Loss

I do wish the Portland announcing was more descriptive. As much as we bitch about WWE and their storytellers these days, at least they provide some sense of historical context about what's happened before and any angles that led to the match. Bonnema just calls out moves but doesn't really provide much context for the most part.

That's most of my problem too, especially the bolded part. I would also encourage people to listen to the Where The Big Boys Play podcasts if you think some of this stuff is just me being an apologist for Flair. On numerous shows, time after time, Chad and Parv discuss a lot of the variation and nuance in Flair's performance, and that includes everything from presenting himself credibly to even having some hierarchy in his offense which Parv has really been a fan of. It's a great listen.

It's interesting that it seems like these days, he gets most of his information directly from the office when in the past, most of the information came from wrestlers. It makes Dave come across as a guy who has morphed into a beltway reporter in some ways. It would also explain the shift in his coverage. The modern Dave would talk about how the WCW midcard guys don't understand wrestling because Hogan is the clear draw. The old Dave would have complained more about Rock being on steroids and not having great matches when he returned.

I'm pretty sure the dates are reversed and incorrect for the two tags on YouTube based on the response from you guys, but also because in the match dated 11/8 on YouTube, Rose and Oliver win, but on 11/15, Youngblood and Lightfoot are the defending champions. In addition, the 11/8 match goes around 33 minutes total while the 11/15 match goes nearly 40 total. Also, 11/8 is announced as non-title because Youngblood and Lightfoot just defended the belts the week before, while 11/15 is announced as a title match. Can anyone confirm that this is the case? 11/8 match on YouTube: 11/15 match on YouTube: That would explain a lot.

I get it in the sense that he was trying to demonstrate that they clearly still see John Cena as the face of the company, because he was the only current performer (unless you count HHH and Stephanie) on stage as part of the announcement. But John Cena can still be Mr. Right while Daniel Bryan is Mr. Right Now.

I will also add that I thought it was better than the first Martel vs Rose match, which I rewatched and liked far more the second time around, but which was still a little on the slow and bland side. It's still a great match, but yeah.

Hmm, I felt like it was more of a good thing.

Buddy Rose & Rip Oliver vs Jay Youngblood & Joe Lightfoot (PNW 11/08/80) Portland goes Mid Atlantic in this awesome tag. That flying elbow from Buddy in the first fall was a thing of beauty. I think I'm letting go of the idea that best of three falls and FIP tag matches are incompatible, because this match proved that to be untrue. In fact, they created a blueprint for how to make it work, because this built the same way any Southern tag typically does (shine -> heat -> comeback), but they just added a fall at the end of each part of the match. So simple and it works. The heat on Lightfoot was awesome. Youngblood is the superior worker on the babyface team, but Lightfoot is excellent at timing his hope spots. Of course, the best ones all happen when Rose is in the ring, so I suspect those are being called for him. Buddy covers really well for a couple of blown spots from him too. And of course, Buddy is also an awesome troll. Instead of just cutting the ring in half like a typical heel team would do, he works just out of reach of a hot tag to Youngblood for most of this to taunt him. In fact, with all the spots with guys being knocked off the apron and build to paybacks, this even feels like epic All Japan in moments. This is quite possibly the best tag match in the United States that I have ever seen, and it's made even better by the fact that Youngblood and Lightfoot, while not a bad team, aren't nearly as good as this match would suggest. I kept thinking this match couldn't get any better and yet it kept getting better. This is a credit to Buddy Rose and Rip Oliver's heel work, but especially to Buddy.

Strangely, Dave also feels like Daniel Bryan not being at the network announcement in Las Vegas says everything we need to know about what the company thinks of him.

The ending to RAW was terrific. It seems like something they pulled the trigger on a little earlier than planned because of the tepid reaction to the angle, but they made the right call if that's the case.

I couldn't even enjoy Warrior promos in an ironic way.

I'm not sure I believe that Wade has WWE sources anymore. He hasn't broken a news story himself in over a decade.

He hates Hogan and has done a few rants the past few years exposing his infidelity and drug habits when they were both on top. No way is it Hogan.

They are crazy if they let that guy speak with an open mic without approving his remarks in advance.

Without having seen the match, it sure sounds like we have a case of Harley "playing the bitch".

Very cool! Where, might I ask, do I find it on the site? I tried looking for it.

