WWE.com Lists the 15 Greatest World Heavyweight Champions
http://www.wwe.com/classics/15-greatest-world-heavyweight-champs
Thanksgiving Episode of Impact Draws Lowest Rating Since the Show Moved to Thursday Night
They drew a 0.7 rating
http://www.f4wonline.com/more/more-top-stories/100-tna/34265-impact-thanksgiving-night-rating
New Episode of Steve Corino's "Old School" Released with Dr. Tom Prichard
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYTZ2FzLOpE
Jim Ross to Appear on "Wrestling Observer Radio" Today
Its only for subscribers but if you do subscribe, it should be an awesome show
http://www.f4wonline.com/
http://www.wwe.com/classics/15-greatest-world-heavyweight-champs
Thanksgiving Episode of Impact Draws Lowest Rating Since the Show Moved to Thursday Night
They drew a 0.7 rating
http://www.f4wonline.com/more/more-top-stories/100-tna/34265-impact-thanksgiving-night-rating
New Episode of Steve Corino's "Old School" Released with Dr. Tom Prichard
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYTZ2FzLOpE
Jim Ross to Appear on "Wrestling Observer Radio" Today
Its only for subscribers but if you do subscribe, it should be an awesome show
http://www.f4wonline.com/
The KOTR is kind of a gimme, so yeah...depending on when. His feud with Warrior just seemed so silly to me. The one with Jake...well, at least they were both older guys, but not being familiar with Memphis wrestling or really any of Lawler's "glory days" at the time, I didn't see why the guy was in the ring.
ReplyDeleteHardcore? Really? Did he have any experience with that style? I honestly don't remember.
If a Chief Financial Officer was playing, I think I would've watched every week.
ReplyDeleteI wish I remember how they blew it. I know the players weren't that good compared to the NFL, but other than that, I just don't remember. Other than JR trying to call a football game, that is.
ReplyDeleteXFL could have been an off-season minor league/college football to the NFL, but people rejected it quickly. Perhaps people just wanted the quality to be at least on par with college or NFL, and maybe it was far worse than that.
Maddux and Glavine should get in together. Ideally with Smoltz as well, but they didn't retire in the same year.
ReplyDeleteI can't conceive of an alternate reality where any of Vince's side ventures would've been successful because he involves wrestling in all of them. Successful umbrella companies don't mix all their subsidiaries together at every turn.
ReplyDeleteVince also has a habit of attempting to change the 'standard'. He goes against the big dog, such as the IFBB and the NFL, and then creates his own set of rules to differentiate the two. That's just not going to work.
The biggest problem is he doesn't know jack shit about anything other than wrestling. He lives, breathes, sleeps, eats, and pisses wrestling. Yet he insists on being directly involved in each venture. You have to know your limitations and I don't think Vince does. In fact, I'm sure Vince thinks he doesn't have any.
Different rules, trying to be XTREME FOOTBALL!!, caring more about cheerleaders than the game, involving Vince in any capacity.
ReplyDeleteHe is credited with one of (if not the) first hardcore matches in history: The Concession stand brawl in Tupelo.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/F5wRnB-eDC8
agreed. He busted his ass in the Angle match for instance.
ReplyDeleteKent mercer or GTFO
ReplyDeleteIf the WHC traces its roots back to WCW, how can HHH be the 1st World Heavyweight Champion? Or should I not think that hard WWE. Jesus.
ReplyDeleteHuh. What a trip. I'm guessing that Lawler's partner is Dundee and the future Honky has blonde hair?? Weird.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing. I had no idea.
Also its insulting to your audience when, if one so chooses, all they have to do is look up HHH getting the belt on Youtube and noticing that WWE's telling of the story isn't how things happened.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. There's just so money in having a viable sports property, even a smaller scale one, that you're right— if the XFL gets through a few seasons and makes it to the current glut of cable sports networks they'd be shitting money.
ReplyDeleteMy thought at the time was that they just started way too big off the bat, yet at the same time not having the talent to back up how big they went. Why didn't Vince try to buy an existing property, like the Arena Football League, and rechristen that instead? Would have given him an existing infrastructure and an actual talent roster that the public could accept. Obviously I have no actual idea if such a thing would have been possible, but it always seemed to me like a more logical use of money than simply starting from scratch.
Overall though, I just think the XFL set too high of a bar off the bat by A) Playing in 75,000 seat football stadiums and B) Pitching itself as an improvement on the NFL, rather than an off-season alternative. Shit like that made their shortcomings seem that much more apparent and open for ridicule.
He actually did try to buy the CFL according to the XFL's Wikipedia page.
ReplyDeleteYep. Lawler had some GREAT bloody matches. It's a damned shame he became such a parody in the WWE.
ReplyDelete1. Chris Benoit
ReplyDeleteThe WWE version of that belt never had more cred than it did from the time Benoit declared that he wanted it to the point that he lost it.
Absolutely. I think he also has a good match with Jack Brisco on his DVD, but that's about it. And after the IC run, his character was terrible too.
ReplyDeleteOh wow, see now that would have made some sense. Yeah it wouldn't have made the splash of creating an actual competitor to the NFL--- but fuck, that had no chance of happening anyway. Vince should have focused on something smaller but manageable.
ReplyDeleteWell...at a certain point, you can't keep doing that stuff to your body.
ReplyDeleteHave you ever heard him outside of wrestling? I heard him do an interview on a local radio show (I forget what they were promoting), and the man was charming, likable, and *completely* different from his heel persona, and much more entertaining than what we get now. It would be interesting to see him break that "character" out on Raw.
