Childs

Bizarre cut to the panel there. Everything about this shows feels off.

You're kidding. Are the agents pranking us?

The finishes on this show have really sucked.

The problem with the Sting -Trips stuff is it leads to a Sting-Trips match.

Good match but not a show stealer.

Well, at least Dustin is still great.

Slander/libel cases are extremely hard to win. It will be interesting to see what kind of legs this one has. Hard to imagine Punk flat out made up the story, but who knows.

Young Fujiwara, WOS Billy Robinson, every Satanico title or stip match from the '80s (could say similar things for a lot of luchadores), Lawler's arena main events from the '80s.

Please lord, no.

The Taue Carny match was a little different in that it was more a tour de force of body part selling. One of my favorite things about the Andre match from '81 is that it featured Stan in more of an underdog role. Also, check out the cage match blowoff with Colon where he was bouncing around to make the native superstar look great. But yeah, I love the little sub-genre of matches built around Stan's selling.

Kobashi was really great in '98 and had a second peak of sorts in NOAH from 2003-2005. I've never been a huge fan, per se, but I'll probably put him in my top 10 ultimately because his best matches, and his performances in those matches, were some of the most staggering efforts in pro wrestling history. I've said this elsewhere, but I'm convinced Kenta Kobashi wanted to be a great pro wrestler more passionately than anyone else I've seen. That passion led to excess, sure, but it also led to some real brilliance. Anyway, he was still a baby in '92.

He also wasn't the same physically. Remember, he'd been working as a top junior/heavy for almost 15 years at the dawn of the '90s.

That was one of the most interesting things to me as I rewatched the '96-'98 TV week to week. It took a long time for Austin to become AUSTIN. The compressed narrative always makes it sound like he dropped the 3:16 line on Jake and a few months later, he was bigger than Hogan. But honestly, did he ever feel like a bigger star than Bret before Bret left?

Worse still, they knew Bryan coming back would be a big deal to fans and treated it as a significant storyline in the run-up. And then they casually dusted him. That added greatly to the sense of spite booking. They also pushed Reigns in such a cowardly fashion--trying to get Bryan out of his way, hiding him during the match and then sending the Rock out to mitigate the shitstorm. If that's your guy, at least have the courage of your convictions. They made this all worse than it needed to be with their half-in horseshit.

This is one complaint--also made by Dave--that I don't get. Bubba was there for an ECW nostalgia moment. Whatever he did with TNA had shit to do with it. I'm all for ripping WWE right now, but I don't blame them a bit for treating TNA like a pimple on the ass.

God also angry that Roman Reigns went over.

Are they even going to be able to run Raw tonight? The CT governor has issued a travel ban starting at 9 p.m.

I guess I'm wondering about those people who are down on Angle in general now or who don't like Sting/Luger vs Steiners. People like my co-host Chad, for example. Again, the special attraction thing is a part of it. As is the fact that Brock is portraying a monster, which Scotty and Angle never were. I'm not a fan of Sting/Luger vs. the Steiners but my criticism has nothing to do with the match being a spotfest. The opening few minutes were great, but then they got really sloppy, and the whole thing petered out to a shit finish.

I could see the triple threat being a match that looks a little worse when viewed at some remove. But in real time, I found it totally engrossing. I'm mixed on Rollins in general, but I thought he hit most of his big spots in cool, opportunistic ways. And he took some sick bumps off Brock's stuff. I didn't mind the stretch with Cena, because it effectively put over the idea that Brock really might be out of it. I'm not sure how their execution was during those moments, because honestly, I was sucked up in the broader story. As for comparing Brock to Steiner and Angle, two things: 1) Brock is helped by his status as a freak show special attraction. If he was doing that shit every week on TV, it would lose its luster more quickly. 2) People loved Scott Steiner in '92 and Kurt Angle in '02.

The Rock coming out actually made it worse.

They hate their fans.

Smartly laid out Rumble so far.

Bubba is actually a great Rumble surprise.

Big grin on my face from that one.

This match is bananas.