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Network Update - 8/2/14

Original > This Week in WWE
             > Episode 288 - 8/2/14

             > Total Divas
             >2013 - No Longer the Bridesmaid - 9/15/13


In Ring > Raw Replays
            > 1995
               > Episode 119 - 7/10/95
                  Episode 120 - 7/17/95
                  Episode 121 - 7/24/95
                  Episode 122 - 7/31/95

The first two episodes listed here build toward In Your House 2. We start to get Goldust vignettes to hype his debut. We also get the on-screen debuts for Dean Douglas, and Isaac Yankem, DDS. The 7/31/95 episode is notable because when it originally aired, the main event was Razor Ramon and Savio Vega vs. Yokozuna and Owen Hart for the tag team championship. The show had ended with Razor about to give Owen the Razor's Edge. That cut-off ending has not been added.
               

Comments

  1. Late 1995 was a weird time for the Ramon character. He started getting put a lot in tag teams with the 1-2-3 Kid or Savio Vega. The character was somewhat stale as a face and a heel turn would've been much better. It was like something out of the blue when Ramon beat Dean Douglas for the title. And I never have understood why they only gave Douglas a 10 minute reign with the belt.

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  2. Had Razor not jumped in '96, they HAD to turn him and run Shawn vs. Razor III on PPV, didn't they? Sell it as the decisive rubber match of the rivalry.

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  3. Yeah, the problem with 1995 was that all of their top guys were all faces, thus unable to have feuds together.

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  4. That's why I don't fully blame Diesel for the downturn in business. I mean, he had Mabel, King Kong Bundy, etc. to draw against.

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  5. One would have to think so.

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  6. That note about the 1995 show sounds like something that makes it less notable.

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  7. Stranger in the AlpsAugust 2, 2014 at 12:20 PM

    It's notable in the sense that it's pointing out something less notable.

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  8. Stranger in the AlpsAugust 2, 2014 at 12:45 PM

    Being notable for being unnotable seems like something that shouldn't be noteworthy. But yet, here we are.

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  9. His wardrobe was entirely his fault, as was not being in ring shape... but I agree to some extent he got more shit than he deserved.

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  10. Because the sun might crash down and it might hurt too much inside!

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  11. I wonder if they'll edit out Hogan's slip on the NBC special.

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  12. Different time period, brother!

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  13. Man did they make a mistake in going with Bryan at Wrestlemania

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  14. Yeah.

    If they pulled the trigger earlier when fans first called for it they could have already made their money.

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  15. He didn't no sell anything, that fight caused him to retire.

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  16. It was the best since the Avengers for sure.

    The use soundtrack just makes the movie so much better.

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  17. By the way, that Owen/Yoko-Razor/Savio match is actually pretty good.

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  18. Rocky fulfilled his bro duties by NOT throwing in the towel and letting Apollo die. Apollo would have never wanted that towel thrown in. He was too proud. He would have resented Rocky for the rest of his living years. Rocky let Apollo die the same way he lived. A true bro until the end.

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  19. Yeah, I've seen bits and pieces of it and the fighting scene looked really, really good.


    I love the first two Rocky films, especially the first. Such a good story of just trying to go the distance, which is a nice metaphor for life. Rocky II was good too for the training montage and the symbolism of him going from the primary Italian area of Philly (with Italian flags) to downtown Philly that has American flags. I actually showed that to students during my Gilded Age portion about immigration.

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  20. Yeah, I get that point completely, but still, the guy freakin' DIED.


    I did love Drago's "If he dies...he dies" at the end of all that, though.


    Plus, the Rocky IV training montage might be my favorite of any of the films. Rocky lifting logs and trudging through snow in the Russian wilderness.

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  21. I've heard Vince is a big fan of Cesaro's thighs.

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  22. The Love-Matic Grampa!August 2, 2014 at 1:04 PM

    To be fair, it does sound like Hogan was tongue-in-cheek here. But then again, it's Hogan.

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  23. I don't know, it's a pretty big beard and Rey's mask has an open chin. I guess if they made a custom mask that didn't actually look like Rey's and also covered Bryan in tattoos it could have a chance of working?

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  24. This is really random, but does anyone else share my sentiment that Triple H looked a lot better when he wore long tights as opposed to short ones?

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  25. Both are better than the groin injury fat man bike shorts era of late 03.

