maria and Hemme were actually good at this, but Hemme cheated to win, although it wasn’t acknowledged as she was kind of given the star treatment and thus allowed leeway to get over. Perez, who was the shortest woman, and thus should have won, literally couldn’t get under the bar at the end because her implants stood straight up as her back was bent over, not that she was the only one facing that handicap, but she was facing it worse than most. Keibler was so just tall she had no prayer in this. There were two new women this week holding the limbo stick. One of them ended up joining the contest. One of the two was Lana Kinnnear, from the old Women of Wrestling group. While everyone was partying, Hassan & Daivari did a promo and announced they would be live next week. There is something really creepy about this company exploiting 9/11 so strongly and at the same time spending the entire war clinging to the troops for TV feature after feature. I’m sure the troops love it, but 1his exploitation of our worst national tragedy is, well, traditional wrestling. Dean pinned Hurricane with a schoolboy using the tights in 3:47. I felt sorry for me commentators, because they had to sell that Dean was an amateur wrestler who had no pro experience, but after the first minute, he did straight pro style. They also acted like it was his first match ever and his first win ever, which only insults everyone who watched ECW, everyone who has attended a house show in the last month and any fan with the slightest bit of knowledge of the game. They spent the entire show airing clips of Stratus harassing poor Lita, building up to them in the main event spot on the show. They did a lot of good stuff. One clip was the heel women, including the departed Gail Kim and Jazz, giving her bridal shower gifts: Orton did an interview. It should be noted that a bunch of Hawaiian lei's came from the ceiling at the start of the show like it was a big party and Jericho did joke after joke about being getting laid. Orton did this embarrassing deal with Coach saying how Coach never got laid, which was again trying to have Orton do Rock, and he only comes off second-rate when they script that stuff for him. Edge saved the thing from dying by doing a promo of his own. Fans chanted "you tapped out" loudly at Edge, who did a great promo here. Orton came out and they knocked each other before getting into a big pull-apart brawl. They had half of some of history's most famous tag teams break it up, I saw Slaughter (Slaughter & Kernodle), half of the Fabs, half of Malenko & Benoit, Half of the Brainbusters and one-fourth of the Horsemen, and finally, half of the Dynamic Dudes. During the commercial break, Orton gave Edge an RKO. That’s also the main event for the 12/13 Raw in Huntsville. Benjamin pinned Christian in 5:28 to keep the IC title. Earlier in the show, Jericho told Christian he could only get a title shot if he dressed up in this foolish looking ring gear as Capt. Charisma. It was this terrible Indy outfit with a mask. In real life, he was not thrilled at all about having to do this, but it ended up being entertaining for what it was. Benjamin kicked out of Tomko's interference of a high kick, then cam back and knocked Tomko off the apron and turned Christian's mask around so he couldn't see. He then gave hi ma T-bone for the pin. HHH did another backstage promo where Flair put him over as being a best selling author and having the best body in the history of wrestling as they plugged the book, and acted like he was a movie star. He talked to what was supposedly Bischoff on the cell phone, telling Bischoff he him, Raw goes to hell, and there's only one real champion. Big Dave hung up the cell phone. HHH got mad. Dave said HHH was stupid, threatening to beat up the G.M. who has all of their fete in his hands if he didn’t give him the title, saying he took the wrong approach. HHH said there was only one real champion and Dave walked off saying, yeah, there’s only one real champion. Jericho & Benoit beat HHH & Batista in 11:43. Your typical top-notch **1/2 Raw main event. Great heat and everyone looked good. It was funny because the crowd clearly was into Benoit & Jericho as the faces, even in Charlotte. However, when Benoit did a baseball slide kick on Flair, the place totally turned on Benoit. But when he started German suplexing HHH, they were back with him. Crowd was chanting "We Want Flair," realizing Flair wasn’t going to wrestle. They should have at least had him do a Heat match or an earlier match as a babyface just because it’s what the fans paid to see. HHH hit Benoit with a chair for the DQ, and this unprotected chair shot to the head business should be stopped because we've learned enough about concussions to not encourage them in this business. He then hit ref Jack Doan with a chair when Doan DQ'd him. He then went to hit Jericho, who moved, and hit Batista, knocking him silly. Flair this time got mad at HHH. He hit Jericho as well with a chair. HHH was apologetic to Batista, saying it was a mistake, but neither Flair nor Batista seemed to be buying it. Show ended with Lita kissing Stratus for no apparent reason, leading to their