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Meltzer will have further details at 1 a.m., but I figured this needed its own thread. Dave's Tweet: "Bushiroad purchased Stardom, details at 1 a.m. on the Observer site, bigger story in the Observer tomorrow."

Also, I almost feel like they have to take the belt off Jericho at least temporarily if he's going to be working Wrestle Kingdom, unless Gedo decides to put him over Tanahashi and confirm that plan with Chris beforehand. Which isn't impossible, I guess, but I don't find it likely.

I'd really rather MJF be kept apart from the Inner Circle, whether he turns or not.

Jericho cheating to defeat an armless man is glorious.

Riho-Baker ended up being a lot of fun despite some awkward moments. You just don't see much mouth-based psychology in wrestling like we saw at the finish.

Boy did that Omega-Janela match not live up to the hype. Janela just isn't good, period.

As an avid American sports-follower I can assure you this makes no more sense to me than it does to you. I guess the closest parallel is how the NFL splits up its TV rights between its two conferences for the Sunday afternoon games, with one network getting the rights to one conference and one to another, which goes back to when there were two separate pro leagues.

Fuck, they used Hager about as well as possible. If he stays in his lane as a goon for Jericho, at least until he shows consistent improvement, I have absolutely no issues with him.

I partially blame HHH and a.) his weird emphasis on "realism" and b.) his complete lack of knowledge of real sports.

TV-14, baby! That was a terrific showcase for MJF, who is 100% into his character and knows how to wrestle like a complete and total prick. Everything old is new again.

As soon as Jericho announced mystery partners, people were thinking LAX.

Speaking as someone who has Herodes on ignore, it all seems like fair game to me. It's all public and it's all out there, and it's not 100% unrelated, either.

Slim Jim, IIRC. It was one of numerous things he discussed on that infamous AoW.

Or they can decide, as in the case of CM Punk, to simply deny him the commercial opportunity and then turn around and give them to somebody else (Cena, Big Show, Rey, and Eve Torres in his case).

It never seems to occur to these people that the economy and businesses might actually be *helped* if the rank and file actually have spending money of their own. But how it affects those poor, helpless "job creators" at large is a red herring anyway. The simple fact is there are specific criteria laid out for what constitutes an "independent contractor" and WWE wrestlers meet every single one of them.

Wow, THE Matt McEwen weighed on this to shoot it down? Amazing. Unprecedented. Wait...who is Matt McEwen again? I'm hearing directly conflicting info on whether this law is across-the-board or not, so I don't know what to believe. But some of the responses to Eric D. Anderson's tweets (the lawyer who Dave is RT'ing) do a more effective job of illustrating how WWE could argue against this law (like arguing that it's unconstitutional since it in theory regulates interstate commerce, which is under federal authority only). Edit: McEwen implies he spoke with an employment lawyer regarding this law. Which one? Who and when and where does he practice? I may be jumping to conclusions here but it sure sounds like Dave and Eric Anderson have had correspondence on this issue already and that Dave did in fact consult with him.

Wrestlers in 1970 and indy wrestlers of today really were/are independent contractors. Ones under exclusive deals aren't anymore.

I don't think this will kill indy wrestling in California, incidentally. Indy wrestlers are very much closer to being independent contractors than guys under contract to major promotions. There are also certain business size minimums (I think 24+ employees or more) that business would have to meet to be affected by this bill, which I don't think most indies qualify for.

I agree with JRH, but isn't there a story of some shady-looking guys coming up to Bruno offering to "take care" of Zbyszko for him? And Bruno having to beg for the dogs to be called off and assure them that he'd handle Larry in the ring himself?

Trying in vain to follow all these tap-dance-filled conversations has me on the verge of dying of an overdose of euphemisms. Someone let me know if some actual fucking facts come out.

I think we need more announced #1 contenders and fewer title shots won through multi-man clusterfucks and tournaments.

I believe Ladd & V lasted for just that first taping cycle. Clint raises a pertinent point--you really weren't meant to watch every last WWF show in those days. Things moved slowly enough that you could really stick to any one of the weekly TV shows and not miss much. I never got Challenge in my market until around when JR took over, and then for awhile Superstars was on an independent station that my cable company didn't carry until another year or so after that, so All-American ended up being my primary show, supplemented by Prime Time. I doubt any major angle or development took place that wasn't shown at least partially or in full on those two shows.

One other correction: it was All-American that became Action Zone, in 1994. Action Zone was mostly Challenge with an added feature match, a format that lasted for about a year when it became basically All-American all over again, a strict recap show. That lasted for about another year (all of these switches started roughly with the new fall season) when Superstars switched from syndication to USA. Superstars itself became a recap show in January of '97. At some point, I think in early-to-mid '86, Tuesday Night Titans moved to Friday nights and simply became TNT.