A well deserved check with the money he was drawing.
ReplyDeleteThere's also not a lot of footage available of Dusty at his peak.
ReplyDeleteThe main difference was that the bloody stuff had psychology wrapped around it. You don't have to bleed or take a chair shot every match. It could just be a good stiff brawl outside the ring.
ReplyDeleteAs for Lawler outside the ring, he is a very likeable person. I wished that Vince would have financially backed Lawler and let him run his Memphis territories the right way.
I noticed you left out the SurSer match with Booker, which was pretty bad. I also wasn't a fan of... a majority of those you listed; only the Rumble triple threat stood out. To each their own, though.
ReplyDeleteI think a lot of the stink with JBL's reign was that it was so out-of-the-blue and poorly booked - I "get" that they were going for the HTM-style reign, where the fans were supposed to salivate at the thought of someone FINALLY beating him, but instead, the fans were just indifferent to him and really didn't get invested in his matches. Plus, if that's the type of reign the company wanted, there were far better guys to give the belt to; Angle, specifically, though a heel Booker or heel RVD would have been interesting, as well.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I do think JBL was always very underrated as a worker. Sure, he wasn't the type to carry lesser workers to a good match (and his "big hoss brawls" against bigger guys were generally terrible), but when in there with a decent opponent, I really liked them. He was especially good against smaller opponents, he always played his role in "David vs. Goliath" matches exceedingly well (IMO). Angle, Benoit, Eddie, Rey, even going back to his "APA" days against The Hardys, he worked really well with smaller opponents.
Granted, you can say that most of those guys could carry lesser workers to good matches, which is true, but JBL's matches with them were generally better than most other big hoss' matches with them.
In true Vince fashion, the CFL inquired about him buying the Toronto Argonauts. He countered with trying to buy the entire league.
ReplyDeleteAgreed on this. He actually was a solidly trained wrestler, but once the character took over, workrate was secondary.
ReplyDeleteGeorge Steele's character was great but the matches were awful
ReplyDeleteMercker? Fuck no.
ReplyDeletelol
ReplyDeleteVince might be a bad business man in every way possible except for wrestling.
"This car is on sale? NO! OVERCHARGE ME DAMMIT!"
I understand your point about that style of brawl, but ECW kind of took that idea, raped it, and gave us some weird bastard child of brawls, blood, and high spots where psychology was optional. Then WWE aped it a bit and eventually gave us the 24/7 thing...which was fine for awhile, but I'm glad it faded out.
ReplyDeleteThe bit about Vince backing him is good, but in the end, VKM would do his best to squash anything he perceived as a threat, including anything supposedly under him of which he does not have direct control.
You know, I've never been much of one to fantasize about reading people's minds; seems like a horrid invasion of privacy. But I would really like to have a peek at Vince's; who he really is and what he truly believes. We get such contradictory info about him from so many sources; it would be interesting to get unfiltered Vince.
Or, fucking terrifying.
Just wanted to say that, IMHO, Hollywood Hogan was the greatest heel ever.
ReplyDeleteEvery wrestler, at some point, plays the delusional, self-aggrandizing "I'm the greatest wrestler on Earth" heel at some point in their career. Many are very good at it. But there's only one Hulk Hogan, and he truly WAS the greatest wrestler on Earth for a long time (at least in terms of popularity and star-power).
Best big-talking chickenshit heel ever.
Yeah, talk about a night and day difference with the same guys, doing the same gimmick...but *completely* different interpretations.
ReplyDeleteI think "Total Divas" is a perfect example of what WWE Films should be doing. Like I say below about the XFL, I think Vince should focus on manageable goals rather than "We're gonna create a fucking football league as big as the NFL, goddammit! And we're gonna create a fucking movie studio!" It's ridiculous and doesn't play to their strengths. Instead though I think there's real money in WWE producing low-budget TV and internet content that they can sell to networks and distributors. (Their Youtube partnership is actually a great example of them doing it right.) Fuck the WWE Network, that's never ever EVER going to fly--- nobody wants 24 hrs a day of WWE content. But could they sell "Legends House" to say Comedy central or Spike TV or TBS, the way they sold Total Divas to E? Yeah, probably. Could a "Total Superstars" reality show find a cable home? Yeah— I mean if Total Divas draws those ratings, I'm sure there's a network that figures the male stars could do even better.
ReplyDeleteSo back to WWE Films... movies are just too costly to produce, at least at a level that actually makes it LOOK LIKE A MOVIE. (Knucklehead/Chaperone etc didn't even look like real fucking movies.) But why not make a pilot for some "Burn Notice"-esque USA Network action show starring Wade Barrett? WWE fans aren't gonna pay for these shitty movies, but I bet they'd draw a pretty big audience for an action TV show starring one of the superstars. And it'd be way easier to finance a viable TV show than a movie. AND... they're already in the fucking TV business!
Or something like Jericho's comedy web-series. Why the hell wouldn't WWE want to finance that themselves? The budget is small, the risk is miniscule, and if it hits then you get some web ad money AND a viable project that you could try to pitch as a TV show to Comedy Central or whoever.
So long story short, my guess is Vince is just obsessed with being the king of everything he does, rather than working with partners. Hence ridiculous BIG ideas like the XFL, WBF, WWE Network, WWE Films, etc. But if they thought smaller and more logically, they could possibly make a shit ton of money producing and selling TV shows. At the least it'd be much more in their wheelhouse.
