ISportsFan

I don't think I made any excuses. I clearly said when someone didn't do as well as they should have, that they are not up to expectations. Some of those people may have reasonings behind them, though. I think Booker's push was less than Benoit, actually. Benoit was treated horribly (well worse than he should be, actually), but Booker was put in an IC title feud, and eventually won it after some crappy ways of keeping the title on Christian. So, what happens after that? Booker keeps the title by using Dusty finishes (aka heel tactics) after Christian beats him pretty fairly numerous times. What kind of person wants to watch that? At least Benoit, while facing lugs like A-Train and being depushed, still kept his dignity in feuds. Of course, no matter how it happened, people don't want to really see Booker T anymore. They DID before WrestleMania, but not anymore. RVD is similar to Benoit, and even got more segments than Benoit. No "excuses" for RVD other than getting buried by HHH last year. People just don't really want to see him anymore. It's not really his fault, but it is what it is. Jason

Lesnar v. Undertaker will be the last match (or at least if they are not the dumbest people on earth). Vince v. Steph IS the main event, though, since it got all the hype and promotion and TV time. Jason

"Hey Jethro, lookie here! That stupid Chinese girl who fucks up all her moves is on rasslin' now! This is funny, check it out!" Although when you say "got so high" I get the amusing mental picture of Gail smoking a bowl with RVD. I'd edit some of it, but trying to edit a post with 20000000 quotes in it is suicide. It goes into HTML mode, and I'll be darned if I know that. Jason

My Raw Analysis Authority figures who can't wrestle and get the most TV time, as we see on Smackdown, should get more viewers. Expected. This is a pretty dang good number for not being involved in PPVs (such as SummerSlam). Not too good for the team who was tag champs during part of the timeframe. Not unexpected at the very least. Pretty good numbers for a lackey, but he is almost always with HHH, so that could inflate his numbers. However, he does wrestle sometimes without HHH, so maybe he's still a partial ratings draw. Main event angle authority figure... see Austin and Bischoff. These should be high, although they're higher than they should be. He was not a main eventer (also defined as being programmed with HHH) for the whole time period, and he got bigger numbers than HHH. For his influence on the show, these should be higher. Not saying they're bad numbers, but they aren't good for being world champ and focus of the show every week. Not being pushed and rarely being on TV does give these results. Chris Jericho is like Benoit and Guerrero and the WGTT on Smackdown - push him to the moon, because people want to see him even when he's being treated as second-rate. Expected. As someone who is pushed to the moon (at least until Shane the Barbarian showed his wrath), these are decent numbers. Similar to an Angle/Brock, he was just under the top tier. Total shock of all shocks. She sucks, but gets ratings. So, the obvious answer is to make her a valet. The joke is played out already, but people don't back the Mack. Get him off the TV. Since Mark Henry is not listed, he's probably in the same category as Mack, so get him off too. Being pushed, but not drawing at all. Decent numbers, but he gets pushed better than Jericho and gets worse numbers. The main eventer for two PPVs before leaving for an injury got numbers that are laughable for someone who was at the top of the card. These numbers are way below his push level. Not good for tag champs during part of the time period. Not pushed at all, so it's expected. Not bad for either, especially Storm after that terrible gimmick. How this is possible, and Gail Kim got so high, is ridiculous. People wanted to see Booker before WrestleMania, and now they don't. But this is kinda indicitive of his push level - getting beat by the heel and needing Austin to reverse the decision every week is not what people want to see. No excuses other than that though, because this number is not good at all. Also proves he isn't a Jericho/Benoit/Guerrero that people want to see in spite of a push. Push should warrant at least positive numbers. Most of these are probably from the ladder match main event. Otherwise, he's similar to Booker T except he didn't get the short hand of a feud with Christian in the same way Booker did. But (this may sound like a backhanded compliment, but not really), these numbers aren't bad. Just not good, and proves RVD is not someone like Jericho/Benoit/Guerrero that people want to see despite the push. Jason

