The Thread Killer

Also, I think we’ve had a chance to see what Chris Jericho’s so-called “creativity” looks like over the past few years, when he doesn’t have someone to reign his more ridiculous impulses in. Musical duets. Football Field Follies. Matches in a giant glass of Orange Juice. And now this fucking endless feud with the Blackpool Combat Club. Hell, the whole stupid “Sports Entertainment vs. Pro Wrestling” angle. Pardon me if I’m not super psyched at the prospect of years more of this crap. Don’t get me wrong. I think Jericho is probably more creative and has better ideas than your average Pro Wrestler. He has successfully recreated himself several times, with great success. But the real issue is, he is nowhere near as clever and creative as he thinks he is. He needs somebody to tell him when he is wrong, or when one of his ideas just isn’t going to work. I don’t think he is going to get that in AEW and we’re probably all going to see the results.

I remember Prichard talking about that on his podcast. He and Briscoe went over and met with Baba at an All Japan show. He pretty much admitted that Baba was insulted that Vince sent his underlings to negotiate for him. So much so, that once the show started Baba (via Joe Higuchi) sent Prichard and Brisco out to sit in the crowd, rather than stay backstage. Apparently, Baba also told them that WWF guys alone would not be enough to sell out the Dome, because AJPW fans wouldn’t care as much about WWF names as they would native talent. Prichard was incredulous and totally flabbergasted about this assertion of course, but I am not convinced Baba wasn’t right. IIRC, Baba didn’t even really want to run the Dome anyway. I think it was Meltzer who reported that Baba only did it because he felt pressured by New Japan running the Dome and getting decent attendance there. I think the whole reason he even entertained doing a co-promotion with McMahon was basically to stick it to New Japan. But there was no way Vince was going to be able to co-promote with anybody, especially Baba. The two promotions couldn’t have been more diametrically opposed. All Japan was doing King’s Road and Vince was doing “I choppee your pee-pee.” I remember JR talking about that, and saying that one of the reasons Vince did it was to punish Michaels for being a massive pain in the ass backstage during that time period. Basically if Michaels wanted to keep getting paid, he’d better strap on his tight little referee shorts and go to Japan. Vince put up with a ton of shit from Michaels especially back then, but I think even he had his limits. I’d never heard that Michaels did it to help his students.

After watching Rampage last night, I can only assume that Tony Khan has secured a ROH TV deal and is getting ready to announce that and the next ROH PPV…or he has totally lost his mind.

I am there for Rey vs. Gunther. Or Solo vs. Gunther. Or even Sheamus vs. Gunther III. Ricochet…who cares, really.

Having to watch her is already painful…for all of us.

The crowd has gone pretty dead for this Hit Row/LDF match.

Did Michael Cole just reference Championship Wrestling from Hollywood?!

I believe Stroman vs. Omos is going to be what JR calls “Bowling Shoe Ugly.”

I was just watching Foley’s podcast on YouTube and I saw an ad for Triplemania XXX tomorrow night on Fite. I am mildly curious, however I still remember back in 2015 when I foolishly paid for Triplemania XXIII via traditional PPV. The show was plagued with technical problems and for the most part the matches were total dogshit. It ended up being a massive ripoff and I have not paid for a Lucha show since. I consider Good Bubba @sek69 to be the “go to” guy here at PWO when it comes to Lucha related stuff. So sek, what’s the skinny on this show tomorrow? Is it expected to be good, bad or ugly? Any big matches worth seeing you think? Please share your opinions with the class.

I think MJF is a legit hockey fan, so I am sure there are more shots at the Leafs to come.

I wondered how long it would take for somebody to reference the fact that the Jays imploded, blew a 7 run lead and got eliminated from the playoffs in two straight games. Sounds like Christian got it out of the way right off the bat. And took a shot at the Leafs, too.

To me, it looks like the belt Elvis Presley was wearing over his sequinned jumpsuit when he did that TV special from Hawaii, back in the 70’s. Maybe whoever wins it can be a hunka hunka burnin TV Champion.

It’s October! Baseball playoffs, dude. Phillies/Cards and Padres/Mets happening as we speak. Plus the Jays just blew an 8-1 lead to get eliminated. WWE can’t compete with that.

The fans love him, he has good matches and he might be the best promo in the business. Why would you actually want to put him on TV or feature him in any way? Then he might actually make you some money! Can’t have that! Besides, he would only serve to take away precious TV time from Wheeler Yuta and Daniel Garcia. Can’t have that, brother. He goes into the “Now You See Him, Now You Don’t” file with Miro and FTR. And Ricky Starks, looks like. And Jamie Hayter’s push.

Does that mean no more Byron Saxton? If so, good. If it means he’s going to NXT? Bad. He’s horrible.