match. Lita won the title in 7:11. This was the best women’s' match on TV in a while as the crowd was really behind Lita as the local Carolinas girl. I thought for sure she ended her career doing a tope and she landed on the ground like she was given a DDT, but not all the way over as she landed on her face. It looked like she broke her neck. She shook it off and continued the match. They traded a lot of good near falls before Lita got the clean win with a reverse twist of fate and a moonsault. After she woke up the next morning, her back and neck were hurting, but she didn’t think it was anything major. ---- ---- ---- Flair has a three-year contract extension on the table that he's expected to sign. His original contract expired last month.. . Esquire magazine has a two-page spread on Vince dedicated to "What I've learned," which should be interesting. Among the things he's learned. "Steroids work. When I took steroids back in my 40s, I could feel a tremendous difference. Should they be banned? Yeah." Stop laughing. "What I learned from my XFL experience is to be smarter the next time I take on the NFL." Stop crying. . . Rico Constantino is now working security at the Palms in Las Vegas and looking at getting back onto the Vegas police department... Hardy has been filming vignettes on his own for when he returns to have a direction, and has shown the tape to HHH, who was said to have liked it... Angel Medina, who was Angel of Da Baldies in ECW years ago, was about to be brought in for a bodyguard role. Vince was looking for a big Latino type to be another Jesus and Heyman made the suggestion that he had a guy to fit the bill. Not sure if this was in addition to Jesus or as a replacement for this one. Also not sure what Heyman's demotion does to this idea. . . Ron Simmons is still affiliated with the company in a P.R. capacity . . . Ryan Reeves and Daniel Rodimer will start in mid-January in Louisville. Both have solid potential, although in the ring Rodimer was ahead of Reeves. They delayed both guy's start because the company had started so many of the new women there (who are already working on both Raw and Smackdown) and they felt mere were enough beginners for one time. It is believed Chris Nawrocki was not offered a contract. It's considered a good bet that no matter what happens, Daniel Puder and Mike Mizanin would join them in mid-January. Justice Smith just hasn't gotten the wrestling at all, so if he were to get a deal, it would be because the company does have the idea right now based on John Laurinaitis to find "stars" (that is, guys who are big, have good bodies, and are nice looking) and teach them to wrestle as opposed to trying to find good wrestlers… Todd Grisham was off Heat this past week because he just got married. Hopefully there are a ton of DVD's that need voiceovers this week while he's gone. . . The Shaw cable (a Canadian company) guide listing for Armageddon read: "Matches include Triple Threat match for the world heavyweight championship—Kane vs. Goldberg vs. Triple H; Shawn Michaels vs. Batista; Intercontinental championship match-Rob Van Dam vs. Randy Orton' Booker T vs. Mark Henry and many more!" Yes, just like some newspaper ads last month got the ad slicks for the 2003 Survivor Series instead of this year, somebody made the mistake again, since this was the scheduled line-up for last year's Armageddon…The 12 wrestlers who were let go weeks ago, all are being paid for three more months’ severance. By getting paid, they aren't allowed to wrestle elsewhere (they will let people do Indies or even Japan, it really means they just can't work for TNA, which even though the company says differently, they by their actions do view as competition) until 90 days after their release. This is built into every contract so someone can't go from being fired and on WWE TV to TNA TV right away. Raven actually did that, but that's because he gave up his 90 days severance and refused to sign the release, because he wanted to get on TNA right away and was willing to give up significant guaranteed money to do so 12/5 in MSG saw pretty much the same show before a crowd of 5,821 paying $244,000. It would be the fifth lowest MSG crowds for pro wrestling of the past 65 years. The last show to draw at that level was a January 16, 1995, house show headlined by Diesel (Kevin Nash) over Jeff Jarrett for the WWF title, which drew 5,400 fans. The modem all-time low is August 25,1994, which drew 4,300 for Shawn Michaels & Diesel vs. Samu & Fatu and Bret Hart & Razor Ramon (Scott Hall) vs. Owen Hart & Jim Neidhart. The only other shows that drew as bad or worse was a 1949 show headlined by Gorgeous George vs. Ernie Dusek, that drew the all-time modem record low of 4,197 (and marked George's only appearance in MSG because it was considered such a flop), and a 1969 show headlined by Bruno Sammartino vs. George Steele (keep in mind that there was no wrestling on television at all in the New York market at this point in time) that drew 5,527. They were selling both ECW T-shirts and ECW DVD’s at the show. In a cost-cutting measure, for the first time in years at an MSG house show, there was no pyro at all