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  26. If Apollo doesn't die and lives just because a guy who he saw as a fellow warrior went against his known intentions and cost him the fight of his life then Apollo would not truly be living a life at all. It would instead most certainly end in a late night Christmas suicide by Apollo <5 years later. The stolen pride along with the brain damage suffered from years of fighting would surely have caused Apollo to take his own life. Rocky did Apollo the ultimate favor.

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  27. Oh god yes, those were freakin' horrid. I wasn't really even watching the product much at that point because of the Triple H "Reign of Terror" but when I saw pictures of that, I was like "what the hell is that?!?"

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  28. Long tights looked better when he was (comparatively) skinny. Once you reach a certain level of bulkiness (like Trips did in '99 during his main event push), the tights look silly and trunks are the way to go IMO.

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  29. 'Mania was the best time to do it.

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  30. It took me a second to get the powerslam reference. I like it. Kudos, sir!

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  31. Marvel Studios or a Marvel movie?


    I rank Days of Future Past extremely high. It gave a really great ending and closed out a generation of movies.


    Haven't seen Guardians yet.

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  32. TJ: Anyone paying attention to this Shannon Briggs/Wladimir Klitschko feud going on. If you ask me, this looks kinda fake and even has dialogue straight out of Rocky 3. Even so, this might be what the Heavyweight division needs to get attention..


    http://www.tmz.com/2014/08/02/wladimir-klitschko-shannon-briggs-brawl-fight-miami-restaurant-video/



    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG7T702aESs

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  33. YankeesHoganTripleHFanAugust 2, 2014 at 1:29 PM

    Apparently there is a deleted scene where after Round 1 Apollo knew that Drago was going to kill him, and that's how we wanted to go out, hence telling Rocky not to throw in the towel, "no matter what"

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  34. I've argued for a while that boxing needs to get the heavyweight division going again to get interest back up in the sports. No offense to the guys at lower weight levels like Floyd Mayweather, who I enjoy watching, but the heavyweight division has that "largest than life" aspect to it (e.g. Ali, Tyson, Frazier, Foreman, etc.).

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  35. Hogan had charisma and an audience connection that the diesel character couldn't touch. Diesel's matches were also reaaaallly plodding

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  36. I don't know, man. All we asked was he do the time-honored QOTD tradition of leaving with a gigantic meltdown. It's too bad a an 18 week relationship had to end because one of the people in that relationship forget where he came from.

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  37. Cause the clique wanted to keep the titles within them

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  38. The Kevin Steen shoot looks like it will be the same as his Hell Rising DVD last year but without the great ROH footage and promos with Jim Cornette to counter-balance his delusional rants. No buys.

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  39. It's so bad that I had no idea Klitschko was still champion or that Shannon Briggs was still boxing. The division gets NO coverage anymore..

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  40. I used to use a site called Streaming Soon until Netflix changed its algorithm and that site stopped updating. Is Instant Watcher for US Netflix, too?

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  41. I'm not denying that, but King Kong Bundy wasn't as big a deal in 1995 as he was in 1986. He'd been AWOL after he left in 1987 or so. It's funny to watch Diesel promos after he won the title. It's like what we see out of Cena and Sheamus and Diesel just comes off like such a dork.

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  42. Yeah, just amazing. After Lennox Lewis was no longer champ, the division just ceased to exist in the eyes of the media.

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  43. Shannon Briggs is still a contender? You would think that getting knocked out by fellow choke artist Dominick Guinn 11 years ago would have convinced him to retire.

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  44. I must admit that I still marked out 16 years later at the Lion's Den match between Owen and Shamrock. Shamrock flying off that cage at multiple angles and scaling it to get out of submission holds was fantastic.

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  45. Yeah, it's baffling that PWI named that as the worst match of the show while naming the Rock/Triple H ladder match (if you love insanely slow climbing, this match is for you!) best match of the show.


    And there's no way you can convince me that the Lion's Den match was worse than Kaientai vs. The Oddities.

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  46. Just incredibly counterproductive. I liked the Dean Douglas character and wanted to see HBK-Douglas, so I was pissed it didn't happen.

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  47. I think the important thing is to come up with new and interesting questions. I feel like we've discussed some variation of favorite wrestler/match/angle/finish dozens of times, either through the QOTD or Scott's mailbag. I don't know if tag teams have been discussed a lot, but I definitely wouldn't mind a conversation or two about that.