When you say main event, I think you mean last match. When I say main event (especially with ratings/buys), I mean the most heavily promoted match on the card. For Smackdown at WrestleMania, that was obviously (and you can't deny it wasn't... see the front of the video/DVD sleeve for a reminder), it was Vince/Hogan. On the Raw side, the most heavily promoted match was Rock/Austin. Brock/Angle was, at best, the third most promoted match at WM. Jason

My Smackdown analysis: Right about where he should be as a "this close to the top guy pushed" guy. Who has he feuded with the past 4 months? He was in the Stephanie/Sable feud and the Benoit feud. The Stephanie feud went nowhere, so that leaves us with Benoit. Now, if his ratings are only up +70,000, and he's feuding with one of the top ratings getters (despite Benoit's status), what does that say about his other Smackdown appearances? They had to be negatives, or else his number would be higher. Not bad. Absolutely phenominal, especially for a tag wrestler, to get a vote of confidence from the public like this. Once again, I believe this is the ultimate proof that people want to see Chris Benoit, and I hope everyone finally shuts up about this. He was treated like crap in the midcard or lower over the last 4 months, and he still gets an average of over 300,000 MORE people watching his segments than the one before him. This has to be extremely disappointing for Vince. Expected, given their push. He should have this high of viewership - he was the main event angle for a major portion of this survey. But, that doesn't mean that people wanted to pay to see him (which is what a main eventer should have people do); his buyrate with Vince was terrible at Vengeance (and if you think that wasn't the most heavily promoted match, thus qualifying as the main event to the people, you're kidding). Just like Benoit, this a huge vote of confidence for a midcarder from the public. I'll be quite honest, this is a shock. Here's a case, however, where you have to think in terms of quality and safety; Gunn blows up two minutes into matches and then becomes a danger to whomever he's in the ring with. Just like Benjamin, a huge vote from the public to a tag wrestler. This is a shame that Matt Hardy is pushed so crappily that people don't even care about him anymore. I remember his main event with Mysterio getting a good audience, but he's rarely on Smackdown anymore. See Zach Gowen... main event push, but do people pay to see him on PPV? WM XIX, Backlash 2002, Judgment Day 2002 proved no. Just like Kurt Angle, a solid number for someone who is just under the top tier of pushed. These two get the biggest pushes on the show and thus should have the biggest numbers. BUT, they are not wrestlers and this will mean nothing if their match at No Mercy (which is the main event, no matter what anyone wants to believe) draws poorly (which everyone thinks it will). Expected. This is a very good number for someone who rarely gets pushed. The huge difference between manager and wrestler is astonishing. The thing about it is that Nidia, when wrestling, has crappy matches with Torrie Wilson and people don't want to see them. Looks big, but remember his main feud was with Benoit (huge ratings) and Guerrero (same as Benoit). So after those feuds, his numbers had to have dropped substantially. This could either be people wanted to see Benoit/Guerrero and didn't care about him anyway OR because of his lack of push Who cares? Good numbers, but he was in the second tier of workers (right under Gowen/Hogan/McMahons) with Brock and Angle for the whole time, and he gets worse numbers than Benoit/Guerrero/Benjamin and Angle/Brock. Expected. See Rhyno, but also he has a feud with cruisers now, and they get shafted anyway in pushes from the bookers, so this might not be his fault. This has to be a very disappointing number for WWE. See Nidia. Raw is coming next. Jason

I still don't think Angle and Brock were portrayed as the main eventers. It's not fair to them to blame them when the central angle on the show and ALL the advertising dollars market the McMahon match on the same PPV. It's as if they're a second-tier main event; the real wrestling main event, but not the one with any promotion. I agree on the position of Benoit and Guerrero though - midcarders (or in Benoit's case, flipping between midcarder and lower carder on a consistent basis) who just shine through in TV ratings. Jason

