spman

I really hope that Vince takes the hint and takes a break from TV for a while. Have Linda come out tomorrow first thing and announce some sort of Executive Board of Directors decision to reinstate Eric Bischoff.

I actually swore Vince was going to try something like this when the Big Peodphile Priest scandal was occurring, because it was right around that time that he was pushing there Reverend D'Von Character, and I honestly thought he was going to do a Pedophile Priest storyline with him.

As I said, maybe I've been spoiled by WWE DVDs, where you get a 2 hour documentary and 3+ hours of matches for 25 bucks or less, and tape dealers at Indy Shows that sell a 6 hour tape or DVD with footage for 5 to 10 bucks. When you consider that, 20 bucks for a 3 hour show seems like a bit much.

I just got back from this myself. Whoever wrote those results and said it was pouring wasn't lying, everone sitting around the perimeter of the tent ended up getting soaked. Really though, for a production that sees itself as legitimate as ROH does, some of the production here was really amateur. For one, they clearly oversold the show, and despite soem of the tickets having assigned seating, none of the seating was labled at all, so everyone just kind of sat wherever. It wasn't untill about the second match that security decided to start checking peoples tickets and doing some seating arrangement, which is something they should have done before the show even started. Secondly, who books an outside show anymore? Especially when the forecast has been rain all week. There was a big fucking indoor bubble soccer field at the facility that they could have used. The reason supposedly why they had to do this show outside was becasue they were expecting more people to attend then the fire marshal would allow in the building, but irregardless, that's just some really poor planning on their part. The show itself though was fantastic, and more then made up for the shitty planning and setup. I was particularly impressed with the Colt Cabana, and Samoa Joe matches, those guys are going to be millionaires someday when they sign with Vince McMahon. The crowd was good, but it seemed like more often then not they were more interested in entertaining themselves then being into the match. CT crowds tend to be a strange mix of marks that don't know anything, and semi-smarks who have been following it for years, and think that reading the copy and paste news sites on the internet automatically makes you knowledgeable. Not too many people familiar with anything beyond maybe 10 years worth of WWF history though. It was an entertaining crowd nonetheless. Finally, the gimmick tables were pretty outrageous. T-Shirts for 20 each, that's fine, I'll give you that, WWE wants 25 for theirs, so that's not too bad. Ring of Honor DVDs at 20 bucks a pop is a pretty big rip though, especially considering they were selling WWE DVDs right alongside of them for only 5 bucks more, which probably had much for content for your dollar. Even then, I've gone to shows where tape dealers have a huge variety of all kinds of shit and only want 5 dollars per disc, so 20 bucks for one 2.5 hour ROH show isn't going to cut it. Overall though this was a great experience, and I'm definitely going back in December when they come back here. I also ran into Joe when I was at the concession stand and got to shake his hand which was cool as well.

I've got tickets for night one tomorrow, although it looks like the weakest card of the three. I've never been to an ROH show before, just WWE, is it really as great as I've read it is?

Hogan always seems like the obvious answer, but he always seems like the type to me that would always live either just at or maybe a little beyond his means and probably didn't save all that well, which is why he relies on those huge paychecks from Vince for his yearly match.

