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Jake/Macho Man feud

I just got finished watching This Tuesday in Texas for the first time since it happened and there's something I'm curious about coming out of it. With everything leading up to, and following, the Jake Roberts/Randy Savage match (the snake bite, Roberts slapping Liz and and insanely intense post match interview from Savage), how is it that all we got out of this program was two less than 10 minute jobs by the Snake on TTIT AND SNME? Savages promo after the match was psychotic. He wanted to fucking kill Roberts for smacking Elizabeth.

I don't get why there was no real blow off. I understand this feud led up to the Undertaker's face turn but with all that came out of it, the payoff seemed kind of weak.

​Yeah, in this case there is actually a story behind it.  Basically Jake was supposed to have the blowoff with Savage at Wrestlemania, but they switched Macho's match to the title match (I'm talking months before, not the TV kayfabe switch) and made promises to Jake about taking over as booker when Pat Patterson retired shortly after Wrestlemania if he'd do the job to Undertaker instead.  And then Wrestlemania came and Vince was like "Psych!  We're just not gonna hire someone after all" and Jake freaked out and threatened to jump ship to WCW because his contract was up, so then he ended up getting completely squashed by Undertaker.  And then WCW changed command structure and he lost his supposed million dollar contract with them.  Whoops.  ​So he got triple fucked and ended up signing with WCW for WAY less in August when his non-compete ended.  


​So basically, yes, the Macho-Jake feud was supposed to go longer and pay off bigger, but they felt it was more important to get the belt onto Savage and Jake was disposable.  Which, as it turns out, he was.  ​

Comments

  1. If Jake was disposable, then why did he get into the Hall of Fame before Savage?

    Don't have a snappy comeback for that, do you?

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  2. What shame. I just watched TTIT as well and that shit was *electric*

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  3. Theberzerker, #HUSSAPPROVEDMarch 1, 2015 at 7:48 PM

    Man, the ~15 minute blowoff match, possibly gimmicked, on the biggest stage of them all would have been goddamn EPIC.

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  4. Unfortunate that Roberts held up Vince for his release (and Mania payoff) because Vince had no intention of filling Patterson's spot (because Pat was really coming back when the heat died down from the sex scandal). Roberts could've done a lot for the heel side in 1992. Other than Flair, it was pretty dismal, with Sid being suspended/fired, and 'Taker turning face. You could argue Shawn, but he was still feeling around his gimmick and style.

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  5. I remember Jake telling his version of this story, which was basically right in line with this, on his DVD. You could tell he feels that moment was a big turning point for him, because he got doubly-fucked.

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  6. Who would Jake feud with? More with the Undertaker? Or paying off the original heel turn with a feud with the returning Warrior?

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  7. Well, Jake attacked Savage with a cobra BUT...Flair insinuated that HE was with Liz before Randy...that clearly takes precedence.

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  8. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 7:59 PM

    It all gets a pass because Flair vs. Savage ended up being awesome and Sid-Hogan was what they always wanted anyway.

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  9. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:00 PM

    Was Jake just a fuck up in WCW or what? He worked the one PPV match with Sting at Halloween Havoc, then was gone as fast as he arrived

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  10. Savage didn't die 5 years sooner.

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  11. He got hurt, I believe. He lived with DDP a while.

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  12. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:03 PM

    Ultimate Warrior, Bret Hart, maybe Boss Man? I could see an interesting quasi-stable of Jake, Papa Shango, Kamala, and the Headshrinkers as the sort of pre-Dungeon of Doom cartoonish heel foils they liked throwing at Undertaker.

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  13. "I could cultivate her into even something that I would want...!"


    Slimeball Jake was the best.

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  14. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:04 PM

    I think it would feel like an even bigger missed opportunity had it not been replaced with Macho vs. Flair, which was also goddamn epic

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  15. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:04 PM

    Weird that he never came back, even if just as a promo guy until he got healthy

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  16. Warrior and 'Taker are good jumping off points, then transition into putting Bret over, and maybe turn him face again after that. When Papa Shango and Nailz are high profile pushes because of a lack of depth, things are in the shitter.

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  17. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:05 PM

    Great heel. Whereas Dibiase, Rude, and Perfect made great heels for being such elitist pricks, Jake was great because he legitimately gave you the creeps

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  18. I think he was released for checking into drug rehab or something.

