WWE Notes from the 3/29 Observer

[Enigma 0]

WWE has an offer on the table for Bill Goldberg to come back, which he is considering. Goldberg has come back with an idea to work limited dates and build to a singles match or program if possible with Steve Austin. Goldberg has been debating whether being off television for a few months would help or hurt his position, but I believe in his mind he does expect to come back at some point, but wants the timing and money to be right. Goldberg was on Harley Race's radio show on 3/22 and said he was supportive of Brock Lesnar making the decision he did, but said by doing so he did leave the company shorthanded. He said the fans in Madison Square Garden were too preoccupied with their own chants to get into his match. He said he wasn't happy with the fan reaction, admitted the match itself left something to be desired (wow, a wrestler admitting his Mania match wasn't the best) but that what they were trying to do was stepped on by the audience. He said in his time off he's going to increase his charity work and appearances. He said he was up for returning if the company gave him the right storylines and that he's hoping to get a part in a remake of the movie "The Longest Yard," and also is working on a television pilot for a show tentatively called "Goldberg is Tougher than you." He talked about being under contract for more matches in Japan, and also said he believed pro wrestlers should unionize. The original Mania finish was Lesnar pinning Goldberg and then Austin stunning Goldberg after he complained about bad officiating.

 

The Canadian Radio-TV Commission has asked for a public call for comments by 5/17/04, when it will make a decision regarding whether Spike TV should be allowed on the CRTC's approved foreign services list. That won't affect Raw, which isn't broadcast on Spike TV into Canada due to non-duplication and WWE being on TSN. This started when the Canadian Association of Broadcasters went to the CRTC to ask for Spike TV to be removed from the list of stations available in the country. The CAB claimed that the license the station was issued back in 1984, as The Nashville Network, was to be a country music station. The claim is the current format is hurting Canadian stations like Men TV and TSN. Removal of Spike TV would mean viewers in Canada would no longer be able to see Velocity, Confidential or Sunday Night Heat.

 

The Rock was on the Mitch Alborn show on 3/23/04 and was asked why wrestling's popularity had declined so much. He said when WWE was on top, it had himself, Steve Austin, and The Undertaker, but then when "we" left, there was nobody who stepped up to their place. Interesting if it was just a slip or just responding without thinking it out considering whose name in specific was not on his list. He also blamed the writing of the shows for the decline.

 

On his first day of training in Arizona, Brock Lesnar weighed 283 pounds, did a 4.65 40, had a 35 inch vertical jump which is pretty awesome for a man of his size, a 10 foot standing long jump, which is also pretty awesome for a guy of his size, and benched 225 for 30 reps, which is very good muscle endurance and strength, but I'd have expected more.

 

Edge's autobiography, which he did while he was out of action and without a ghostwriter (he would join only Foley and the 2005 Billy Graham book as WWE wrestlers doing books without a writer) has been renamed once again to "Adam Copeland on Edge" which is a whole lot better than "Over the Edge" for obvious reasons

 

A few more notes about WWE finances. WWE earned $5.6 million in the last quarter on international TV rights. The company earned about $900,000 during the quarter for executive producer fees for a motion picture (one of The Rock's most recent movies, I'm guessing The Rundown). In the last quarter, the company averaged $8.56 per head at live events in merchandise sales, so merchandise per capita is holding up well, and is ahead of the pace of last year at the same time. That generally would say either they are producing better merchandise, or that to the people that attend live, the characters are more over than a year ago. The problem is fewer people are attending, and that's more important in the big picture. That's the old judging who is over by the size of the pop in an empty arena. Magazine sales are down 36% from last year. DVD sales are up 59% while VHS sales are down 57%, but in total because nobody buys VHS tapes it seems (only 32,900 sold during the quarter compared to 361,100 for DVDs, approximately one-fourth being the Flair DVD), the overall figure is up 29%. The company cut live event and PPV advertising down from $7.4 million from the same period one year ago to $3.7 million, but that should change in the next quarter with the $5 million ad budget for Mania alone. Currently, the budget for a producing a television taping is about $500,000.