Just got home from tonight House Show at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut. It actually wasn't too bad, and the whole thing was filmed with the stage set up and everything like it was a TV Taping. Meltzer says that it was done because they're trying out the new HD Hardware, so maybe it'll air on TV eventually. With the camera and the stage set up, and lots of undercard guys in semi-squash type matches, it actually felt more like a WWF Wrestling Challange taping from the 80's, which was kind of cool. I had phenomenal seats as well, very front row, right on the side of the stage, hard camera side. It was a little too close to the pyro, but it was still great. Quick rundown of the card Scotty Too Hotty def. Jamie Knoble with a rollup. Decent match, mostly set up for Scotty's comedy spots though. Kash tried to do the run in, but Tatanka got away. When Pitbulls were leaving down the aisle, my friend and I started houdning them, along with others in our row, and they started threatening us. Great fan interaction, that's how it should be. Shane Helms def. Jimmy Wang Yang. Yang's new gimmick is silly, but enjoyable nonetheless. Great back and fourth action. Helms won with his feet on the ropes. After the match, Yang was cool enough to shake hands with the crowd and came over to my section which was great. Hooligans def. Stevens and James. Mostly a squash for Hooligans who are really impressive, but it's only a matter of time before they tell them to limit their offense and cut them off at the knees. Finish was Kendrick hitting Sliced Bread, and London hitting a standing SSP for the pin. Sylvester Terkay def. Tatanka with the Muscle Buster Suplex. Very little action here at all, and the crowd was dead. It was silent enough that I was able to stand up and shot "boring" at Terkay and he pointed at me and told me to shut up. MVP came to the ring to MC a waste of time Diva Dance-Off. Ashley def. Jillian, Leyla, and Krystal, despite being the worst of the four. She has no talent at all. Vito def. Regal in a comedy match. Vito kept lifting up his dress, and Regal's facial expressions in response were hilarious. match ended with Vito getting Regal to submit after using his teabag submission. After the match coming towards the entrance, I could see Regal mouthing to the referee "He put his bloody dick in my mouth", then regal spewed. It was funny stuff. Ashley def. Jillian Hall. Jillian was ok, but Ashley looked lost in the ring. Move Jillian to RAW and have her wrestle there, she's wasted on Smackdown. Kennedy def. Lashley and Finlay in a three way for the US Title. Kennedy did his full entrance, including the mic lowering from the rafters. This acutally was a semi-disappointing match. Only two interesting spots were Finlay spearing Lashley while he had Kennedy up for a suplex, and another Spot where Finlay had Lashley in a half crab, then Kennedy came in and put a half crab on Lashley using his other leg. Then both Finlay and Kennedy poked eahc other in the eyes. Kennedy rolled up Finlay for the pin. After the match, Finlay and Lashley teased an encounter, but Finlay ended up walking to the back. Lashley stayed and shook hands with the crowd, and when he saw me harassing him wearing my Finlay T-Shirt, he came over the my section and started shaking hands with people, but then grabbed me by my shirt, not in any sort of mean spirited kind of way, but it was great none the less. Main Event was Rey Mysterio def. Booker T by DQ after Chavo did the run in. Rey did most of the work in this match, while Booker T just took the bumps. Booker teased a spinaroonie, but then just flipped off the crowd. Chavo did the run in and pushed Rey off the top rope, causing the DQ. After Rey fought off both off, he sootd around and shook hands with the crowd, which was again a nice gesture. Overall this House Show set-up like a TV Taping was pretty good. This is really what WWE needs to try and go back to, taping matches and just splicing in the promos. There's no good fucking reason why a 2 hour Live RAW should only have 3. 4 minute matches, and 90 minutes of Promos.

I always thought having DOA evolve into a Klan stable to feud with the Nation would have rocked.

My idea was always to have Paul Bearer come back and inspire Kane to return to evil once again and then eventually bring him back to Smackdown to destroy The Undertaker.

Yaknowhuttamean?

10-15 seconds at most I would say. That's too bad. It literally is only the final move of each match then. Do they even have a few seconds of footage from both of Sammartino's title victories? This would be interesting to know, as far as I was aware, WWF footage that's left prior to Billy Graham was spotty and intermittent at best, as Tape Preservation was unknown until the mid-70's, and that both Sammartino title changes have been lost, with no known copies in existence, even in Vince's collection. It's possible that some footage still remains, but most of the stuff from the 50's and 60's is gone for good.

Still, interference or not, there's no real good reason why you should have a guy like Batista lay down on free TV, unless you're trying to bury him. Either way, it's pretty ridiculous booking as it serves to help no one. Booker T doesn't really even need the rub from Batista in the first place, as he's drawing heat on his own, and jobbing out Batista, even through interference, just makes him look weak. Fucking WWE.