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  19. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:08 PM

    Jake would have made a good cult leader type, long before Bray Wyatt. Roberts brainwashing dudes into following some crazy message would have been effective if only because Jake was such a great heel promo.

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  20. I always believed that Bray should've had a Koresh-like family who answered to a greater calling...that being Jake Roberts.

    Ultra creepy.

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  21. The Savage Tuesday in Texas is one of the Top 5 promos in the history of professional wrestling. Fact.

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  22. Savage AND Jake are both money.

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  23. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:15 PM

    The Wyatt-as-cult leader gimmick really could have gone somewhere. Recruiting converts and such, expanding his sphere of influence, strength in numbers, etc. Like Raven, only not necessarily with a bunch of jobbers. Even using guys who weren't doing much else, it at least freshens people up and makes Wyatt seem important. Having just the two sweaty hillbilly dudes for a year didn't make him seem all that menacing.

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  24. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:21 PM

    Side tangent: WCW really did have a way of over-complicating things. They bring in Jake Roberts, coming off a successful heel run in the WWF, at a PPV called "Halloween Havoc" and program him with Sting, their biggest babyface. Yet instead of just saying "go have a wild brawl" or putting them in a cage or something, they do the "Spin the Wheel, Make the Deal" nonsense and put a fucking glove on a pole.

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  25. I have talked about it ad nauseum....


    But if Wyatt had actual women and children with him...and these people willingly sacrifice themselves for him...it'd be a dark, twisted turn. Macho used to get heat with Liz by putting her in front of other guys...can you imagine Bray doing that with a 11-year-old boy? Or a woman?

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  26. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:22 PM

    Did anyone actually like Jake's 1996 run? Other than being a catalyst for Austin's "3:16" promo, it seemed pretty useless to me.

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  27. Wasn't that match a rare example of the wheel actually not being gimmicked? Or am i remembering incorrectly?

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  28. He was visibly out of shape, and just felt like a shell of his former self. It wasn't "Awful", but he was one of the hypocritical participants of the "new generation" mocking WCW pushing has-beens.

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  29. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:24 PM

    Hell yes. They were more than willing to do that kind of stuff with the Eddie-Rey feud too. Bray having some creepy children out their as his "sheep" would definitely add something to it. As it stands, he's just a guy in goofy clothes who does rambling promos and sometimes wins a match. I like the guy, he just doesn't get booked like something special. I think it's a matter of a guy who should come across as unique, but who is just a guy at the end of the day

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  30. It was gimmicked. Every other option would require blood, and they had a no blood policy.

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  31. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:25 PM

    Yeah. Even without blood though, just do a crazy "No Holds Barred" or "Street Fight" type thing. Taking a scary heel vs. your top babyface and giving it a shitty gimmick match payoff made the whole thing silly

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  32. One of my favorite feuds ever. I love Savage getting that crazy look on his face when Snake's music starts playing and jumping him in the aisle.

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  33. Things like this is why WCW was constantly losing money (promising big, failing to deliver), but for the short term, Havoc '92 popped a rather large buy, I recall.

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  34. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:27 PM

    I almost think Jake's comeback would have worked better in WCW. If he first just played the same creepy heel as a part of the Dungeon of Doom, maybe that group at least has one guy with some credibility besides Giant. Then when the nWo comes around, maybe he's the crazy loner who refuses to join, ala DDP in '97.

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  35. Fat, Ugly Inner-City SweathogMarch 1, 2015 at 8:27 PM

    You know whose music never should have changed? Jake Roberts.

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  36. I thought his feel music was pretty cool. Sounded more menacing and twisted.

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  37. Yah I loved both of his themes.

    "Trust me...."

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  38. They had cage matches all over the country in the first part of '92. Remember, house shows were still the money makers while TV was a loss leader--the precise opposite of how it is now. To see the blow off you had to buy a ticket and watch it live.

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  39. That, and they decided that if there wasn't going to be blood, then they should at least do a gimmick match that was new to a national audience. That said, the coal miner's glove stip didn't have the cache in 1993 WCW than it did with Dutch Savage in the Northwest, where it was way over and treated as a career-ending spectacle.

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  40. He and Watts absolutely hated each other and probably still do to this day.

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  41. Bret has said that he was supposed to feud with Jake coming out of WM. I don't know how plausible that really is, because I think they had already started sowing the seeds of Shawn challenging for the belt on TV before the show and Jake quit that morning. But that's what Bret says.

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  42. TJ: Bayless have u ever reviewed sandman/sraven roh straight shootin vol 1/2?