 

The company sent several PPV events to the Museum of Television and Radio this just before Mania, and was to have those donations screened as another publicity vehicle leading to Mania in New York. Apparently what was sent were several Wrestlemanias, to show the evolution of PPV and of Wrestlemania. What was donated were highlights of Hogan & Mr. T vs. Paul Orndorff & Roddy Piper, the Battle Royal from Wrestlemania II, Hogan vs. King Kong Bundy, Hogan vs. Randy Savage, Hogan vs. Andre The Giant, Hogan vs. Ultimate Warrior and Hogan vs. Sgt. Slaughter, as well as a history of Mania feature that includes more recent stuff.

 

There's more heat regarding Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels stemming from the Wrestlemania 10 best matches special, when Michaels talked about being the innovator of the ladder match. As best we can tell, the ladder match was invented by Dan Kroffat (not Phil LaFon, but the Calgary wrestler of the 70s that LaFon took his ring name from). Hart, who had several, including a famous one with Dynamite Kid in Calgary, brought the idea to Vince, and did the first one with Shawn. It's well known Hart was mad about Michaels vs. Ramon being booked in a ladder match. Michaels blamed it on Vince and Vince said Shawn asked for it. You know how that goes. Vince had promised Hart that because he came up with it, he could have the first high profile one, but that kind of a promise means nothing. Anyway, the feeling was that Michaels going on TV and claiming to be the innovator of ladder matches could have only been said knowing it would get Hart mad.

 

When he got back from South Africa, Brock Lesnar called John Schiley, his high school wrestling coach in Webster, SD, and told him he was quitting. He told his coach he was tired of never getting a weekend off, and that Wednesday and Thursday were his weekends. He said when he quit, he was the calmest, most rested and happiest he's been in a long time. Brian Lux, his high school football coach described Lesnar as being overly aggressive, and got personal foul penalties that hurt the team. He was having a great senior year until being injured, and his injury hurt the team even worse. Lesnar is going to Arizona to work out with a football guru and personal trainer to get him ready for camp this summer.

 

The company stock is now being covered by Natexis Bleischroder, a Wall Street Firm, and Maxim (another stock analysis firm, not the magazine). Virtually nobody in Wall Street had been paying attention to the stock. The upswing in profits has gotten some attention even though the stock has very little trading. There are projections that 2005 will be a good year, but they are obviously seeing things that aren't there. Aside from the potential for more international expansion, there are no signs of a future turnaround, but they've got the business costs under control to where it's going to take a large step down to actually threaten a painful bottom line. Everyone is projecting lower for the fourth quarter of this year than it will wind up doing in my estimation.

 

The APA angle was to set up Bradshaw going heel and to get rid of Ron Simmons. Simmons had long talked about retirement, but was fired. The company offered to put him in alcohol rehab. He refused. Simmons, who turns 45 in May, was the second-oldest active wrestler in the company beside Flair, who is ten years older. There was a lot of talk about what Simmons did to get him fired but it wasn't a single incident that caused this as much as that his time was up.

 

An amazing stat on the 3/11/04 Smackdown show is that 26% of the viewing audience was Latino. Smackdown is, however, no longer the top rated Latino television show in the U.S., as it's now No. 3.

 

The upcoming WWE Films movie vehicles for Austin, HHH, and Kane are being budgeted at between $15 million and $20 million a piece.

 

The 4/10/04 Raw house show in East Lansing was canceled due to a poor advance.

 

HHH is featured in the current Muscle & Fitness magazine.

 