Whether they had TV or not, the fact remains that WCW was a dead brand by 2001. Vince had clearly gained a solid grip on the industry and what minor portion of the audience WCW had left was almost a complete non-factor. By 2000, WCW had to essentially give away free tickets just to get a crowd in for their tapings. TNA does this now, but they only run the arena in Orlando which barely fits 1000 people, and they have their production is run in such a way that they can do this and still not run at a loss. WCW was running 12,000 seat arenas, still trying to keep up a pretty hi tech production, and was still not selling any tickets or merchandise, and no one was watching at home. The only thing left by 2001 that had any value was the Tape Library, the brand itself was tarnished beyond repair.

Wow, if Batista lays down for the pin, then I guess they've just lost all faith him. Perhaps Batista and Cena will do the switcheroo again after the PPV?

In all likelihood, it has to do with WWE not wanting to pay royalties to song writers, or musicians who played on the songs. This mostly pertains to songs composed by Jimmy Hart, and songs off the Piledriver album.

A friend of mine one literally used a tip calculator on his Cell Phone when we orderd pizza while watching a TNA PPV once and asked, seriously "Does anyone have any pennies".

I think it's a case of it being the big PPV of the year and the "important" event to have in your collection, if you own wrestling videos. For example, WrestleMania XV isn't very good, but I have the DVD sitting on my shefl waiting to be watched every March. The past few Wrestlemanias have also generally been good, if not great outside of the fluff Diva segment and whatever Cena's in I dunno, I really hated this years Wrestlemania. I thought it was one of the worst since 15.

Frankie Goes to Hollywood wtf was Holly Johnson smoking when he came up with that.

Anyone else notice that during most womens matches, WWE seems to use fast camera switches and shoots the ring from an angle or from far away, instead of from the front. Is this done to lessen the likelyhood of boobage or camel toe?

I actually like Informer, it was one of the first Dancehall tracks to become a hit in this country. Stacy's Mom by Fountains of Wayne is the dumbest song ever. Period. 1985 by Bowling for Soup is #2.

Good question, nobody was able to stream WOL tonight since shitty Sports Byline was down.

Actually, S_D, I don't the Magazine in front of me as I left it at work, but I think I pasted it wrong. The answer for D. should read "Beginning of his descent into obscurity", but it's still funny nonetheless.

So I decided on a whim to drive out to the mall this morning before work to go see John Cena at the autograph signing he was doing. He was supposed ot be there from 9-11, and I figured there'd probobly be a long line, so I got there maybe 45 minutes early. Man was I right, even at 8:15 the line wrapped around the mall and started heading towards the back exit, there had to have been over a thousand people there. Supposedly the people at the front started the line outside at 4am, which is completely insane in my book. From the looks of it, the line eventually wrapped outside into the parking lot, clearly way more people then they would have time for, with no sign of them cutting off the line. So I wait in line for at least a little over 2 hours, and once I get to the front, it turns out that THAT'S when the conveniently tell you that it costs 25 dollars to even get in there to get an autograph, on top of 5 more for an 8X10 photo for him to sign, and another 20 if you wanted a polaroid photo with him. So since I had stood in line for so long, I shelled out my money, and what do I get for my 30 dollars? A 2 second handshake, an autographed color 8X10 Photo, and an asshole promoter cursing in front of children at every person who wanted to take a picture with a personal camera. It was a pretty big waste, but Cena at least seemed interested in being there and glad to meet all his fans, it's just the asshat promoters that want to push as many people through as quickly as possible so they can nickle and dime as many as they can in the alotted time that ruin it. This was actually the first signing I had been to since I went to see Bret Hart at an auto dealership, where the autographs were free, despite having to wait 2 hours in the freezing cold. So does anyone have any stories of being at crazy autograph signing like this one?

Ladybugs is a funny ass movie. His #1 will forever and always be Caddyshack though.

The biggest laugh for me on this one is when everyone says that Vince hates Yes Men and can smell them from a mile away. What a joke, this is completely opposite of everything Meltzer and Scherer have ever said, which is that Vince basically is the creative team and everyone else just tells him that all his shitty ideas are gold.