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  48. Wow, PWI must've been smoking crack. That Kaientai-Oddities match had its moments, but was like a 10 minute squash. I do like the ladder match, but the slow climbing spots from the Rock in the early going are ridiculous. Triple H's slow climbs made sense because his knee was pulverized.

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  49. 1-4 were all good in various ways.


    I actually think 2 is the best, even though 1 is probably the actual best.


    I enjoy watching 3 the most though. The downfall of Rocky, losing his "eye of the tiger", then Apollo and Adrian helping Rocky find it again, and finally Apollo and Rocky going at it one more time "no cameras, just 2 guys trying to find out whose the best".

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  50. Yeah, it got bad to the point that Corrie Sanders got a freaking title shot. As if John Ruiz holding one of the titles was not bad enough.

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  51. The Rock was probably nervous working a ladder match. He didn't exactly do a lot of those during his career.

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  52. I hated John Ruiz fights. Punch, grab, punch, grab.

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  53. The heavyweight is important because people love watching boxers get knocked the fuck out.


    I'm still amazed that after Tyson, the US never really had a great heavyweight again.

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  54. Showtime hated his fights too. I remember around 2004 they had an opportunity to air one of his title defenses and they turned it down out of fear the fight would suck.


    The boxing world was outraged, complaining about how refusing to air a heavyweight title fight was disrespectful to boxing and Showtime's response was along the lines of "We're showing more respect to boxing by airing a potentially good fight instead of a terrible heavyweight title fight". And they were right.

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  55. This surgery will take place in a HELL...IN A CELL!

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  56. Daniel Bryan is beat to shit at this point.

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  57. Stranger in the AlpsAugust 2, 2014 at 2:13 PM

    Yes, it is. I've been using it for a few years and it's never let me down.

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  58. And he would have done the same thing in 1995 right?

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  59. Are you saying Cornette or Steen has delusional rants in that sentence...

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  60. I think he meant Steen being delusional.

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  61. "ONE MORE [question]! ONE MORE [question]!"

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  62. Uh, WrestleMania was the absolute best time to pull that off. It's not their fault he got hurt.

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  63. MikeyMike, WitnessAugust 2, 2014 at 2:26 PM

    Both would work.

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  64. Evander Holyfield says hey.

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  65. That's because 99% of your comments lack any real substance.

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  66. He should have a Christian gimmick where he keeps saying that he wants to post one more question.

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  67. Well, when it came to this, I tried to participate and give decent answers.
    Outside of this, you hit the nail right on the head.

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  68. I'd love to see Bryan comeback to face Lesnar for the title and actually get the chance to be on top with the full WWE machine behind him, but since Reigns is their chosen one, I don't see it happening.

    What I see now is Bryan coming back and doing a career vs career match with Kane with Kane of course losing. Then what will be interesting is how strong the YES movement remains. If it doesn't I could see a heel turn at some point to give the heel side a credible face in Bryan.

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  69. I'm still surprised the E has never tried to recreate that story.

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  70. Dude not even a crying Owen Hart at Survivor Series '94 woud have gotten Rocky to throw in that towel.

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  71. Heavyweight boxing has been the shits since the Klitschkos have dominated. They need a heavyweight Mayweather equivalent in the worst way to shake things up.

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  72. Oakland is being no hit through 4.

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  73. Nice little run on QOTD, going out on top. Thank You.

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  74. AverageJoeEverymanAugust 2, 2014 at 3:22 PM

    The hurting inside could have only come from something crashing down.

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  75. Uncrusimatic_Buck_NastyAugust 2, 2014 at 3:26 PM

    DoFP is a great storyline movie, very different from the others in terms of not as much action, imo

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  76. GREAT RUN!!!!


    Don't overstay the welcome, you got yourself over. Good job.
    Who's next?

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  77. One of the things I liked about 2006 - 2009 DX was that a lot of the time Shawn did portray himself as a goofy old guy who was too old for what they were doing sometimes. He had this dry annoyance at the goofy stuff sometimes.


    And while I know this can open up a can of worms, I think a lot of Shawn's 90's reputation is over-blown. The stuff about him being a drug addict and an asshole, sure, by all accounts, including his own, that's entirely true - but that he was unjustly made the champion and dominated the show while burying anyone he felt like because he played politics, etc, is over-blown.

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  78. This was my first one posted. I won't lie, it's a hell of a feeling.

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  79. Off the top of my head he only had 2.