Roddy Piper did an interview on The Fan in Portland on 3/19 with Brian Wheeler (Trailblazers play-by-play guy who is a subscriber to this publication), and said that Vince called him six days before Mania and asked him to do a match with Hogan, but he declined. He said that he offered doing a Piper's Pit where he interviewed Vince, but Vince declined. I don't know how much of this is true, but this is not the first we've heard stories regarding Vince making a late offer to get Hogan on the show after all, but it's more likely not the case. We've heard that neither Hogan nor Piper were ever considered for the show at that point, because by that time, the show was filled, the belief is Hogan and Piper with no build wouldn't have added buys (their last singles match last year died on PPV also because of no time to build it) and Hogan wouldn't have come cheap so it made no sense. Piper would have had incredible heat in the dressing room being brought back in. By that point the company was more concerned, as you can see, with getting as many of the full-timers as they could on the show to share in the big payoff. He also said, and this does sound true, that when Dennis Rodman was in WCW, Hogan told Piper that they should stick as close to Rodman as possible so they could get their photos everywhere. We used to joke that Hogan was surgically attached to Rodman's hip in those days. Piper claimed he was the reason TNA wrestlers got health insurance (okay). He claimed it was a shoot when he slapped Vince Russo on TNA TV (okay) and that when he was a rookie, Moolah and Mae Young pulled him from the driver’s seat of the car into the back and tore off all his clothes. He also said he was with Mad Dog Vachon once on a beach and Vachon had the runs, pulled down his pants, crapped on the beach and said, "That's why they call me the Mad Dog."

 

When he was at the OVW taping, Jimmy Valiant talked about meeting Cornette when Cornette was 12, and that Cornette has become the smartest man living in the business. Whether true or not (he probably is the smartest man living at booking 1984 Mid South Wrestling with totally green talent in the year 2004), this does lead to a story I heard when Scott Williams was talking with Booker T. Sharmell Sullivan (Paisley in WCW), who is Booker's girlfriend, was there, and she was asked about her stay in OVW. It wasn't much of note for her, since she blew out her knee training to be a wrestler and was then cut after an attempt to make her an announcer on Smackdown. She said she loved being in Louisville anyway, citing Cornette as the reason, saying it was one of the most amazing experiences in her life learning from him. She said Cornette was the smartest person she'd ever met in her life.

 

In the 3/20 issue of Sports Illustrated, as part of their AOL/Time Warner ad campaign, they had an ad for Raw, which read on the bottom, "Don't miss Royal Rumble, January 25 on pay-per-view." WCW lives.

 

Some upcoming DVD releases are a Rise and Fall of ECW, Chris Benoit, and a Four Horseman, which is basically an excuse to put more Flair footage to use after his first one sold so well.

 

The Hall of Fame banquet was scheduled to go a little more than two hours on the night before Mania, but wound up going five hours plus. Part of the reason is everyone was requested to limit their speeches to three minutes. I believe Jimmy Hart (introducing Greg Valentine) was the only person who came close. Most of what happened was said to have been great. Heenan ended up getting something like four standing ovations. Ross also gave a great speech. Pete Rose gave Heenan a high-five when Heenan said that he used to bet on wrestling matches, which I guess shows Rose's true remorse. Apparently Heenan had come up with a promo on Rose, talking about him being arrested, kicked out of his sport, tax problems, gambling problems, as a prelude to, "Pete, welcome to the business." He ran it by Vince, who nixed it immediately. The one negative was also involving Heenan and that was the speech Jack Lanza gave to introduce Heenan. Apparently Jessica Heenan, Bobby's daughter, was in tears as Lanza went on-and-on about Heenan's heavy drinking and insinuated he was lazy, and that's why Heenan was a manager and not a main event wrestler. If you are realistic, Heenan could have been one of the best working prelim or mid-card guys in the business during the 70s, or he could have been probably the best wrestling manager of all-time for a lot longer period of time. Many were upset that Lanza never once credited or thanked Heenan for help in his career, as the feeling was Lanza was a main eventer everywhere more because he had the best manager more than he himself was the best worker. While almost everyone was putting themselves over incessantly, Jesse Ventura won the award for that one, and there were people who felt he went way too far. Greg Valentine was said to have been surprisingly good with his speech, considering what was expected out of him.

 

Shane McMahon was sitting several rows deep at ringside at Mania. The two things noted to us were he was screaming with everyone else "You sold out" at Lesnar and that he was going crazy for everything Undertaker did. He also took his personal intermission during the cruiserweight match. At the Hall of Fame, where he was going crazy for Heenan, Shane went to Heenan after the speech to praise him, and Heenan said, "And your name is?"