    I swear it is my favorite shoots of all time.

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  43. Lawler was a lot of fun during their feud together.

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  44. GET OUT OF HERE! GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE. I DON'T WANT TO TALK TO YOU.

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  45. WrestleMania VIII that should have been:
    Hogan/Flair (WWF Title)
    Savage/Jake (no dq)
    Sid/Undertaker
    Money Inc. v. New Foundation (tag titles)
    LOD v. Natural Disasters (street fight)
    Bret/Piper (IC Title)
    Shawn Michaels v. Marty Jannetty

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  46. Best part about it?

    It was essentially the same song, but in two versions. The faster one is the babyface version, the heel version is the same riff, but almost at an Undertaker-like pace.

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  47. Yeah they had started sowing those seeds. Michaels went over Piper by count-out (or dq) in a non-title match on the "Road to WrestleMania" special the week before WrestleMania, setting him up as a natural challenger for Bret.

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  48. I sat first row when they did the Cage Match Matinee in Moline, IL. Dude, they tore the place apart.

    So weird seeing a Cage Match in the middle of the day, with the Sun shining and stuff.

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  49. Were there real justice Jake and new valet Sherri would have terrorized Savage and Liz, but White Knight Vince wouldn't want to book heat, no sir. He was too busy leering at Liz on commentary.

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  50. Dibiase has to be the best heel of all time. Th mdm was just such a pompous gimmick that he nailed.

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  51. Ehhhhhh. Liz wasn't getting in the ring with anyone, Sherri would be kinda pointless added to the feud.

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  52. I honestly didn't mind that Jake was a loner. It almost played up to the fact that he was a total scumbag who nobody cared to support.

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  53. They wouldn't have to wrestle. Sherri would stalk and chase her, maybe attack her once before the blowoff when Liz finally puts Sherri on her ass and Randy wins.

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  54. I'm gonna go with Demolition. Went from an awesome theme to a generic theme better fit for like Papa Shango.

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  55. On his DVD, Jake says it was also the issue of his addictions hitting full blast. Vince gets the good line that Jake at the time was one of those guys who could be high as a kite and/or drunk and you wouldn't even know it and that played into things.

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  56. and yet WWE tries to paint Paul Heyman as the biggest liar in pro wrestling. VKM doth protest too much.

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  57. Michaels/Jannetty at WM with the rest of the card as it went down would have been awesome. Too bad Marty got busted for having cocaine and fighting the police right before the Rumble.

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  58. Whoa, awesome! I knew about the coke, but I forgot about the fight with Police. Jannetty is soooo old school tuff.

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  59. I've always heard and/or read that nobody could hide their intoxication better than Jake.


    .....well, except for that Hotel bedroom floor that Mick Foley slept on. There was no hiding that intoxication.

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  60. Yeah actually I think that's how they turned the coke actually. He had some issue with a guy outside a club, the cops got called, he got into it with them and then got searched.

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  61. He's one of those dudes, and I see it on Twitter...


    He just does not give a single fuck. I guess...more power to him. Party on, Rocker Dropper.

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  62. "Paul never lied to the fans. He lied to the WRESTLERS, but not the fans." Tommy Dreamer.

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  63. I do love how the feud started and even like the elimination match from the clash.

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  64. Yeah the angle was very good! The match is where it totally bombed,

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  65. To this day I'll never get how WCW thought Rude was going to workout as a face in 1994 had he not gotten injured.

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  66. Watts just seems like a piece of shit with HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGEEEE insecurity issues.

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  67. "Son, I'm going to have to Fine you, just for that slanderous curse word."


    --Cowboy

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  68. Huh, cannibalizing Jake for Vince's baby. Thankfully he'd never do THAT again.

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  69. Watts always just seems like he had a problem with anyone who talked back. All the people who really hate him were often outspoken guys who also sometimes had substance problems (Jake, Shawn), but the guys who like him are fairly clean-cut, keep-your-head-down guys (Foley, JR).


    He's obviously really opinionated tho, and he has the whole "old man yelling at clouds" thing down to a science. He always did.

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  70. Watts story I love from the WWF, during his short run as "guy in control." Vince HATED the idea of Raw ending on a downer note, the episode specifically being the massive beatdown on Taker that was in kayfabe covering up a real injury caused by Mabel. He hated Watts idea so much that the show was edited to have meaningless filler put after it. A few weeks after Watts quits for whatever reasons, Vince ends Raw on the downer of down notes: Shawn's collapse.