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  80. I liked the long-tights he wore that had the logo on the side of the leg, he wore a couple versions of them. I didn't like the black with another colour down the middle ones.

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  81. I've never understood the love for that ladder match. I understand it's a significant moment in the growth of both guys' careers, but I always thought it was sooooooo goddamn boring.

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  82. I never thought of that but I just looked at some pics and you're right, right before he went to trunks he looked weird in the long-tights. I wish Jericho would go back to long-tights now that he's doing Y2J again though.

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  83. Me too. Honestly, Jericho's too short and stubby-looking to pull off trunks. I've never liked how he looks in them.

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  84. I dug the ones he had when he was still the Connecticut Blueblood that looked like riding pants.

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  85. I caught some of Raw for the first time in what feels like years a week or so ago, and good GOD is that one Kevin-Smith-like bald spot Jericho's working on.

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  86. Uncrusimatic_Buck_NastyAugust 2, 2014 at 4:09 PM

    not his nip slip

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  87. Uncrusimatic_Buck_NastyAugust 2, 2014 at 4:12 PM

    i've always been of the opinion that the rock/hhh ladder match is boring as all get out, even after repeated attempts to give it a chance

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  88. Uncrusimatic_Buck_NastyAugust 2, 2014 at 4:12 PM

    upvote for you

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  89. To keep the Yes Movement thing strong, once this Brie/Steph storyline wraps up they should kind of back off from mentioning Bryan for a while as he heals. Maybe mention him in passing with updates on his progress, he'd be on Total Divas probably too. Then when it's certain that he's coming back and they've got a date and everything, start airing "Daniel Bryan is COMING" vignettes. Show him training, working out, what have you. Air that shit for weeks before his return and all the fans would remember "oh shit, we love this guy."

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  90. I was ready to type up something snarky, but then I saw they're up 8-1 :\

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  91. Just saw Rocky for the first time a few months ago, and I didn't really like it. I know that's probably because it's been talked up so much over time, and I know how influential it was. But when you're SO influential that every sports movie after you copies at least ONE thing from your film, if you see it when I did you'll just think it's cliched and corny. Also, I thought the scene where Rocky and Adrian finally hook up resembled a bear mauling a bunny rabbit.

    Caught part of III the other day when my Dad was watching it on AMC, conveniently enough the fight between him and Hulk Hogan where he presses him into the crowd. I asked my Dad "this is supposed to be a 'real' fight, right? So then why is Thunderlips doing moves that would require cooperation from the other person?"

    His response was "I don't think that was a concern of theirs."

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  92. Man, not even one poop-related QOTD? Fuck that.

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  93. Sigh. Fucking Royals.

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  94. Not to mention that Douglas had his friggin foot on the rope and they act like nothing happened. So pissed at the time... well, and now too.

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  95. He could've hidden it under that hood/mask thing that Rey wears over his regular mask.

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  96. I'm kind of surprised Netflix is just getting around to putting Face/Off and Mad Max.

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  97. Stranger in the AlpsAugust 2, 2014 at 4:42 PM

    Netflix has this deal where they pull movies for a while and then re-up them again. These movie have been added in the past.

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  98. Stranger in the AlpsAugust 2, 2014 at 4:44 PM

    Of course, with the Monday Night War series debuting this month, there is only about one month's worth of RAWs left before the debut of Nitro.


    Perhaps will see the addition of Nitro the the vault, as a lot of people are assuming.

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  99. He could only afford a B+ surgeon.

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  100. (unrelated to anything)

    I’m sick of all these contract signing/arm wrestling/debate/birthday cake presentation segments in professional wrestling. Give me an in-ring game of Scrabble! You could have Jerry Lawler in there calling commentary - “John Cena just played the word ‘equine’ on a triple word score!” Then, when it inevitably breaks down and becomes a fight, someone could slam the other dude onto a pile of letter tiles! That shit would hurt!

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  101. you've just got to be a man (Randy was onto something after all!), it don't help to hide.

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  102. Maybe they could do me a solid and re-put up Big Lebowski.

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  103. No, I think Dean gets the belt if he and Michaels actually wrestle. Since Michaels couldn't wrestle and they were "screwing" the fans out of a top match, they at least put the babyface over to send them home happy.

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  104. I remember on the Bret-Shawn DVD, Bret even said he thought Shawn did a good job as champion and it was unfair to blame him for bad business as no matter who was champ, NWO would have led WCW to crush in the ratings.

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