 

There were giveaways regarding the draft before Raw started in Detroit. They taped Heat first, and Cade did a singles match with no sign of Jindrak, while Jazz did a match with Lita, without Teddy Long. Storm worked heel against Hardy, which makes perfect sense being that Hardy has been an established heel. Jindrak did a promo talking about how happy he was to leave Raw. This may be inserted in Heat since it was done during a commercial break on Raw. Rhyno did a promo with The Bashams running down Detroit before his match with Benoit, but that was just to make sure he wasn't cheered in the match. The show ended with the big brawl, with everyone being run off except Show, Kane and Austin. Austin gave stunners to both, and then Benoit came out and he and Austin drank beer for several minutes. They sold both Raw and Smackdown merchandise at the show, and aside from Austin, the biggest seller appeared to be John Cena.

 

WWE Originals fell out of the top 200 this past week.

 

Steve Blackman is considering a return. Well, he's talked about it for years. But he's now able to go all out in training, and is coming to San Diego in May to be a training partner for Ken Shamrock as he prepares for his match with Kimo.

 

The next European tour will be 5/26 to 5/29 with the first two dates in Dublin, both of which are already sold out, followed by 5/28 in Manchester and 5/29 in Birmingham. England.

 

The company was planting the Molly Holly signs making fun of her being bald that aired on Raw on 3/15.

 

Sylvan Grenier's injuries were ruptured C-5 and C-6 discs and a neck fracture. He declined surgery and has been training of late in Louisville and is ready to return to the ring, as he did a backstage skit on the 3/16 Raw.

 

On the "Can you dig it," from Shaquille O'Neal, I'm now told he got it not from wrestling, but either from the Shaft movie or the 1979 "The Warriors" movie. Shaq's cadence when delivering the line after the Lakers first championship were the same as in the latter movie.

 

In the Lesnar story from last week, when talking about Stephen Neal of the New England Patriots, while Neal is considered a success in football circles as it's very rare for someone who never played in college to start in the NFL, he only started one game last season before being injured.

 

In the Smackdown handicap match on 3/11, the two guys Big Show beat were John Walters & Arch Kincaid. We listed it last week as Walters & Onyx.

 

The 3/8 Bridgeport, CT sellout for Raw TV was about 12,000 paid and the 3/9 Smackdown TV did 8,100.

 

We didn't get all the U.K. numbers yet, but the tour did just under $2 million on four dates, not including merchandise, so it was very successful. Apparently this was a lot easier tour, even though everyone was tired coming off Mania, than the South Africa tour.

 

3/18 Smackdown house show in Newcastle, England drew a sellout of about 11,000. 3/19 in Sheffield, England drew a sellout of about 10,000.

 

Newcastle was headlined by Guerrero over Show with a frog splash to keep the title, plus Rikishi & Scotty kept the tag belts over Bashams, Cena beat Bradshaw to keep the U.S. title and Chavo Guerrero beat Mysterio and Nunzio for the cruiserweight title. Cena cut a rap mentioning Kieron Dyer, a soccer star with Newcastle United (who was at the matches along with a few teammates). Bradshaw ran in while he was rapping, acting like he was going to clean house on Heyman, but hit Cena with the microphone and Heyman set up the U.S. title match. Cena won that quickly. Guerrero told fans they are as great as the fans in New York, and Cena did a rap with Brian Hebner doing the human boom box gimmick.

 

Sheffield was the same show as Newcastle, except there was a switch as Rikishi & Scotty beat Haas & Benjamin.

 

Basic same show in Aberdeen as Newcastle. Based on reports, the schedule was getting to people as we heard it was a great atmosphere but not much for wrestling. Heyman got significant ECW chants. Benjamin did a promo with a Scottish accent. This turned him babyface in a match against Rikishi & Scotty. Guerrero used a low blow and belt shot to beat Show. Fans were into Guerrero but didn't seem into the match. They added something, as after Eddy won, Chavo hit the ring and they had a 20 second brawl with more action than most of the complete matches. As it turned out, half the crew ended up in the ring with the faces cleaning house. Bradshaw then came out and accused Scottish people of incest, and all the faces beat him up, and Rikishi & Scotty, along with Guerrero, Cena and Mysterio danced after the show.