WHC: I think I'll pass.
ReplyDeleteImpact: When you're cold, you're cold.
Old School: I might have to check this out
JR: I'll leave the recap to someone else.
"So long story short, my guess is Vince is just obsessed with being the king of everything he does, rather than working with partners"
ReplyDeleteSee: The rise of the WWF/E.
Also see: Duh?
I'm not gonna click on the WHC link but by God if HHH isn't #1 I'll lose faith in the wwe propaganda machine
ReplyDeleteI lean towards terrifying, in a "trainwreck with mangled bodies and body parts scattered across the landscape" manner.
ReplyDeleteYou'd be unable to look away.
Rick Martel, while not horrible in the ring as the "Model," was a much better wrestler as a face than he was as a heel. His face comebacks were great, watch any Strike Force match and he was on his game.
ReplyDeletePiper was embarrassing in WCW. He came off like a guy who couldnt get over the fact that the 1980's had ended
ReplyDeleteC'mon...maybe VKM is really just a big, inflated, fluffy kitten at heart.
ReplyDeleteHere's the thing: The seeds of the Evil "Mr.McMahon" character actually started in Memphis. He sent talent down there all the time.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/oI_1cW-1xZc
Even more terrifying.
ReplyDeleteHe is.
ReplyDeleteWBF: There is no alternate universe where this succeeds. Sorry.
ReplyDeleteXFL: Vince did a lot things right with this one and was ahead of his time with the presentation and sensationalism. However, as others have said, it needed to be branded as an alternative more along the lines of the arena leagues.
WWE Films: I have no idea how this could be successful.
Regarding the heart of the What If, many of us are leaning towards Vince distancing himself once one of the other ventures becomes successful. The guy spent over 30 years as the majority owner of the company (breathing and sleeping WWF/E), 20 years as an announcer, and a quite a few years as a performer. He is not ashamed of WWE at all. Do you seriously think that he's stayed because he doesn't have an alternative?
He is ashamed of the pro wrestling stigma, but the man seems rather passionate about the product he has put out for the last 30 years. I picture him ziplining down for a Wrestlemania 12 rehearsal, flying off the cage and through a table in 1999, taking the HBK elbow from the ladder in 2006, and still berating writers to this day... he loves THIS BUSINESS.
"C'mon...maybe VKM eats fluffy kitten's hearts."
ReplyDeleteFTFY
After I listen to JR, I will post some of the highlights
ReplyDeleteLLOL Nice.
ReplyDeleteI swear, I've seen them run that 'Best WHC List' like six times since August now...
ReplyDeleteMind boggling. I've said this before and probably again. This habit of putting HHH and McMahons on top of every "Greatest" list has got to stop.
ReplyDeleteIt's infuriating. It'd be like at Apple, if Steve Jobs had given himself the employee of the month award every month. Just. Why do it? Why? Is HHH's ego really that fragile?
I think if he could leave wrestling for another business while staying in the same role for the same money, he would in a heartbeat. He's going to put his heart and soul into everything he does, but he's in wrestling because he can't get into anything else (without starting on a lower rung).
ReplyDeleteOh yeah, totally. And I guess that's the problem for Vince—— he sees himself as the guy who took the giant FUCK YOU gamble (going national, Wrestlemania, putting everyone else in wrestling out of business) and it worked bigtime, so now he wants to replicate that same model over and over. The difference is he did that in pro wrestling, and he was already a giant in the business of pro wrestling. All these other ventures (bodybuilding, football, TV network, movie studio, the US SENATE) are things for which he has zero experience or business advantage. This isn't ESPN spinning off with ESPN 2--- it's "Outside the Lines" starting it's own network. Vince got spoiled with the success of taking pro wrestling national, and thinks he should be able to pull off that level of success in fields which he's totally a nobody in.
ReplyDeleteI can't hear the audio at work; I'll check this out at home. I have heard of his sending talent elsewhere, but I would be willing to bet a large sum of money (and I don't gamble) that he never really thought of the other promotion as a threat. At the time, he probably saw it as a A or AA promotion similar to baseball. It was an arrangement that probably benefited all involved, at least for awhile.
ReplyDeleteBut, the kitten-eating ego just wouldn't let it last if the smaller fed started getting to big for its britches.
Just to let you guys know, I have ordered a ton of shoot interviews lately, due to the Black Friday sale at RF Video. I took full advantage of that sale. Here is what I got for shoots:
ReplyDeleteJake Roberts
On the Road with Jake Roberts
Ted DiBiase
Harley Race
Greg Valentine
Jim Duggan
George Steele
Paul Roma
Chris Hero, Volume 2
Koko B Ware
King Kong Bundy
Tracy Smothers
Buddy Landel
Sam Houston
1983 Timeline with Don Muraco
Also, do yourself a favor and watch the 1963-1969 Timeline with Bruno Sammartino. I would call it the best installment in the series.
The list of top 15 World Heavyweight Champions might as well just be a list of 15 world heavyweight champions. The only guy I can think of they left out that still works for the company is Christian (he still works for the company, yeah? I lose track sometimes).
ReplyDeleteAlso, Triple H was listed too low. They should have found a way to make him ABOVE number 1. I've lost faith in WWE.
As far as TNA goes, it was Thanksgiving and the rest of the year's episodes have already been taped. Speaking of which, can we get a SPOILER THREAD for the rest of the year's Impacts? The rest of the tournament was... surprising.