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  71. ARRRRGH THE BARBARIANMarch 1, 2015 at 10:00 PM

    I owe ya one, pal.

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  72. I never liked it. He was generally portrayed as someone who could never win an important match, in fact often losing in humiliating fashion (kotr, Lawler at Summerslam) but whom we were expected to root for because he still got in there despite his "age" and gosh darnit just "gave it his all". It always felt to me like when the kid who's dead last in a swimming race gets a round of applause anyway; patronising and rather pitiful.

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  73. In Bret's book he said when he was told about losing the IC belt and winning it from Piper that he'd be losing it to Shawn in the fall, before Bret suggested he drop it to Bulldog instead. He didn't mention the Jake thing at all.

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  74. Your avatar is barbaric!

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  75. Vince does to both

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  76. Rude was someone who should NEVER be a face, ever. His heel stuff was just too good. WCW was never the sharpest knives in the drawer. . .

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  77. CruelConnectionNumber2March 1, 2015 at 11:50 PM

    "The Steiners and Public Enemy aren't going anywhere." Heyman to the ECW fans... four months later, they'd be gone.

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  78. CruelConnectionNumber2March 1, 2015 at 11:53 PM

    They also let Steamboat walk months prior. Could've got HBK over Steamboat (!) instead of a meh Tito match.

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  79. CruelConnectionNumber2March 1, 2015 at 11:55 PM

    He was horrible and it sucked.

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  80. I disagree with you about Rude as a face, I think he would've been crazy over. The WCW version of Rude was a lot more harder-edged and fans respected that he was a tough guy who was arrogant because he was 'that damn good.' Rude as a face would've had a lot of similarities to Flair whenever he was a face in WCW, frankly.

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  81. Jake's 1996 run wasn't great, but I liked that his age and past-his-primeness was a part of his character. He was the tough old veteran getting by on guts and wiles, who'd normally be totally overmatched except for his insta-killer finishing move. The DDT was the big equalizer for Jake to retain credibility.

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  82. I believe the SNME that featured the final Jake/Savage bout and the infamous "chair attack through the curtain" incident was the last SNME prior to Wrestlemania 8. If they'd had one more Main Event in between the two shows, I suspect that would've been Savage vs. Jake in a cage or something to blow it off completely, probably with some Undertaker supernatural shenanigans to stop Jake from more crazy stuff.

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  83. Theberzerker, #HUSSAPPROVEDMarch 2, 2015 at 12:22 AM

    The "RIGHT NOW YEAH!" promo from their SNME match was no slouch either. Savage had the wildest eyes of any wrestler ever that night.

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  84. Theberzerker, #HUSSAPPROVEDMarch 2, 2015 at 12:24 AM

    It definitely was, but we wouldn't have known how much of a missed opportunity...not until Summerslam at least, or maybe Survivor Series.

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  85. exactly. there's dozens of feuds that never a had definite "blowoff" match on tv.

    Earthquake vs. Hogan, Warrior vs. Shango, Warrior vs. Undertaker, Savage vs. Ramon, Boss Man vs. Heenan Family, .... (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about any of those)

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  86. like the Dungeon part, dislike the nWo part.

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  87. which btw wouldn't work today at all because essentially every finishing move has been kicked out of countless times.

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  88. The joke about the tough old veteran bit is that he was only two years older than Bret Hart (although of course he looked a lot older).

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  89. I am pretty sure they wouldn't dare to do anything like this because of being afraid of "losing sponsors" etc.

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  90. absolutely. who would want to trade that awesome Flair vs. Savage match against a mediocre Flair/Hogan one? (and let's be realistic. it's very likely it would have been just that. something similar could also be said about Savage vs. Roberts as an alternative to what we really got)

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  91. disagree. actually I always thought it was weird that Demolition had such a babyface-ish theme, even back when they were heels (imo a heel theme doesn't need to pop the crowd).

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  92. Yeah, but us WCW fans got that awesome Rhodes/Steamboat vs Larry Z/Arn Anderson tag bout from the clash out of the whole deal.

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  93. Rude vs Roberts. When I was younger it use to make me scratch my head as to why it seemed like they'd start these stories, but never finish them. Thanks to the network I now know that so many of these feuds were simply blown off at msg.

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  94. Sounds like a pretty cool image actually. One of the reasons I LOVE wrestlemania 3 is for that very same reason.