Of course Vince, Steph, HHH, and all the other main eventers are going to have high averages. That's to be expected. They're the ones who get the biggest pushes. Now, when you get that big of a push, ratings don't really matter for you anymore (because yes, more people are going to watch your segments, it's a fact of life when you get the biggest pushes). What matters for them are PPV buys - since they get the biggest pushes, people should want to see them on PPV. And Vengeance (built mostly around Vince v. Gowen, notice the radio ads and TV commercials, similarly for Vince v. Steph this month) was a failure. The ones that should surprise people are the characters who are treated like crap; the ones who are given low placement on cards, etc. And, a direct quote from the paraphrase of the article... People that are pushed like crap and people still tune in to see are the ones that SHOULD be pushed more. That means people want to see them in action, etc., no matter whether they're getting a push or are 1-6 on PPV for the year and have no direction at all. Jason

I don't know how that could be one of the worst things ever when it wasn't even the worst thing on the show - and definitely not even in the top 5 of the worst things of the month on WWE TV. I'm not defending the skit in any way, I thought it was terrible. But let's not exaggerate too much. Steph's interview was more horrible by a magnitude of about 100x, and the Eddy/Big Show stuff, Kane/Shane stuff, and other Vince/Steph angles were worse too. Jason

It wasn't the night after No Mercy, it was either the Smackdown after No Mercy or 2 Smackdowns after. Benoit beat HHH in about 4 minutes after the entire Radicalz interfered, and they reformed. Jason

Amazing how this is the only match they ever had. Televised anyway. They faced each other on Smackdown at least twice off the top of my head - the first week the Radicalz were in WWE (2/3/00 I believe was the airdate) and after No Mercy 2000 Benoit won a rematch and the Radicalz reformed on Smackdown. Jason

Bad show Very good show Awful show with a night-saving main event Bad show Bad show with a good ladder match and decent main event Really good last two matches saves it Really good last two matches saves it Awesome tag match and good main event save it Sense a pattern in most of these October shows? The shows normally suck, but one or two matches are MOTYC. Jason

Replace this with the Bret Hart/Jerry Lawler/Doink segment at SummerSlam 1993. Jason I thought of another one... the SMW tag title match at Survivor Series. Another very good match. Jason

If they do make it (with your 6 points plus PAT rule), who would get the ball after the second PAT attempt? I think it should stay the same. I think the rule for college is good for college and the NFL rule fits their style of game better. Jason

Replace this with the Bret Hart/Jerry Lawler/Doink segment at SummerSlam 1993. Jason

I hate to be nitpicky again, but didn't Backlund still defend the title around the country during the supposed "held up" period? So I think the title was really only disputed in New York so the WWF could make money around the horn with Backlund. Of course, I could be wrong. Jason

Actually, didn't (in storyline terms) the Big Show's dad not die until weeks/months later? I mean, yeah the security guard did yell him about it, but that was just Bossman putting the security guard up to it I think (if I remember correctly, of course, I'm not going back to the tapes to watch Russo-era and slightly past Russo-era Smackdowns for more info on it). Jason

Odds are it's a two part answer 1) Yes 2) In about 2 or 3 months Jason

Blanchard v. Magnum Jason

I just tried killstevebartman.com and it appears to have been taken down already. Jason

Stu impacted us more than any other guy... he's the father of most North Americans with workrate, either the actual paternal father or he trained them. He will be missed dearly. Jason

I think it's because it's a fancam, and the footage is not worthy of being on a DVD release from a quality-control standpoint. I'd love to have the match on there because it's awesomely awesome, but it doesn't have the footage quality WWE would like. And, it shows people can get away with taping their house shows, which is a big no-no. The only time they'd show a fancam is to advance an angle (i.e. the MSG Clique incident). Jason

Easily the 80s heel Bossman with an actual good match out of Hogan and the nightstick. Although the 1999 Bossman with the Big Show feud was... Jason

So you're telling me it's $3.99 for 3 chicken strips? I can get a better price at a sitdown restaurant. Jason

But they do... especially when they can book it with a Latino stereotype and a 500 pound giant. Jason