Ooh! Paul Roma should be fun, if not a little on the fiction side. Is this a vote? I vote that one!
ReplyDeleteI am in favor of reviews for the ones with Jake, George Steele, and Harley Race.
ReplyDeleteWell me never know but in my opinion he likes the competitive world of business and promotion more then the actual product. I think he's always viewed it as an "in" towards a greater purpose. I've heard a few people on podcasts say his real goal was yo be a media/cable mogul. Just look at the wwe the past decade, it's been a lackluster no risk product strictly concerned with branding itself, not putting out a great wrestling show.
ReplyDeleteVince's mind would probably be something like this, but more midgets and Hillbillies.
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/DWKijJ9n-VQ?t=16s
No. You shouldn't.
ReplyDeleteAnd fuck you.
- WWE
George Steele's 1986 Timeline is a great. Cant wait for his shoot as he seems like a great guy and is a fabulous story teller.
ReplyDeleteJake's will certainly be interesting.
Guys like Smothers, Landell, and Houston were/are fucking maniacs and have tons of crazy stories.
Well, Benoit probably gave the WWE the most mainstream publicity it had received since they got the F out, or since the steroid trial. Or the sexual misconduct allegations on Donahue.
ReplyDeleteSchultz!!!!!
ReplyDeleteThe auto correct on the iPad put CFO instead of Xfl for some reason... Fucking apple lol. But yea if u remember the coin toss was putting a football on the ground n having 2 guys chase it, which is dangerous as hell. Needless to say one poor soul fucked his shoulder up badly.
ReplyDelete*applause*
ReplyDeleteNice pull. That movie is one of the few Sandler did that I genuinely like.
There would be more women. Naked women. And African Americans dancing. Pretty sure the sucking on Gene Simmons' tongue would remain as is.
Based off of the trailer for Roma's shoot, he seems to hold nothing back and apparently has a lot of bad things to say about HHH.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure most of these guys have fantastic stories. I just always dug George and Jake is my all-time fave. I have a hard time separating truth from what he says, even if *he's* convinced it's true. I would love to see him get a chance to have real input into WWE's creative direction, if for no other reason than to see if he's anywhere near as good at it as he thinks he would be; if his mind for the business matches its reputation.
ReplyDeleteThe On the Road with Jake looks incredible.
ReplyDeleteHm. Does he post here under an assumed name?
ReplyDeleteYES to this. Bruno knocked it out of the park.
ReplyDeleteJust watched the Nash Timeline and Bruno blows that away
ReplyDeleteIf only WWE had access to archival footage that would allow them to put together really slick video pieces to explain to the fans why unifying these titles is a big deal. Boy, if only they had some nifty little pieces on notable champions that they've aired IN THE PAST SIX MONTHS ready to go as well.
ReplyDeleteYea, hiccups I'm with you bc they're prolonged. I heard a dude, think it was the guy who used to be big dick Johnson, say that it got to the point where staff members would be afraid/uncomfortable to sneeze in front of him because they could tell he was annoyed and disturbed by it. That's a little weird I think
ReplyDeletePiper vs. Perfect, from the 12/90 MSG show. I think it's the best WWF match of that year, having watched just about every major match the company ran and fairly recently. Bunch of solid performances in '91-'92 against Savage, Flair, and Michaels. Piper vs. Brisco is good. The brawls with Paul Orndorff in '85 are all awesome as hell. I was never that big on Piper as a worker, but he has way too many solid to excellent performances to be dismissed.
ReplyDeleteYou *totally* made me think of this cartoon:
ReplyDeletehttp://youtu.be/3nTUsWhhDn4?t=3m59s
They should re do thunder in paradise and replace hogan with cena.
ReplyDeleteYou ever think of putting a compilation of all your interviews, timelines, etc together and selling them? I'd be a customer I think
ReplyDeleteThe best heel ever was Attitude Era Vince McMahon. Much better than nWo Hollywood Hogan. We knew Vince wasn't going to get into the ring until it mattered, so we were okay with just getting skits until the time came. And when the time DID come (St. Valentine's Day Massacre), Vince delivered with a fantastic effort. You can argue his workrate, sure, but for a guy in his 50s at that point, you can't fault anything he did in that match (including taking the bump off the cage into the announce tables). He let face Austin get EVERY bit of offense he could, but never died. Hogan would make a face look bad in the ring- Austin never looked bad in that match.
ReplyDeleteYou just set yourself up in the worst way.
ReplyDeleteI need to work on my cardio, I guess, because my lungs can't go too deep. I just chug some water. Man, I want to punch someone when they have hiccups and don't do anything about it right away.
ReplyDelete'Randy Orton's in ring talent'
ReplyDelete...
early goldust. it's amazing that it's really only been in the last decade when he's been blowing people away with his in-ring work
ReplyDeleteThe "Big Gold Championship" doesn't quite have the same ring as "Big Gold Belt."
ReplyDeleteMaybe Michael Cole could compare Show's chinlocks to boa constrictors?
ReplyDeleteExcept there really isn't a market for a secondary football league big enough to handle the problems with the product. Look at Arena Football- a perfectly positioned and marketed product that doesn't make money (they just filed bankruptcy and relaunched). The CFL is great in Canada but has never gained traction in the States. College football works, but it's a separate product with its own traditions.