 

Rhyno did the fake knee injury spot, so I guess Fit Finlay was an agent. Makes sense because why wouldn't he be for a U.K. run? That was confirmed the next night. Finlay, who would be around 46, did his first match, if you can call it that, in years on the 3/21 show in Glasgow. After a blindfolded Noble beat Nidia in a replay of their No Way Out match that most have tried to forget (they did that match the entire tour but put Nidia over on previous nights even though that angle has been forgotten about on television since mid-February), he challenged Finlay, who was sitting at ringside. Noble started talking about how they were in Finlay's home town (well, Belfast, Northern Ireland and Glasgow, Scotland are different countries, but to Americans who never studied geography, would know better?). Finlay destroyed Noble in rapid order with about five moves and got the pinfall with his trademark tombstone piledriver. Finlay was one of Europe's all-time great heels in the 80s. Heyman got lots of ECW chants again, and responded with, "Stop chanting ECW, its dead and I wish you all were." There were also loud chants for Rhyno and it almost babyfaced him in the other cities when he was working in prelims. On this show, Cena pinned Rhyno in 25 seconds, so one or both were banged up. They moved Bradshaw to a match with Kidman. To make sure the people didn't cheer Bradshaw against someone who has gotten as much promo and character development time of late as a department store mannequin, Bradshaw made sure to talk about how much he hated Scotland, saying everyone knows it's just "England's bitch." Well, at least he knew what country he was in. Main was the same Guerrero over Show match. This time, after an early ref bump, Eddy was about to do a belt shot but Chavo stopped him. It wound up with Rikishi & Scotty, Bashams, Haas & Benjamin and Cena all doing run-ins while the ref was down. Cena used the FU on Show and Guerrero got the pin with a frog splash. All the faces, along with Nidia and Tome Wilson danced to end the show and tour. This was probably to cover for both being banged up. Show nearly fell asleep on the turnbuckle before the match started. In the stupid move of the night, ring announcer Tony Chimel was told to bring up the May tour of the Raw brand, which people popped for, but when he mentioned the shows were in England and Ireland only, the Scottish fans were none too pleased and booed him out of the building.

 

The only domestic house show of the week was the Raw brand on 3/21 in Fort Wayne. It was headlined by Benoit over HHH with a crossface. It was something of a skeleton crew with RVD, Booker, Flair, Orton and Dudleys not on the show. Dudleys had transportation problems coming from New York. Spike was there but wasn't used. None of the aforementioned names were advertised as the show was built around HHH and Benoit in the advertising. Christian beat Jericho using the ropes and with distraction of Stratus. Storm worked as a heel against Richards, establishing it by saying that his dancing days were over. Richards' apparent heel turn on Heat aired after this show took place for those who actually try and keep characters consistent with television.

[Internet Warfare 0]

I've been waiting for this.

[Use Your Illusion 0]

Hogan vs Piper at WMXX.

 

The fact that it did not happen proves, without doubt, that God does truly exist.

[Hektik 0]

He also said he was with Mad Dog Vachon once on a beach and Vachon had the runs, pulled down his pants, crapped on the beach and said, "That's why they call me the Mad Dog."

When I read that this morning I couldn't stop laughing. It's the whole image of him doing that and then saying that phrase after he's done.

[AnonymousBroccoli 0]

The Canadian Radio-TV Commission has asked for a public call for comments by 5/17/04, when it will make a decision regarding whether Spike TV should be allowed on the CRTC's approved foreign services list. That won't affect Raw, which isn't broadcast on Spike TV into Canada due to non-duplication and WWE being on TSN. This started when the Canadian Association of Broadcasters went to the CRTC to ask for Spike TV to be removed from the list of stations available in the country. The CAB claimed that the license the station was issued back in 1984, as The Nashville Network, was to be a country music station. The claim is the current format is hurting Canadian stations like Men TV and TSN. Removal of Spike TV would mean viewers in Canada would no longer be able to see Velocity, Confidential or Sunday Night Heat.

Fuck. That. Not only for WWE, but MXC.

