Pro Wrestling

This ECW is NOT going to be like the original version. THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH FANS TO SUPPORT THAT VERSION OF ECW. ECW WENT OUT OF BUSINESS. It's going to be a WWE show with WWE booking and WWE stars. GET OVER IT. Sorry, had to get that off my chest. Vince winning the ECW title has people making doomsday predictions and talking about how it will destroy the company in various places, which humors me because WWE is a company that has done far worse things in the past five years that haven't killed them, so why would this? Also, Cena winning was perfect in setting up a rematch with Michaels. People who in one breath are buying PPVs to see him lose and are unabl…

A few things crossed my mind watching this match: 1. Anyone else get the impression that match was the result of some pants-shitting after Orton got sent home? You can almost hear the writers "WTF are we going to do for RAW now? Why not just let HBK and Cena go the whole second hour? 2. How come Chris Masters and anyone else with a receeding hairline gets hairplugs, but the guy in his 40s with a heartthrob gimmick inches closer and closer to looking like Dory Funk, Jr? 3. Smartassery aside, can anyone really make a case against Cena at this point that doesn't amount to "I hate him because he's popular"? It's only April and the guy's already had 3 MOTYC in m…

Didn't MTV hold back on the last episode because that would start the clock on the contracts of the guys on the show? Since it seems that the show's gone, why didn't they air the last episode? It would seem that it doesn't matter now if the contracts start ticking or not.

From his Blog: It’ll probably open the show, and I don’t get why everyone thinks MVP is winning the belt here. Benoit has been the midcard goto guy for months now as US champion, and I don’t see any reason why they would take the title off him here. Benoit by submission, should be decent, but then I thought that about Benoit v. JBL last year and he couldn’t pull of a miracle there, so who knows. It's been 3 years (3 years!!!) Scott since JBL beat Eddy for the title. 3 years and you still can't forgive him. I like how he implies JBL is a worthless worker that can only have a good match if a "miracle" happens. Scoot Keith criticizes Vince McMahon for holding gr…

19 years ago today, we had Clash of the Champions on TBS going head to head with Wrestlemania IV. Pretty historic day for Savage's title win, Demolition winning the WWF tag titles, a Hogan/Andre encounter, Sting becoming a superstar, Windham and Luger winning the tag titles and a great MX/Fantastics match. It doesn't really seem like it was that long ago, but the business has truly changed quite a bit during the last two decades. I remember watching that first Clash as a kid. You knew you were seeing something special with Sting really going from midcarder to big star, and he pretty much rode the wave of momentum from that match for a pretty long time. Of course, I h…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoa'i_family Basically, it breaks down like this: The original 5 siblings are Afa, Sika, Junior, Tumua, and Vera Anoa'i. Their parents considered Peter Maivia a "blood brother" and the kids considered him an uncle, which is where the Rock and his dad come in. Afa's sons: Samu, Afa Jr. (who's in DSW now I believe), LA Smooth, and daughter Monica who married Gary Albright. Sika's sons: Rosey, Joe Anoa'i (who currently plays college football) Junior's son: Yokozuna Tumua's son: Black Pearl (wrestles in Rikishi's Italian fed) Vera's sons: Tama (from the Islanders), Rikishi, Umaga …

Through the magic of Netflix, all the discs on the Wrestlemania Anthology DVD set that came out two years ago are available individually, so I've been checking out shows that A) I've never seen in full before or Haven't seen in a while to see if they still hold up. WM X - This would fall into the first category. Yes, it has two great matches. Yes, it may be one of the most memorable WMs of all time because of those two matches. That doesn't excuse the fact that the rest of the show is pretty dreadful. I ended up FFing through pretty much everything aside from the opener and ladder match. Crush/Savage could have been something if it was five years later when th…

IWE Heavyweight Title: Strong Kobayashi © vs. Rusher Kimura (7/9/72) This came off the first IWE Box Set, which covered 1969-74. A match listing that catches one's eye--not because it's a dream match-up of two brilliant workers, but it's a native -vs.-native title match in 1972, a full two years before the Inoki-Kobayashi showdowns that were supposedly the first big native-native matches since Rikidozan-Kimura. Perhaps the IWE had less of a choice in these matters, being a 3rd promotion with a skeleton crew of a roster. I watched this more for the historical value than anything else, but I was very pleasantly surprised by Strong's work. He is "the man" of IWE…

Not really a full review Kurt Angle vs. Rey Mysterio, WWE SmackDown! 31/3/06 Considering their talents and the matches they?ve been able to produce together with similar time constraints, they disappointed me. The match was a far cry from their famous Summerslam match or even the match from Japan last year. Like most of their matches, they were able to start out really well with nice simple character establishing spots. Angle would attempt to ground Rey down with holds and with his innovative offence, Rey would manage to weave his way out of the situation around two or three times. The spots were effective as when Angle was finally able to contain Rey, it came…