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  95. The "RIGHT NOW YEAH!" promo from their SNME match was no slouch either.
    Savage had the most coked up eyes of any wrestler ever that night.

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  96. But think of the time frame. The heel promo, yet I'm a face that Austin became so famous for was years away. I can't picture Rude with the usual schtick and getting that over as a face. What's he going to say "What I would like to please ask is for all you great, friendly fans......." yeah, just can't picture it.

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  97. Eh......I'm not so sure there. I thought his work with Hogan in WCW was just fine.

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  98. Flair attacked with his snake before Jake did.

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  99. And yet so many people always think Bret was this big, innocent little puppy in his beef with Shawn. Bret played politics just like the rest, and honestly all HBK did is learn from so many before him, and that to make a success you just have to play the game that others did.

    Compare those that did and those who didn't and see how successful their post wrestling lives are.

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  100. I don't know, it seems like they were getting pretty good heel heat for their theme by SummerSlam 90

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  101. I think he seemed much more motivated (again) at that point.

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  102. Yeah, I agree with that. Hogan's WWF work kinda tanked after WM7, but by his WCW run it seemed like he had something to prove and a lot more to lose.

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  103. They just had not enough PPVs back then. And now we complain about too many of them... strange world. ;-)

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  104. His gear was even worse than his working ability.

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  105. The wrestlers lied to Paul?

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  106. Why not with Savage for the title? Just continue their still existing feud.

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  107. "Macho Madness is more seductive than sex".

    Been going through some old Prime Times as Id been nastalging hard for some Gorilla/Heenan chemistry, and Savage just broke out this line during a segment with Mean Gene.

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  108. It was the very first PPV I ever got to order as we had just gotten the capability in my area.

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  109. Really though, what were the plans with Savage suppose to be had Savage not left after summerslam, and did they know he was leaving, thus the wedding angle?

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  110. Easy fix. Just have Rude's pre-match promo be directed at his opponent instead of the fans. "What I'd like to have right now is for this fat, ugly, mask-wearing Rocky Mountain sweathog to keep his mouth shut about he's the man, while he looks at what a real man is." Then he does the hip swivel right in front of an irate Vader.

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  111. It's just a weaker Seinfeld, especially when Ross desperately tried to be George in the later series. It has funny moments but Friends should have stopped years before it did.

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  112. Charismatic eNegro Jef VinsonMarch 2, 2015 at 5:45 AM

    This would would IF we had a World champion that didn't defend his title once every 1000 years.

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  113. Charismatic eNegro Jef VinsonMarch 2, 2015 at 5:45 AM

    Jokes about Jerry Lawler or jokes that Jerry Lawler might say?

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  114. Charismatic eNegro Jef VinsonMarch 2, 2015 at 5:46 AM

    That makes sense and I like it.

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  115. Early ppvs had guys fight that didn't really have a feud to set up or advance angles for upcoming house shows.

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  116. "I heard Haku wants Barbarians antlers" - Monsoon

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  117. Which made the title mean something.

    Course, the trick was that WCW had so many main eventers that they had themselves covered. I mean Flair, Luger, Sting, Nash, Giant, Savage, Piper... throw in DDP and Hall if need be, and they had someone to cover the slack.

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  118. If Cena turned heel, the crowd would cheer him so much he'd have to turn babyface. See Austin, Rock etc. The best heel was Jericho, who did NOTHING to get any cheers whatsoever. Most people can't comprehend that.

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  119. OFF-TOPIC... but does anyone else agree Chris Jericho's 'serious man' heel run was one of the best of all time? He managed to play a scumbag who could back it up in the ring while still selling like a boss for faces, he had great matches and feuds, and he achieved this without ever doing anything that'd get him a slight cheer.

    I bash Jericho a lot, but during that period? Dude was the best in the world at what he did.

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  120. Sherri was not needed in that feud. Jake was fine on his own.

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  121. I thought Wrestlemania 8 was excellent already, but could understand the idea behind this card.


    I like the tag matches you have as I thought the tag title match at 8 between the Disasters and Money Inc was pretty boring and heatless.

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  122. Great idea.


