Random question - I remember for many years Kane was billed as the "Big Red Machine", but in the last number of years (not sure when exactly) they changed it to the "Big Red Monster" (which I personally have never gotten used to hearing.) Was there any reason for this change? Was there a copyright issue with the Cincinatti Reds?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Red_Machine
Nope. Things like this are generally just at the whim of Vince, to be honest. Just like Championships cannot be belts, and any wrestler not from America will be booed instantly, thus they all must hail from where ever their last hotel stay was at. I could seriously Vince walking in one morning and saying "I saw Frankenstein this morning! Scared the hell out of me! Saw Fast & Furious, didn't scare me! Cars are machines! Frankenstein is a monster! What the hell have we been doing?! Plus I heard there's something called a Goldberg Machine, and we already have crowds chanting Goldberg at Ryback, we don't need them chanting Goldberg at Kane! He's the Big Red Monster from now on!"
Although I'm pretty sure I heard them refer to him as the BRM lately, but I could just be thinking of an old PPV match I saw recently or something.
Speaking of the Goldberg chants at Ryback, they really need to acknowledge that and turn it into an angle. Ryback(or any wrestler) announcing they are going after Goldberg's streak would probably do pretty well. And of course for win number 174, you give Goldberg ALL the money to come in and do the job.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised Kurt Angle's nickname for him didn't stick: "The Big Red Retard"
ReplyDeleteI thought it was a heel/face thing, to be honest. The "Machine" moniker was heaviest during his tag run with X-Pac, and I took it as a way to humanize him. But once he went back to being grim, it was a return to his "Monster" status.
ReplyDeleteWas that Kurt, or was that Rocky?
ReplyDeleteI swore either DX or Jerry Lawler started that.
ReplyDeleteI seem to remember The Rock starting that one.
ReplyDeleteCaliber's impression made me laugh pretty hard.
ReplyDeleteLOVE it
ReplyDeleteSince his character is a bully they could even bring back Sid's gimmick where he just randomly interrupts matches and pins 2 guys and adds them to his number. They could get weeks of TV out of that before he even has to wrestle a real match.
ReplyDeleteIf I'm not mistaken, it started when he was a member of the Corporation, so it's entirely plausible that it was the Rock. Hell, even Vince could have been the one to say it.
ReplyDeleteI remember fondly Angle calling him "Big Red Freak." So much so that I named a fictional wrestler in a board game I had "Big Red Freak."
ReplyDeleteMy memory's hazy, I was only thinking of the Angle promo ("Not that I have anything against retarded people because I don't! I have a lot of retarded fans out there!")
ReplyDeleteRock's voice box impression of Kane. We were doing that all week after in junior high. Classic.
ReplyDeleteI don't recall any of those Vince social commentary segments about baseball, where he talks about their steroid problems while putting over the Wellness Program, before he confronts an indie wrestler dressed up in a Reds uniform who admits, with tears in his eyes, that baseball players aren't real men like wrestlers before Vince slaps him to his knees and rubs his naked ass in his face before running around the right in a home run trot - so I'm guessing there was no legal issue with the Reds.
ReplyDeleteAh, here we go: The Rock was calling Kane a retard during his Corporation days, but then you have this promo, where the "Big Red" comes in.
ReplyDeleteThe way things are going now, he'd probably start jobbing to two guys at a time. At that point, maybe people would start chanting Gillberg at him.
ReplyDeleteProbably wouldn't be much of a problem copyright wise because 1) The reds didn't make the phrase up, a writer from the Cincinnati newspaper did. 2) Lots of other people use the phrase "Big Red Machine" for the name of their business. 3) As far as I can tell the Reds never even tried to copyright it. SO Kane and the WWE are probably safe in that regard
ReplyDeleteThey'd never stick with it long enough to make it work.
ReplyDeleteCalling him a "machine" was a way to....humanize him?
ReplyDeleteI was very awkward when he did moves off the top and would be called by JR the Big Red Missle. Me and my friends used to cram all his big red names together and call him the Big Red Retarded Missle Machine.
ReplyDeleteYup - the name likened him to that incarnation of the Reds, which was built around (of all people) Pete Rose, and put Kane's attack closer to hustle by a ballplayer - Fighting Spirit, if you will. Shifting to "Monster" makes it into something fueled by malice.
ReplyDeleteYou're confusing copyright with trademark. Copyright is for "content", whereas trademark is for a name or symbol.
ReplyDelete"Big Red Machine" is a registered trademark of the Cincinnati Reds in the clothing subcategory. While there's not really a means by which the Reds could stop WWE from referencing Kane as the "Big Red Machine" in broadcast (as there's little chance there would be a claim the usage is confusing to the audience), they certainly could and probably would prevent WWE from marking any clothing or ancillary hard goods with said moniker - thus, the commercial expectancy of the name for WWE is virtually nil. If Vince can't make money off a nickname, why use it?
True, but then this is the same company that lost their name to the Panda People in '02, despite the fact that even to this day when the initials "WWF" are said, people think "wrestlers" or "fake fighting" as opposed to "pandas" or "animal rights."
ReplyDeleteMan, I miss JR's Freudian slips
ReplyDeleteMARK HENRY IS HANDLING THE BIG JOHNSON!
LITA IS JERKING EDGE OFF!..........THE LADDER!
book it
ReplyDelete