September 2, 1985--Battle of the Belts in Tampa, FL at The Sundome drawing 7,600: Hector & Chavo Guerrero b "The Crippler" Rip Oliver & The Grappler Cocoa Samoa b "Hustler" Rip Rogers Kendall Windham b Jack Hart (aka Barry Horrowitz) to win the Florida Title Rick Rude (Southern Champ) b Billy Jack Haynes to retain The Road Warriors (AWA Tag Champions) vs Harley Race & Stan Hansen was a DOUBLE COUNT OUT Nick Bockwinkel b Frankie Lane Ric Flair b Wahoo McDaniel to retain the NWA World title in a 2/3 Falls match in 45 minutes First off, this show was the day Hurricane Elena made landfall in Biloxi MS. It resulted in heavy thunderstorms in …

Marty Jones v Pete Roberts - World of Sport 06/27/79 This was the opener of a show from Wembley Arena, and what a terrific match it was. All sorts of Tiger Mask/Dynamite Kid-style offense and pacing a few years before that feud even got off the ground. I've seen three Marty Jones matches in my life, and they've all three been great (****+ if you like the star ratings), so he's off to a good start with me. Pete Roberts is pretty awesome also, but this is really the Marty show for me because he adds so much really strong heel schtick into all the super-paced athletic stuff. I was thoroughly impressed, and if this match is any indication, it's really worth wading through…

http://www.wrestlingobserver.com/wo/news/h...t.asp?aID=19033 1,200 advance is pretty insane for a 2007 indy. Impressive.

The Funks vs. Nick Bockwinkel & Blackjack Lanza 9/21/1978 - It's amazing how in 1978 a double underhook suplex was sold by the wrestler, and announcer as certain death. The moveset they used then is nothing, nothing, nothing like what they use today. An atomic drop back then would be a nearfall, today, it's never used anymore. This match is a must for anyone who enjoys mat wrestling, high psychology, and "southern style" tag matches.

This got linked at KM and I thought it was interesting...

SI.com story. WO.com coverage. Most interesting to me, from Meltzer: FYI, this is the policy that got Jamie Noble fired.

From WO.com: I love wrestling.

To go watch the pair of first round match ups in the Lucha 64 tourney and review them. PIRATA~!, MIDGETS~!, MORE PIRATA~! BLOOD~! EVEN MORE PIRATA~!

This has been done in the past, but thought it might be fun to revisit. Construct the ultimate wrestling card, based on matches that have actually occurred that you've seen in the past. Guidelines would be as follows: (1) No wrestler can appear more than once. (2) No title can be defended more than once. (3) Show can not exceed 3-3 1/2 hours in length. Put them in the order they would go on the card with explanation of why you put specific matches in specific spots, and keep things in mind like putting heels over too much, repeating exact finishes and also not creating such a great opener that the rest of the show pales by comparison. Ultimately, the ma…

Chris Benoit vs. Rey Mysterio, 3/10/02 Having watched quite a lot of Guerrero vs. Mysterio matches lately, I felt as though I needed to watch Mysterio?s match with Benoit just to see how I would view it now. Watching this match showed me just how much Benoit has declined in just one year. Up to a point, he was great last year, but this year he isn?t being inventive. I agree with the sentiments that he?s comfortable with just chopping his way through matches and landing multiple German Suplexes and deeming it acceptable. He is certainly inventive in this match and having Mysterio in there to provide for his usual cool spots makes for a great match. The opening of the …

The short version: I hate most 80s UWF and UWFi style matches. The long version: I know that most people associate me with lucha libre, like some people are associated with joshi or AJPW, but I'm a guy that watches everything and anything. During my "down periods" a few years ago, AJPW classics were my saviour and basically the only thing I watched along with CMLL TV. Last year 80s AJW was my "great re-discovery" (I had watched many stuff over the years, but never tons and tons of hours like last year) and now I'm heavily getting into WOS the same way. When AAA was "the best promotion in the world", NJPW was my favourite. I'll watch lucha or Reslo or early 90s WCW or…

http://www.vanguardngr.com/articles/2002/s...p208032007.html Of course, none of these guys have been signed for this show, but this is pretty funny. I say this thread can be a catch-all in the future for total fabrications like this.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/more...uble0312/1.html This will be interesting.

http://www.wrestlingobserver.com/wo/news/h...t.asp?aID=18818 This makes me sad, and it's also kind of hilarious since they inducted The Blackjacks & Verne Gagne last year when they've been off the radar for so long, while Lance was at least on WCW TV in the '90s.

Watching the Monday Night War for 12/9/96 on WWE 24/7 and seeing an ad for this show reminded me of something I wanted to ask the crowd here: The main event for this show is Sid vs Bret Hart for the title, but the name of the show would suggest that somehow Vader was supposed to be involved. Was this orignally planned to feature Vader or is that just one of those wacky WWF things?

Reading in the WON how Dusty has successfully lobbied to get the ECW tag titles revived, combined with his previous work booking Smackdown, can a case be made that he almost single handedly saved tag team wrestling in WWE? You could even argue that without Smackdown reminding people that tag team wrestling still exists, the RAW tag belts would still be jobber fodder instead of being fought for between main eventers (one of which being the WWE champion).