ReplyDeleteThe truth is this- people always think that the NFL is vulnerable. But as long as they have the best football players, they aren't. The USFL was only able to put up the challenge they did because they competed with the NFL for top talent (Reggie White, Jim Kelly, Steve Young, Herschel Walker). If your league doesn't have that top talent, the football isn't watchable.
That was always the flaw with the XFL. It wasn't Vince's execution- I think that he did as good a job as you could do. But the concept was flawed from the start. Sure, I'll watch football in the spring. But if the talent is second-rung talent, I'm not going to watch for long.
Yes.
ReplyDeleteEr... NO!
I mean no.
The biggest problem Vince encounters with any of this is that all these products will have wwe stain on them. No one in the media will treat these projects with any respect. The wwe films have a ceiling of b movie shit. I've seen The Call, its 5/10 and that'd supposed to be their best film. So not only do they not have the skills to make films they are also playing everything they do to the same 4 million people (vkms total audience). Wwe is a niche product, and no matter what side project they take on they aren't outgrowing that niche. They have the stigma of being a shit product for idiots that frankly 95% of the country has at best no respect for and at worst actively disdains while anything they try to do is a shitty 2nd rate product (movies/xfl/even the total divas ratings have plumented).
ReplyDeleteTl;dr Vince is a carny wrestling promoter, not a serious entertainment mogul like ted Turner or mark Cuban etc and frankly he's past his prime as even that.
I have. My first goal is to put together an e-book with all of my 1984 WWF reviews. I have the rest of the Championship Wrestling episodes that I did not cover along with some house shows and the "Wrestling at the Chase" shows from St. Louis
ReplyDeleteI also want to do a book on the first year of TNA.
The shoot and timeline stuff will happen too.
My next project is reviewing every single Wrestling Observer Match of the Year
HHH's eg0 = Nash's Quad ?
ReplyDeleteThis. I thought Big Poppa Pump would be (to quote Gene Rayburn/Brett Somers) the definitive answer.
ReplyDeleteI remember being blown away by the Can-Am Connection. It's my understanding that Strike Force was a direct result of Tom Zenk leaving. Is that correct? Any insight?
ReplyDeleteYeah. He went to WCW if I'm not mistaken.
ReplyDeleteVery well said.
ReplyDeleteYes. Zenk quit, believing that Martel was trying to get more money for himself and that he was getting the shaft. In Martel's shoot, he basically said that Zenk was full of shit and a baby, which seems to be a consensus among wrestlers.
ReplyDeleteI think he did tours of Japan then went to the AWA before WCW
ReplyDeleteYou make some great points about Show, including the one about his being a heel hiding his personality. But...I can't help it. I really like it when he's the pissed off giant heel who knocks the shit out of everything and everyone. Granted, they've never really gone all the way with that character.
ReplyDeleteHayes was awesome. Probably the best regular (i.e., non-Flair) in World Class or at least 1b with 1a Kerry.
ReplyDeleteI also disagree that the xfl could have worked. It was literally a 5th rate league (behind college, NFL, cfl, and arena). And its associated with Vince McMahon who outside our little realm where he is God, he is viewed like a don king or jerry springer but less classy. What's the audience its supposed to reach? Wrestling fans? Okay that's 4 million people. Now a percentage of those people aren't even football fans. So lets say thats a maximum of 3 million viewers. If they run it in the summer its up against mlb. If they run it in the winter its up against NBA. No one is going to go see the 4th worst pro football league when they can get their sport fix watching high level athletics instead. Also waaaay more people are going to be turned off by whatever freak show aspects Vince uses to market it.
ReplyDeleteSuperstar Billy Graham was nothing special in the ring but he had charisma by the gallon. Certainly one of the most influential guys in WWF/E history, as he was their first long-term heel champ and their first guy who was pushed as a star as a character rather than as an in-ring monster.
ReplyDeleteSomeone cited Michael Hayes earlier in the thread, a great choice. Imagine Hayes if he had the workrate of Gordy or Roberts....he would've been a heel to rival Flair.
Amongst modern guys, Titus O'Neil is a guy who's just overflowing with natural charisma. If he was younger and anything above below-average in the ring, WWE would be pushing this guy to the moon.
HHH's ego = his own Quad.
ReplyDeleteWell it sounds like the not unification feud between cena and Orton isn't a draw. Raw dropped half a million viewers from last and if my math is correct did a 2.5 this week. (I couldn't find the actual rating just the viewer data but I think that's right) can't blame this on mnf because that game was over by 9pm est
ReplyDeleteHhh isn't a draw, never was, never will be.
An interesting change of history from WWE in that countdown, that Cena introduced the current WWE title belt.
ReplyDeleteLook I'm not an entertainment mogul like Stephanie McMahon but a 12% drop in the ratings can't necessarily be a good thing. I thought they were in a full press to increase TV ratings, ppv buy rates be damned? That's weird.
ReplyDeleteAlso that last hour only did 3.4 million viewers so why not SNME this shit and put all the big stuff in the first half of raw and then fill the back end with long matches for us wrestling nerds? Who loses out on that?
So getting Punk and Bryan out of the way early in the show caused ratings to go away at the end, what a surprise.
ReplyDeleteKane just finished his 16th year in the wwe (as kane but we could go back even farther) and how many *** singles matches has he had? 5 or 6 maybe?
ReplyDeleteI would argue the XFL's positioning (3rd, behind NFL/college, ahead of Arena and CFL)... but that's like asking would you rather be run over by a steamroller or tossed in an industrial woodchipper.
ReplyDeleteYou die either way.