    I'd add something to it. Namely keep Cesaro as a Heyman guy, and have him 'represent' Lesnar at various events. Like a 'beat Cesaro, you get Lesnar' deal. And one that pisses Cesaro off. So Cesaro is a Heyman guy/Authority member and you slowly start to turn him face. Make Rumble 2015 a four way between Cesaro, Rollins, Cena and Lesnar and then have Rollins vs Cesaro at Mania. And if you need to give Orton something to do, have him fucking face Taker in a 'you beat me at your peak, but now you're broken down' thing. Like Lesnar took the streak, Orton wants to kill The Undertaker's legacy. And it helps Taker because if anyone is going to have a match where they don't kill Taker's body, it's Orton. Dude is a fucking safe machine.

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  123. Theberzerker, #HUSSAPPROVEDMarch 2, 2015 at 6:37 AM

    Touché.

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  124. Theberzerker, #HUSSAPPROVEDMarch 2, 2015 at 6:39 AM

    "Happened so fast you can't even talk about it, yeah."

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  125. That was during JeriShow, right? When Jericho switched to speedo tights?


    Yeah, that was unquestionably his best period. I like Jericho in general, but that was the best he was in his career.

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  126. I don't see what the big deal is there. Netflix, I can understand, because more than one person in the household might want to watch different things. I can't imagine that being the case for a niche product like wrestling.

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  127. 1,000,000+ subscribers is the new failing?

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  128. Still offering less flexibility for the same price. Some people will be annoyed because they have two PPV streams running at once in case one stream goes down.

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  129. It is when that number is mostly bullshit and far below projected numbers.

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  130. If everybody does that, that's twice the load. And the stream was failing pretty miserably for me last month, so I'm fine with this. They probably should have done it from the start so that people would have gotten used to it.

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  131. Like Flair and Backlund being the same age in the 1993 Rumble but Bob was the old veteran.

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  132. Projected numbers are bullshit for the investors. Internally, I would guess they are actually quite happy with the progress.

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  133. Uh oh, we're from the same town.

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  134. Friends = John Cena where intelliget people dislike it, and the only people that like it are kids or people that don't know any better

    Frasier = Daniel Bryan

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  135. I heard when fat Monica was born, she had a C, D and E-section.

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  136. I loved those parts of his third book. Where Show was all 'eh, let's entertain people' and Jericho was all 'NO. WE'RE HEELS. AND NO JERISHOW GODDAMNIT.' Those two were a great team on/off screen.

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  137. AverageJoeEverymanMarch 2, 2015 at 7:39 AM

    "Jokes Jerry Lawler Might Say" sounds like a $10,000 Pyramid answer.

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  138. I was actually talking about his babyface run in 1994/1995.

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  139. "Yes, the TV title defenses and such were deflating the importance of the belt on a weekly basis"


    I don't remember this happening nearly as much in the last 10-15 years as it did in the Attitude Era.

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  140. Jericho's one of my two or three favorite wrestlers ever, and yeah, his Bockwinkel-esque '08-10 run is phenomenal stuff. '00-01 babyface Jericho and '98 WCW conspiracy theorist Jericho are the only other versions of him that are on par with that, to me.

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  141. His stuff with HHH in 2000 comes a close second, but those shitty punches...

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  142. Some of the subtle things he did in the feud with Michaels were great. Realizing when he punched Shawn's wife he went too far, not looking him in the eyes...I don't know why they didn't just run with him as the heel champion to Wrestlemania that year.

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  143. Read his book for the behind the scenes on that. Everything re: Michaels in that book is fascinating.

    Jericho vs HHH for the title at that Mania would've been great. Humiliates Michaels and Batista, then it's up to HHH to stop Jericho. Play up their previous feuds, have Jericho get psychological, and have at it.

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  144. WCW Rude was fucking awesome. Amazing what a haircut and just letting the guy beat the shit out of people can do for someone. The ass whooping he gave Steamboat on the April 4th 1992 episode of WorldWide is one of the best ever.

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  145. I dislike Jericho in general, and I didn't enjoy that heel run for the most part. Slow, monotone promos littered with words like "hypocrites" and "sycophants" don't entertain me. Plus, he had the same problem that I noticed during his Undisputed run: way too obviously an artificial 'character'. Tried too hard, and wasn't very believable despite it. Edge had the same problem.

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  146. Plus a slew of good TV matches on SD against a variety of opponents (Sheamus, Kane, Khali, Rhodes, Barrett, etc.).

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  147. JBL was better at that than Jericho was.

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  148. I've heard people criticizing Reigns' cardio (especially during the Bryan match) but I haven't noticed him seeming particularly blown-up.

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  149. 100% agree - it was a fantastic idea that was mishandled.

