sek69

This is great news, while Vince is busy making fun of his own loyal employees and trying to steal UFC announcers, TNA will be reminding wrestling fans that it's possible to watch wrestling again and not be embarrassed.

It's funny, WWE vs UFC is like a fight where only one side is taking part. UFC doesn't even pay attention to what WWE does, while TNA is slowly building an audience and holding decent TV ratings, not to mention slowly becoming an attractive alternative to guys who are being shat on by Vince.

I'd wager Matt will end up in TNA as soon as contractually possible after the rapid depush he got as well.

So they pulled the old Wendi Richter manuver on him, demanding he sign a contract on the spot? I can imagine what was in the fine print when they want people to sign legal documents without reading them. If his contract just ran out, does that mean there won't be a no-compete clause? I can't see how they could enforce one if his deal with the WWE ended on its own with no firings/releases.

Also, this doesn't seem to be worded like other times people part with the company. When someone gets cut or their deal isn't renewed, the WWE.com story usually is worded like "WWE has released Jason "Christian" Reso and we wish him the best in his future endeavors".

Part of me wants to think this is a setup for some type of angle, but then I remember the WWE is more interested in giving guys penis gimmicks than thinking up ways to push people who got over on their own. If this is legit, I for one won't be surprised. Wasn't there reports out that Christian wasn't happy with getting shunted to SD and forgotten about? I really hope this is true so he can go to TNA and have that "Waltman shooting on Hogan when he came back to the WWF" moment you know he wants to do.

Apparently the Tolands, former OVW tag champs, are going to be billed as James and Jack Dick, and their whole gimmick is their name. Seriously, are 12 year olds running creative now? The best they can come up with for guys now is dick jokes?

What was the deal with Nick Bockwinkel on commentary for some of those matches? The time frame would have been during his last AWA run and I don't recall him ever doing anything with the WWF.

It's all just a huge slap in the face to the one segment of the fanbase that sticks with Vince no matter what stupid crap he pulls. "Hey, thanks for staying around all these years, here's the shittiest WM box set we could come up with!"

I got the first four WMs from the UK in that "Tagged Classics" thing they do with old school PPVs. The DVD of WM 1 had all the music cut or dubbed over with bland rock music, so it was done before this box set. This seems to be the most horribly designed box set the WWE could have imagined. Sticking WM XXI on top and hoping it won't fall off and get scratched is just idiotic. How many DVD packaging fuck-ups have they had so far? I remember they had to offer new cases for the Flair set, the discs fell out of most the Undertaker sets....Christ, you'd think they'd put more into these since DVDs are their best money makers. I'm wondering, do they still censor every mention of "Federation" when someone says "World Wrestling Federation"? I know they did when they first started getting the F out, but I heard a few "federation"s on the Taker set.

This is some of the best news a TNA fan could hear. Not only is it possible that Jerry Jarrett could be gone, it would mean the end of Jeff being rammed down everyone's throat as a main eventer and champion. The best part is WWE made a fuss over thiis thinking it would stuck it to TNA, and it could end up being the best thing that ever happened to them. I'm sure Vince is probably doing his Movie Villian Laugh thinking this will destroy those pipsqueaks who think they can challenge his company.

To me, it seems like Batista has bought into the "WWE Style is your Lord and Master, there are no other styles before it" mantra that Vince drills into everyone's heads. Anyone who doesn't work kicky-punchy style is told they can't work and will never get over so it's no surprise a WWE guy thinks what AJ does isn't wrestling.

I'm not saying I can't be proven wrong, but a 16 man elimination match just sounds so ass-numbing to me. How do they work them, are all 16 guys in the ring?

They probably want to buy Jerry's Memphis tapes for 24/7. Maybe they want to do a Jerry Lawler DVD as well. I love how they'd try to imply Jeff was with him, as if they would sign him after the Chyna fiasco.

Having a match with 15 falls is ridiculous no matter how long it takes.

It used to bug me during the Monday Night Wars where they'd say certain guys were the reason segments would jump in ratings. I don't know about the rest of you, but I've never called friends to go put wrestling on because certain guys are on TV. There's certain quarter-hours that always get more viewership than others, and WWE just puts guys they want to get over in those segments so they can point to the ratings and say "see, he drew the highest rating of the show" when that part of the show would always get a high rating.

This reminds me of guys who try to set the record for holding someone up in a vertical suplex. There's just no point.

All I can say is every time I go to a graduation and they play Pomp and Circumstance, I have to make an effort to not launch into a Randy Savage impression.

The four year old is his child with his current wife, the child support is owed on his kids with his ex-wife.

Help Ricky Morton get out of jail for being behind on child support payments that were based on his 1991 income when he was with WCW.

They're the exception that proves the rule, especially Sabin. His music has the "Hail Sabin" at the start that immediately identifies who's about to come out, just like how every WWF/E theme has a tag at the beginning to let the crowd know who's coming out.

That's kind of my point, they put questionable quality matches on DVD because of some historical importance, but they'll leave of good quality matches also of importance in favor of some crap with no history behind it.

As TNA is starting to gain a foothold on Spike, it's already becoming a divisive issue on the 'net if it's ever going to become a competitor to WWE. To that length I was thinking about some things that they can do to improve their product. 1. Get more TV time. This seems to be happening, with Spike giving them a primetime special and possibly a permanent 2 hour timeslot. In this era of wrestling, one hour of TV is simply not enough to establish characters and tell stories that sell PPVs. 2. Let a homegrown talent run with the belt. This also seems to be happening, with Monty Brown being groomed for a title run in the near future. Jeff Jarrett must not be given long runs with the belt, even if someone has to use duct tape and rope to prevent it. 3. Introduce a secondary singles title. Assuming they get a 2 hour time slot, they need to have a secondary singles title for guys not in the world title picture to chase after. The X title is the domain of the high flyers, they need a IC or US title that the guys they want to groom for future world title runs can go after. The NWA has a North American title that could fit this role nicely, it could even be worked into an angle with Team Canada. 4. Real entrance music. This is my big knock on TNA right now. The music guys come out to now sounds like bad cellphone ring tones. Entrance music helps set the stage for a wrestler, it's a key element of their personality if done right. The next time they get the itch to give another heap of cash to someone like Nash who isn't going to be a long term part of the company, they should instead put that cash into a decent music producer who can come up with memorable themse like Jim Johnston does (did? I don't know if he left or not) for WWF/E

11/12 tapings:

I just took it to mean that you have to promote all your teams, since in baseball they tend to get shit ratings if there's no New York or California teams in the World Series. Even if you have exciting games, people outside of the home cities have no vested interest in watching. That's what I got out of it. You gotta give people a reason to watch.