I can't wait to see the survivor series buy rate. I couldn't even be bothered to stream it because of that crazy pats vs broncos game. Supposedly even the head up their asses wwe is bracing for a bad buy rate on it already.
ReplyDeleteYea, that was interesting to me also when I was writing this. How much has the wrestling/carny stigma hurt his other stuff? I don't think I can objectively answer, or even know, since I'm a wrestling fan and can't step out of that perspective. I think the stigma of "wrasslin" has definitely lessened since the 90s but it's definitely still a real thing. To what extent, im not really sure.
ReplyDeleteCough drops. They always cure my hiccups.
ReplyDeleteI don't agree with your statement about Hollywood Hogan.
ReplyDeleteHe had the benefit of having creative control which in his case meant unlimited promo time, making 15M$ a year (which definitely helps to invest in a gimmick) and above all, never showing ass. With all that, he is way below early 80's Piper or late 90's Vince McMahon.
Wrestling's "mainstream" view has roller coastered since 1984:
ReplyDeletemid/late 80s: Acceptable, but always on edge.
early/mid 90s: Back to "normal"
late 90s/early 00s: Acceptable, even with the backlash. Hell, the backlash from certain groups helped, if anything.
mid 00s/now: Back to "normal", if not a shade lower.
He had some GREAT ones with Kurt Angle.
ReplyDelete... and neither Orton nor Show will take more than a minor bump from the "failure". The usual idiots will find a way to blame the usual suspects...
ReplyDeleteI gulp water while holding my nose.
ReplyDeleteI think it has a worse stigma today if that's even possible. Rock and Austin brought it main stream and almost made it cool to like wrestling but that was short lived and then you had the Benoit thing and Vince slapping the HBO reporters papers out of his hand. Today you have the fake/offensively stupid gimmicks/fans who are bottom.of the barrel/carny stigma its always had now multiplied with new public awareness over steroids/concussions as well as all the wrestlers Vince circus animaled to death. So I think shit the falling out of main stream combined with the old time and new age stigmas makes wrestling lower than ever. Also the rebranding as sports entertainment is so transparent that it actually makes it worse.
ReplyDeleteThey promoted it as "old-school" football, which clearly resonated. Stuff like no fair catches on punts, harder hits, etc.
ReplyDeleteBut then the first game starts with a Rock promo & then a Vince McMahon promo. There was nothing "old school" about it...if anything, the He Hate Me stuff and the sexy cheerleaders...it was more like football of the future (Vince's future) than the old-school football people wanted.
It quickly went off the rails and got real weird as they got desperate. But there was a HUGE audience for the old-school football thing they promised, but didn't deliver.
Jesse Ventura, although I'm not sure he was ever really a very high level
ReplyDelete'character' as a wrestler either. His fame seems to be based entirely on his career as a commentator.
Well at least the xfl had the common courtesy to not have two teams with the exact same names.
ReplyDeleteI pound a huge glass of water in rapid small swallows until its empty. Works for me every time
ReplyDeleteSorry, small tj. I'd give anything to be a fly on the wall during a baseball FA negotiation. Like Cashman has to know Cano isn't worth whatever he's asking right? Is he just thinking "fuck, I'll give him the money even though I'm getting ripped off". Is Cano thinking "man, these guys can't really think im worth this amount of money right?"
ReplyDeleteThey'll blame MNF and the holidays, not really sure how they could blame Punk, Bryan, Ziggler, Ryback, etc for it this time.
ReplyDeleteThe stupid rule changes really killed the XFL and kept them from being taken seriously as a sports league. If they're just created a football league with a primetime television slot and major corporate backing they might have been able to sustain it as a profitable business venture...but instead they made it into a sloppy, embarrassing punchline.
ReplyDeleteTheres a very funny post on deadspin this morning about red Sox fans reactions on twitter to ellsbury 2 nyy. They are all calling him a "trader"...so fucking stupid, and our country is finished but its still really funny to read
ReplyDeleteI can almost picture that working with Mark Cuban.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I seem to recall hearing that elsewhere, now that you mentioned it. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI stand (sit) corrected.
ReplyDeleteTwitter: Automatic -25 IQ.
ReplyDeleteHuh. Cuban is constantly looking for other challenges and revenue streams.
ReplyDeleteVince would reject Dallas.
ReplyDeleteJake would be awesome. I wish he would write a book, I would read that thing cover to cover multiple times. In two days I'm going to get Jake's autograph and then the next night he's doing an 8 man tag, which should be a fun show. Can't wait to meet the Snake this weekend!!
ReplyDeleteYou know Vince had a hard-on during that promo... good thing the belt hid it.
ReplyDeleteThe funny this is that unlike HHH who likes to wear the WWE title, Vince gets off on owning OTHER companies titles. (WCW, ECW, USWA)
ReplyDeleteIt would not surprise me if these belts are on his mantle.
"Is Vince really embarrassed to be a wrasslin promoter as people claim?"
ReplyDeleteYou get your first job. You're a 16 year old kid working at McDonalds. You enjoy the job enough and it pays fine, but you know it's temporary. You're going to school to be an engineer, a doctor, a pilot, something like that. This is just the first step.
You're 22. Assistant manager at McDonalds. You ended up going to school but you're taking a break for now. You didn't think you would still be at McDonalds but its okay. You're still young and making more bank than most of your friends. You're a highly motivated person and can succeed in anything you want if you put the time and effort in it.