    I wouldn't have even minded Brock defending every other month, but four months was just way too long. I fully support the idea of having the champ only wrestle on PPV (especially now, as a way to push the "Network"), but like anything, if you wait too long to pull the trigger, the audience stops caring.

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  150. In today's WWE, if you sometimes win a match, you ARE booked like something special.

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  151. I really, REALLY like your idea for Cesaro.

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  152. JBL had a lot of X-Pac Heat, though; with Jericho, even if you didn't find the character "entertaining", you still knew you'd get a pretty good match. JBL, not so much.

    And that's coming from someone who always liked JBL/Bradshaw.

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  153. Ehh, I think it depends on if he's champion or not. As champion, I feel he should wrestle at least every other month (so, like, 9 out of 12 PPVs), but if he's not champ, then I'll be happy with the 3-4 matches per year.

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  154. Definitely. One of my favorite programs was Rock and Foley trading the title back-and-forth; they were positioned as two tippy-top guys that were on equal footing with each other.

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  155. They should really just unify the IC and US titles into a new TV title already. Make the champ defend every Raw, Smackdown, and PPV. Put it on a workhorse like Cesaro until a hot new act comes along.

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  156. Not knocking that at all. JBL was a brilliant heel. He had that 'incite a riot' heel attitude.

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  157. Cesaro vs Lesnar AT Fastlane writes itself, ya know? I know they'd have to pay up to Lesnar, but that match would've been the shit. Just for Cesaro doing the Swiss Death on Lesnar for a near fall.

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  158. I honestly think the snake wedding angle was done just to get Sid over as a babyface as I think Savage was pretty adamant about not coming back full-time. Then Sid tore up his triceps and was out from October until the Rumble.

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  159. Yeah, I mean Bret dropping it to Davey in England is a good suggestion and was the way to go, but if that's Shawn suggesting that he not drop it to Bret but to drop it to, say, Razor, instead we'd still be hearing about it. Shawn was pretty open about politics on Jericho's podcast - he was presented with things he didn't like sometimes, he made his case why he didn't like it, and whatever was ultimately decided on was decided on and he did it. He's not worse than anyone else.

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  160. They still have Sting and Giant...

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  161. How many times did the belt change hands between SS 98 and WM 99? Like twice a month? Foley and Rock swapped that shit bi-weekly at points. And it didn't matter because Rock was such a good heel that seeing Foley kick his ass wasn't enough - you wanted Austin to beat him. Same reason Austin-McMahon works... Austin got his revenge on McMahon what... 60-70 times between WM 98 and Fully Loaded 99? He beat McMahon weekly and it still worked because of how brilliantly loathsome McMahon was.

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  162. Another rumor was his wife was pregeant and threatened to leave unless he quit.

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  163. Rude '94 vs HHH '15. Not sure if that scenario popped into my head because that would be a cool dream match, or because they somehow show similarities.

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  164. I like this though for some reason. DoD Elite in comparison to what the real Dungeon turned out to be.

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  165. Yeah that is a good little match with a pretty bad finish.

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  166. I always dug the SuperBrawl V match. Wrong guy went over though, and Hogan ruined the powerbomb. Or did he do that at the previous Clash, even? When Vader's pants ripped?

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  167. Look at the early days of Nitro. The belt was defended regularly on tv and there were a couple of title changes as well. This was all about countering what Raw was doing but it didn't devalue the title because of the storylines and feuds revolving around the belt.

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  168. I agree, I'm just saying the title doesn't seem to be defended on free TV anywhere near as much as it used to. I remember it happening once in 2014.

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  169. Agree with the majority, the theory was excellent, the execution has been awful.


    One of the major focuses of the weekly show in the last year should have been around earning the right to take on 'The Monster', everybody literally crawling over each other in order to be the one who gets the chance to defeat Brock and be the man who beat the man who took the streak.


    They could have had fueds based solely around the number one contendership, mini Raw tournaments to name the No 1 contender and a whole lot of really strong matches with 2 guys just trying to prove they are worthy of a shot.


    Instead what have we had - the usual mix of Cena title shots, Authority soap opera nonsense and everybody trading wins and losses in the name of making nobody look weak (whereas in reality it makes everyone look average)


    In short, a great idea, horrible implementation and a missed oppurtunity

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  170. Santana vs Martel, Jake vs Quake. Jake and Quake were even teaming a few months later at SurSe 91. Sigh.

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