[Tawren 0]

Wait...they have AUSTIN on the roster, and they want FAAROOQ in rehab?

[CanadianChick 0]

Storm worked as a heel against Richards, establishing it by saying that his dancing days were over. Richards' apparent heel turn on Heat aired after this show took place for those who actually try and keep characters consistent with television.

 

Richards turned heel? How?

[The Mandarin 0]

The Canadian Radio-TV Commission has asked for a public call for comments by 5/17/04, when it will make a decision regarding whether Spike TV should be allowed on the CRTC's approved foreign services list. That won't affect Raw, which isn't broadcast on Spike TV into Canada due to non-duplication and WWE being on TSN. This started when the Canadian Association of Broadcasters went to the CRTC to ask for Spike TV to be removed from the list of stations available in the country. The CAB claimed that the license the station was issued back in 1984, as The Nashville Network, was to be a country music station. The claim is the current format is hurting Canadian stations like Men TV and TSN. Removal of Spike TV would mean viewers in Canada would no longer be able to see Velocity, Confidential or Sunday Night Heat.

Fuck. That. Not only for WWE, but MXC.

And Blind Date repeats!

[SuperJerk 0]

At the Hall of Fame, where he was going crazy for Heenan, Shane went to Heenan after the speech to praise him, and Heenan said, "And your name is?"

Gotta love Heenan.

 

 

I'm under the impression Heenan once said in an interview that he thought Shane was the best person in the business to be a manager.

[2GOLD 0]

Storm worked as a heel against Richards, establishing it by saying that his dancing days were over. Richards' apparent heel turn on Heat aired after this show took place for those who actually try and keep characters consistent with television.

 

Richards turned heel? How?

 

I'd like to know when he turned face before we talk about him turning heel. When did Stevie even become a face???

[CanadianChick 0]

Storm worked as a heel against Richards, establishing it by saying that his dancing days were over. Richards' apparent heel turn on Heat aired after this show took place for those who actually try and keep characters consistent with television.

 

Richards turned heel? How?

 

I'd like to know when he turned face before we talk about him turning heel. When did Stevie even become a face???

During his feud with Test. When Test attacked Victoria, Richards defended her honor, or something like that.

 

 

Now, how did he turn heel?

[ChrisMWaters 0]

Now, how did he turn heel?

Brutally attacked Rico's leg after losing a match.

[Guest I Got Banned for Sucking]

Yes - the hypocracy of that is often brought up.

 

For fuck's sake - Goldberg said himself what the chances were of him returning to WWE.

 

Please, Vince - don't do it!

 

Well, for those who doubted Brock Lesnar going to camp, there you go.

 

Wow - Edge is writing his own book. I'll buy it, if only to hear his opinions on The Hardy Boyz and their matches together, and to see how he fares as a writer.

 

You notice how every older WrestleMania match given to the Museum of Television and Radio involved Hulk Hogan?

 

And where the fuck is Steamboat/Savage?

 

I can't wait to see the WWE Hall of Fame speeches - I'll buy it for Bobby Heenan's speech alone.

 

Interesting House Show notes there, although there's been some pretty retarded worker turns, i.e. Lance Storm.

 

Great read.

[cbacon 0]

No more Stevie and Vicky?

[Guest I Got Banned for Sucking]

No more Stevie and Vicky.

 

But you know how they are in Texas... making-up, breaking-up... Who knows?

[AndrewTS 0]

Anyway, the feeling was that Michaels going on TV and claiming to be the innovator of ladder matches could have only been said knowing it would get Hart mad.

 

Jesus would be so proud.

 

The upcoming WWE Films movie vehicles for Austin, HHH, and Kane are being budgeted at between $15 million and $20 million a piece.

 

Lord knows why.

 

the belief is Hogan and Piper with no build wouldn't have added buys

 

Hogan and Piper with build would have added buys?

 

For fuck's sake they mocked WCW for this same fucking match almost 6 years ago.

 

n the 3/20 issue of Sports Illustrated, as part of their AOL/Time Warner ad campaign, they had an ad for Raw, which read on the bottom, "Don't miss Royal Rumble, January 25 on pay-per-view." WCW lives.