You're 35. General manager at McDonalds. Lots of money saved up now even if you never went back to school. You never were able to after those Wendy's sonsofbitches tried to run your store out of business. Fuck them. Not only did you run them out of town, you started selling Frosty's at your store advertised as "not as good as McFlurries." Now back to the dream of being an engineer, doctor, or pilot.
You're 48. You own multiple franchises. You've been peddling burgers now for over 30 years. Why the fuck are you still at McDonalds? All your friends were able to pursue their dreams and get the jobs that they want and while you were very successful and make more money than them, you still feel like Ronald McDonald when you're around them.
You're 60. You're forcing the managers for your McDonalds to sell spaghetti and blankets.
Nowhere near as bad as a Hollywood Hogan. Hulk was capable of good matches, but getting a DUD rating out of him from 1996-99 was like getting 3-stars out of anyone else. He was unwatchable every single match.
ReplyDeleteIf Vince would treat them as separate entities without involving anything wrestling, they might work.
ReplyDeleteThe WBF had Vince and Bobby Heenan on commentary with Lex Luger, someone with zero bodybuilding competition experience (at least to my knowledge) as a guest performer.
The XFL has Jesse Ventura and Jim Ross on commentary with Vince on the 50-yard line for the first ever kickoff.
WWE Films always have wrestlers as the main star whether or not they have the chops to pull it off.
Everything Vince does is like a (shitty) Universal Monster movie: Wrestling Meets Bodybuilding! Wrestling Meets Football! Wrestling Meets Movies!
Vince would only make that trade for the Yankees because they're in New York and "I have the best wrestling company so I get the best sports franchise. DAMMIT!"
ReplyDeleteHe wasn't. Jesse was downright boring in the ring.
ReplyDeleteA thousand times this.
ReplyDeleteDustin has always been at least a solid hand, around a B/B+ level. Honestly, I think he's progressed as a worker (mostly from a psychological perspective in knowing when and how to sell and work the crowd), but the discrepancy between him and the rest of the roster is due to his being a scion of an era when guys were just better all-round workers.
ReplyDeleteBubba Ray/Bully Ray is going to end up as one of the most underrated workers of the last 25 years. He can't be given *enough* kudos as to how his skills have evolved during his career - remarkable stuff. The only other two guys that I can recall watching who consistently (and noticeably) got better and better with each match to that degree are The Rock and Kurt Angle.
ReplyDeleteKane is probably my least favorite guy to watch wrestle. At least watching Khali can be humorous.
ReplyDeleteTotally agreed on Hollywood Hogan. I don't know about him being the greatest heel ever, but he's up there. NUCLEAR heat, and while he didn't lose much, he was never afraid to show ass in matches. He spent entire matches begging off from Roddy Piper, which looked ridiculous. Dude was a true heel surrounded by "cool heels."
ReplyDeleteThe excuse he used in his book was that McMahon wanted him to wrestle the same style every night and that he was capable of expanding the moveset when he went to Japan.
ReplyDeleteSo my question is why wasn't he busting out 450 splashes and moonsaults in WCW?
Michael Hays wasn't that bad when he got the face run in World Class. But he still looked like a wookie to me.
ReplyDeleteHe'd consider the football Giants, I think.
ReplyDeleteToo old by then?
ReplyDeleteMost big men are like that, because I couldn't STAND Mark Henry when he was younger.
ReplyDeleteNo excuse.
ReplyDeleteJust read it. Funny stuff. As much as I live sports I could never get as emotionally invested as alot of people do.
ReplyDeleteBTW - I wonder why Vince never brought them back for a guest appearance when Big Johnny was in charge?
ReplyDeleteDel Rio, Ziggler, Kahli, Swagger.
ReplyDeleteJericho
ReplyDeleteI've always hated c Webb for the way he bailed on GS but that was a dude who looked like he could be the best guy in the league demanding to leave my fave team. I also hated Stevie franchise (lol) for refusing to play in Vancouver during the draft but I could never begrudge a guy for taking the most money. You have to do it.
ReplyDeleteHowever I will always begrudge a Boston sports fan for not knowing the difference between trader and traitor.
Totally agree here. Dusty is a tough one because, while certainly never a true "workrate guy," he had ridiculous in-ring charisma. And unlike Hogan, he could do long matches convincingly (as you stated).
ReplyDeleteAlso, upvote for using Bockwinkel as the workrate standard. LOVE me some Bockwinkel.
They really should have figured out a way to list HHH more than once. He could (should?) have been first and second.
ReplyDeleteHa yea. Dude, C Webb + mullin, Hardaway and sprewell is fucking a legit perennial contender. I completely agree, I view his career as disappointment just because he could have been one of the greatest big men ever IMO. I'm not a huge Zach lowe fan but he did a really good article on his HOF chances a few months ago.
ReplyDeleteSo if Randy Orton could cry on command and badly deliver stupid jokes, he'd be the biggest star of the era? Big Show's character sucks.
ReplyDeleteA part of Cano must be crying at how much he lost by leaving Boras for Jay Z.
ReplyDeleteHmm. Really? Weird.
ReplyDeleteKurt Angle could have carried a guy with Rush Limbaugh's athleticism to a *** match at that time.
ReplyDeleteLowest rated raw since Xmas eve 2012. I honestly believe its going to go down again next week.
ReplyDeleteThe Dr. D one should be epic
ReplyDeleteAh, Wrestling at the Chase. A show is good when they played it for over a year after Crockett bought it.