Obviously I'm not your target audience, but for whatever it's worth, and I say this in as friendly and constructive a way as I possibly can: I like the stuff you normally write much better. I think the Masked Man style traps the writer in a predefined narrative and then the writer supports that narrative, even if there are other inconvenient truths that are part of the picture. Your interviews are top notch, and I'd definitely like more of those, although I realize doing more columns like this doesn't preclude you from doing more interviews. I also really enjoy the other writing I've seen from you. I even defended you against criticism on the "disposable commodities" line you rolled out about how Paul Heyman treated wrestlers a few years back and still think you were 100% on the right on that. I just like your style more than his.

Sure I've met know-it-all geeks. I am one! But I haven't met the former ECW fan who hates John Cena and plays Magic.

Beat him Chad! Beat him like a dog!

Something that has been lost in all the hype about the network is that Vince's pompadour is making a comeback. This is huge news!

As someone who is normally a fan of your writing, I'm not a fan of the sweeping generalizations you make about wrestling fans in this article, one where casual wrestling fans are naive dimwits and where hardcore wrestling fans are angry nerds. Does every type of wrestling fan fall into one category or the other? I'm a pretty devoted fan of wrestling, but I've never touched Magic: The Gathering, and my hardcore fandom is not rooted in ECW or Paul Heyman. I feel zero connection to either of the groups you described, and I can't think of many wrestling fans with whom I interact that fall into either of these categories either. I do agree with the general point that there has been a dissonance in what fans have wanted from WWE for a long time, and WWE has given mixed responses to those mixed messages. WWE has made a choice and they're banking on hardcore fans, or at the very least training casual fans to act like hardcore fans in some respects. But by including clips of Daniel Bryan and CM Punk in this article, the assumption is that they have no appeal to casual fans when that's clearly not the case. I feel the need to respond to a lot of this: What about males who are casual fans? They exist too. In fact, a lot of them boo John Cena and cheer Daniel Bryan and CM Punk. It's not like most of those people post here or at DVDVR (or I would wager any online message board), and when you look at all the times Cena has been booed out of a building, there's no way the WON, the Torch and PWInsider combined have that many subscribers. They are casual fans. The in thing to do is boo Cena and cheer Bryan and Punk ... so they boo Cena and cheer Bryan and Punk. They chant YES because the masses chant YES. People who follow the in crowd are casual fans. Do they understand history? Would they have been able to poke holes in the press release last month about the finish to Thesz/Rogers without Dave pointing it out? I'm not sure everyone could do that here. I'm not sure I could. Look at how many people still don't understand the details of Montreal, despite the info being out there and readily accessible. The people who understand wrestling history by and large aren't in arenas booing Cena. They are posting on Wrestling Classics. I want to give you the benefit of the doubt here, but surely you aren't implying that the only people who boo Cena and cheer Punk and Bryan are former ECW fans? If ECW would have had that many fans, they would still be in business. Less than a year ago, a stadium full of fans booed John Cena like crazy when he defeated The Rock. Did ECW ever fill a stadium with fans from around the world? My problems with this statement are that it's presumed that hardcore fans have been happy with the direction of WWE since Summerslam, that Daniel Bryan and The Shield aren't over with anyone except Internet fans, and that they may in fact be driving people away. I think we both know that isn't true. If this is the case, should I expect WWE to fire John Cena and build around Daniel Bryan as their new Hogan after Mania? Will Brodus Clay and the Divas not be on the roster anymore since they have no appeal to hardcore fans? I think the truth is more complex than this article suggests. I also think most wrestling fans are people with all sorts of nuances and unique characteristics and motivations for watching, and I've never really met anyone who acts quite like the hardcore fans you mention in this article.

Disney does, and they manage to build up anticipation for re-releases. So I can see the logic. But I don't think that's WWE's game at this point.

If I remember correctly, they had a brief house show resurgence in this time (at least by the standards of a really tough time for the company), and Vince made the call that because of that, they could hold off on Lex's big win for the next time that houses started to fall.

I'm sure there are contractual reasons they aren't. I don't think they would just purposely hold off launching anywhere if they had their way.

We shouldn't forget that most subscribers who grew up on Rock & Wrestling and Attitude probably haven't seen it since it originally aired, so it will be huge for them.