I initially accidentally misread the thread title as “Getting a Brazilian is suffering” and I thought: “I’m sure that’s probably true…but why is Good Bubba @KawadaSmile posting a thread about getting a bikini wax?” Now reading it properly, it makes a bit more sense.

You’re absolutely right. The idea of holding a TV taping for a show that doesn’t even air on Television in the market where you’re taping the show is just…a WCW level strategy. Not to mention (although the tickets have come down in price - dramatically in some cases) the ticket prices are absolutely insane. I was going to Dynamite come hell or high water…until I saw those ticket prices. $300 for a single ticket. They’ve come down to $150 or so now, but still way too high. That’s not on AEW, that’s on the Secondary Ticket Sellers but still. After all the smoke has cleared I would not be surprised to end up seeing empty seats at Dynamite after all, and especially at Rampage for sure.

Today was a National day of “Truth and Reconciliation” and it was a bank holiday. Not surprised she wore the shirt in Winnipeg, there is a large First Nation’s population in that area.

I love Alone. I’ve been watching that show since it debuted, it’s great. However to hell with Judge. The Jays needed to win tonight to clinch the AL Wildcard, dammit!

What this show needs is a long promo segment.

The first hour of this show has been exceptionally underwhelming.

Man, Tony Khan is ride-or-die with these pushes for Garcia and Yuta isn’t he?

Sorry to hear that. Hope you land on your feet.

“He’s talking to the ketchup now.” ”Maybe being disgraced and forced out of his company destroyed his brain.”

I love the ECW series, those are outstanding. The first one covering 92/93 with Tod Gordon is especially great, there are some hilarious stories in there, plus he provides great insight into the founding of ECW, before Paul Heyman even showed up. He also dispels a few ECW myths too. The only negative about that interview, is that Gordon mumbles and mutters and talks really fast at times, so it’s hard to understand him. 94 features Shane Douglas and it is also excellent. Douglas is eloquent and well spoken and he has a good memory and is pretty insightful. I liked that one a lot. The 96 year in review is pretty good, but not as good as those first two I mentioned. Raven is the guest. He is really funny and offers some interesting insights into his time in ECW but his memory is terrible so there is a lot he doesn’t remember, or he gets confused. Plus he tends to go off topic a fair bit, he is very easily distracted. He himself actually attributes some of that stuff to his excessive drug and alcohol use during the time covered by this interview. I thought the 1997 interview with Sabu was great. He has loosened up a lot over the years and is way more communicative than he used to be. I get the impression that his attitude is that he doesn’t really like talking about himself or backstage stuff, but if he is getting paid to do it he will try his best. Keep in mind he has a slight stammer and obviously has social anxiety, but I still love his interviews and this one was great. The only negative thing I could say is that I think he tended to live in his own little bubble and I think his perspective on some things may not be the same as you would get from other people in the locker room. Still a great interview. The 1998 episode with New Jack is surprisingly subdued for New Jack. He might be high during this interview (it would not surprise me) but he’s definitely not taking anything that gets him all amped up like you sometimes see with him in a Shoot interview. This is not screaming, threatening, can’t stay in his chair New Jack. Much like with Sabu, New Jack tended to only see things from his perspective and how they affected him. Douglas and Raven were able to look at things as they affected ECW overall whereas Sabu and New Jack only looked at things as they affected them…but it’s still a great interview. The JYD story is a highlight. The 1999 interview with RVD is surprisingly good. For a guy who smokes as much pot as he does, he actually has a great memory (much better than Raven and New Jack) and RVD seems to enjoy the interview and gives some great answers and insight. The 2000/2001 interview with Justin Credible is what it is. This covers ECW during it’s death throes, so it’s kind of depressing. Also, Justin Credible is kind of a divisive figure with ECW fans because a lot of people tended to point to his push to the Main Event as a sign the company was going down in flames. YMMV on this one, but it held my interest and I didn’t hate it. He seems like a nice enough guy, and he’s a decent interview. The only negative thing I can say about the Kayfabe Commentaries ECW timeline series is that the 1995 interview with Sandman is a trainwreck and a total waste of time. He’s very obviously drunk and/or fucked up on something during this interview. Look at his face. I don’t like to lob accusations about somebody being on meth, but in this case… I’m not convinced that he would have been a good interview even if he was stone cold sober, but we’ll never know. Literally no interesting or insightful answers here. This really pissed me off because 1995 was a big year for ECW and this interview was a lost opportunity. I wish Sean Oliver would redo this one with Mick Foley. They did such a great job covering the entire lifetime of ECW but this one isolated interview was a missed opportunity. The 1995 episode is somewhat infamous because Sean Oliver sat there trying to conduct the 90 minute interview with a clearly incapacitated Sandman, only to discover that the asshole had literally left his kids waiting in a hot car the whole time.