ReplyDeleteSwagger held the more prestigious WWE title.
ReplyDeleteBig Poppa Pump Scott Steiner. He was a shell of himself as a worker but those promos are among the best. He was the only thing that kept me watching WCW for some time.
ReplyDelete+1000000.
ReplyDeleteIt's something that people don't realize until one day they wake up and realize they are unhappy. Most people wish they had their own Hot Tub Time Machine.
They blamed Zack Ryder and only Zack Ryder for the one main event in 2011 drawing badly.
ReplyDeleteHe had some good matches in WCW as 'The Natural;, albeit often in tag-teams. I think he was a bit under-appreciated at the time due to the dreadful state of WCW for much of that period and the fact that he probably wouldn't have received such a big push if he wasn't Dusty's son. But he definitely was not Erik Watts or Greg Gagne.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if I'd go that far, but the way he reinvented himself as 'Bully Ray' is impressive.
ReplyDeleteWell yeah. He financially supported ECW and lent some talent to ECW during the WWF "invasion" of ECW. But it's definitely not a coincidence that once ECW got a national TV deal he immediately hired their world champ and tag-team champions.
ReplyDeleteIsn't the upcoming MNF game a clunker though?
ReplyDelete(looks) Dallas/Chicago... well, it is two decent big market teams...
He actually is apparently really generous in some ways - he has given a lot of money to former wrestlers who are on the outs, helping pay for their rehab or surgery.
ReplyDeleteI think that game will do a similar if not bigger rating than hawks/saints. Bears and cowboys have two of the biggest fan bases in the NFL and they are both still technically in contention.
ReplyDeletePlus raw was awful so its not like they hooked in any viewers.
If you're going from 2002-present then I agree that Triple H should be #1. He held it longer than anybody and maybe more than anyone else. And his reign led to two big moments where he lost it to Benoit at XX and Batista at 21. We call it the Reign of Terror but he's still #1 if we go from 2002-now.
ReplyDeleteNot that I'm a huge fan of the guy, but where was JBL on this list? Was that during the time the WWE title was on Smackdown?
ReplyDeleteNope. Swagger held WHC. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_WWE_Champions
ReplyDeleteI'm not a fan of either team(go Raiders!) but DAL/CHI has potential to be a fun game that means something. Better than the Thursday Night offering.
ReplyDeleteYes. JBL was WWE champ, NOT WHC champ.
ReplyDeleteReally? I remember little kids loved them, but anyone over 12 or so absolutely HATED those goofy idiots. At least during the tail end of their WWF run, I've never seen any of their NWA/WCW work.
ReplyDeleteChrist, WCW Piper might be the worst worker of all time. Though in fairness, none of his opponents were much better.
ReplyDeleteI think Dreamer is an OK worker, and Sandman is just fine for what he was used for. The Dudleys were more green then shitty in those days, and the Gangstas barely had any wrestling training at all. And lets be honest, you don't watch any of those guys because you're looking for a good technical contest, you're looking for blood and mayhem.
ReplyDeleteNot really his fault (well, it kind of was, he was the one that thought it would be a good idea to get shitfaced and wreck a Hummer), but yeah, he should have been kept out of the ring until he was healed.
ReplyDeleteI'm a huge Nash mark, and I can't think of one. Last good match he had period was the IYH match with Michaels.
ReplyDeleteWhoopsie doo. Well. Less embarrassing for WWE, then.
ReplyDeleteWell Rush is pretty nimble.
ReplyDeleteOK, Mr. Hogan...brother.
ReplyDeleteHulk Hogan is one of the few wrestlers in the history of the business with a legitimate claim to being both the greatest babyface and the greatest heel of all-time.
ReplyDeleteI remember Show taking big bumps through tables and shit every week when he was ECW champ several years back. He really had his working boots on then.
ReplyDeleteGood pick. I loved the JBL character, but I don't think I liked a single match of his during that entire reign.
ReplyDeleteHe was the best heel champion WCW trotted out in years and was booked very effectively, but it was waaaaaay too late to do them any good.
ReplyDeleteIf Pillman's injuries hadn't derailed him, he should have been the Moriarty to Austin's Sherlock Holmes. Those two should have been feuding to the bitter end.
ReplyDeleteSean O'Haire's "Devil's Advocate" character was unspeakably brilliant, but the guy just couldn't bring the goods in the ring at all. Having to work "WWF style" just killed the poor guy.
ReplyDeleteAlways liked "Ten Pounds of Gold" myself.
ReplyDeleteHis match with Goldberg was far better than it had any right to be.
ReplyDeleteDifferent belt, for the record.
ReplyDeleteTen Pounds of Gold is the predecessor to the Big Gold Belt.
I'd even go so far as to say that I enjoyed Bubba's brand split singles run.
ReplyDeleteI had a revelation recently that Dreamer was like Ric Flair in that he wasn't the "best" at anything really, but he was just good enough at everything to get by on the same basic shit for years.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I always found that interesting. The rest of the nWo was getting pops like crazy and tons of fans were wearing nWo t-shirts and doing their catchphrases. But when Hogan walked out, it was like nuclear heat with garbage being tossed into the ring. And he was their LEADER.
ReplyDeleteStop downvoting me, Hulk.
ReplyDeleteGoldberg.
ReplyDeleteAtrocious in the ring but he had the IT factor enough to get insanely over.
The title affectionately called the “Big Gold Championship”
ReplyDeleteBy nobody outside of WWE, ever.