 

 

Some upcoming DVD releases are a Rise and Fall of ECW, Chris Benoit, and a Four Horseman, which is basically an excuse to put more Flair footage to use after his first one sold so well.

 

Rise and Fall of ECW--oh, this should be good.

 

Yay on the two releases.

[Guest I Got Banned for Sucking]

Speaking of Chris Benoit's DVD, I'd love a Chris Benoit book - written by him. While I can't see it, at least it being written by him, a main factor being that most written by the wrestlers themselves, i.e. Mick Foley, Billy Graham and Edge, have been done while they are either down and out, or just out, it would be great so that those who don't already can appreciate what he has been through on his journey to the top.

[Lil' Bitch 0]

No more Stevie and Vicky?

 

They split strangely as they first got together strangely.

[JoeDirt 0]

Shane doesn't like the cruiserweights...

 

Big shocker!

[iliketurtles 0]

Shane McMahon was sitting several rows deep at ringside at Mania. The two things noted to us were he was screaming with everyone else "You sold out" at Lesnar and that he was going crazy for everything Undertaker did. He also took his personal intermission during the cruiserweight match. At the Hall of Fame, where he was going crazy for Heenan, Shane went to Heenan after the speech to praise him, and Heenan said, "And your name is?"

 

That got me the laugh of the night.

[Guest wildpegasus]

Speaking of Chris Benoit's DVD, I'd love a Chris Benoit book - written by him. While I can't see it, at least it being written by him, a main factor being that most written by the wrestlers themselves, i.e. Mick Foley, Billy Graham and Edge, have been done while they are either down and out, or just out, it would be great so that those who don't already can appreciate what he has been through on his journey to the top.

They asked him about that up in Halifax. He didn't give a real decisive answer and than basically just said he still had a few more chaptors to write in his career.

[Guest Mulatto Heat]

Shane McMahon was sitting several rows deep at ringside at Mania. The two things noted to us were he was screaming with everyone else "You sold out" at Lesnar

 

Hmm, no one jumping down Shane's throat saying how wrong he was? Why not?

[Use Your Illusion 0]

For fuck's sake they mocked WCW for this same fucking match almost 6 years ago.

Funnily enough, back in 1997 that match drew SHITLOADS of cash for Halloween Havoc, while HBK vs Taker in the Cell, which involved HBK killing himself about 7 times over, just drew shit.

 

UYI

[Scroby 0]

There's more heat regarding Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels stemming from the Wrestlemania 10 best matches special, when Michaels talked about being the innovator of the ladder match. As best we can tell, the ladder match was invented by Dan Kroffat (not Phil LaFon, but the Calgary wrestler of the 70s that LaFon took his ring name from). Hart, who had several, including a famous one with Dynamite Kid in Calgary, brought the idea to Vince, and did the first one with Shawn. It's well known Hart was mad about Michaels vs. Ramon being booked in a ladder match. Michaels blamed it on Vince and Vince said Shawn asked for it. You know how that goes. Vince had promised Hart that because he came up with it, he could have the first high profile one, but that kind of a promise means nothing. Anyway, the feeling was that Michaels going on TV and claiming to be the innovator of ladder matches could have only been said knowing it would get Hart mad.

 

I remember seeing that match on a tape back then. I thought it was the first ladder match done in the WWF.

[Guest I Got Banned for Sucking]

Ah, I forgot to mention the Shane McMahon piece.

 

Whether the Cruiserweight Open and the Women's Championship match left something to be desired or not, as well as sucking pretty much always when he's used on TV, being expendable in helping to get a gimmick over that's just died, he's an asshole as a person aswell.

[CanadianChick 0]

Maybe Shane knew the two matches would just be filler. If you know that in advance, why watch?

[Guest I Got Banned for Sucking]

I can't them as filler when they're for Championships, especially the Cruiserweight Championship match with it's unique stipulation, but really, they are.

 

It's WrestleMania - filler or not, it doesn't mean that they're going to suck.

 

Note: Whether they did or not did is not an issue here.