rainmakerrtv

New babyface Andre the Giant. I definitely recall the return of Studd as being a big deal at the time, and they were clearly indicating a feud with Andre after WM V . It's a bit hard to imagine, given how out-of-shape Studd was at that time, but he was being given a fair sized push.

I was, too. Warrior was my first favorite wrestler, and I don't know what kind of joyless bastard you would have to be to hate Randy Savage, so I was happy neither of them sold out at the time. As an adult....Flair and Perfect went a very long way to accomplish something that they could have gotten from jumping Savage in the parking lot before his title defense against Flair. If the in-universe goal was to injure Savage's knee going into that match, this was kind of a needlessly elaborate plan that could've easily backfired on them. If the real life goal was to create added tension for the Savage/Warrior match, it's not like either of those guys need help being paranoid and insane. I was actually watching their tag against the Nasty Boys from the SummerSlam Spectacular just the other day. You totally buy that these guys would have dissension even without an outside heel party getting involved. So the storyline comes across as kinda pointless to me. I would guess they were hoping to make one of them snap and burn out at the PPV then pick up the scraps. When it became apparent that was not going to happen, they just fucked up Savage's knee. I would assume the main thing was for Warrior not to get the title. Divide and conquer. Attacking Savage in a parking lot just damages Savage and could mean Warrior gets the title. Using mind games to get them angry at each other means that they have a violent, mutually damaging match instead of a clean-cut, scientific match (I know, I know) between respectful athletes, and thus the match takes its toll on both men, hopefully leaving Savage injured for when Flair gets a shot at him and comprimises Warrior for any future challenges. Besides, villains love overly elaborate plans, it's one of the great traditions of villainy. Flair was probably operating under the rules of the Guild of Calamitous Intent.

Sadly, yes.

"Sports entertainment" being used seriously by anyone not actively employed by WWE.

Forget whear but Tracy Smothers did an interview once talking about how SMW actually did have a big # of fans who were in the KKK and how much he hated them but had to pretend that he didn't to keep up his gimmick. The story I remember (from Cornette) is that , shortly after they ran the "DWB burns the Stars & Bars" angle, Smothers was working the gimmick table and the local Klan rep came up, gave him his card, and said "If you don't get the job done tonight, we will."

I love the fact that the waiter addressed him as "Senor Razor".

What was the Puerto Rican team that the Steiners were slated to meet in the first round? Miguel Perez Jr. and somebody else?

Conspicuous in its absence from Watts' announcement : the off-the-top-rope ban. IMSMR it was included at the very tail end of a later Watts announcement. I remember it at the time as he wrapped up by saying, "Oh, and one last thing, moves off the top rope are now an automatic DQ, 'kay, bye!" And I was watching thinking, "Wait, what?" There has been some discussion, both pro and con, regarding the Watts Top Rope ban, but I thought it was very poorly introduced. First, it seemed a kind of cowardly way to roll out something that Watts has since claimed was trying to be something important that would restore the audience-impact of top rope moves, just to off-handedly throw it out there right at the end of an interview with no time for anyone to react. Secondly, it smacked of hypocrisy that the two new rules were introduced around the same time. "We're taking away the ringside mats because our wrestlers are so tough! And were banning moves off the top rope because we don't want our wrestlers getting hurt!"

I figure the big , rough-and-tumble sailor is a reasonable wrestling archetype, Tugboat just seems to me to be a cartoonish variation on that archetype.

The word on Buddy is that he was his own worst enemy and every time he would start to get ahead, he would do something (or something would happen) that would screw it up. The legend is that he signed a contract with WWF after the closing of SMW and on the way out the door he slipped on a patch of ice and broke his ankle. A real shame, he was a great entertainer.

There is a fair stretch of his career where it could be said Dr. Tom was doing a Piper imitation in his interviews.

Who was the first of these, in your opinion? Group has to have a namesake. Oliver & Johnson's book says the Fabulous Ones. I wouldn't disagree with that. By all accounts, the Rock & Roll Express were created as the teeny-bopper B-show Fabs, the Fantastic Ones (as was their original name) were the replacement knock-off Fabs. A lot of subsequent teams (The Midnight Rockers, Southern Rockers, Rock & Roll Rockers, etc.) came from the Rock & Roll, but the Fabs were first.

Always loved this segment, especially the crazy brawl at the end. So so disapointed when they cut those guys out of the war games match. My brain might be making this up, but wasn't Goldberg one of the dudes that tried out? I think it has been established that that was Horshu AKA the future Luther Reigns.

I like Tarrantino .... I just thought Russo might have been deluding himself into thinking he was just like Tarrantino, much like he has deluded himself into thinking he draws ratings, understands what wrestling fans want, etc etc etc.

Russo?

So anyway, sorry about the Dusty Rhodes comparison. Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Guess it boils down to Russo being like a lot of other bookers who only knew how to push themselves, except Russo was never a star in his own right, he just wrote himself to be. There was no way that he could claim so much of how he was pushing himself was going to bring ratings or buyrates, it was all just to make himself look big.

Dusty and Russo should never be in the same sentence... Shit. Sorry, let me explain. I love Dusty, but towards the end of his booking run he had some flaws that caused problems leading to the sale of JCP to Turner. I was just struck how Russo seemed to repeat and magnify these flaws in his run that destroyed WCW : constant screw job finishes, making himself the center of everything and jamming himself down everyone's throat, whenever he was not around having everyone say "Where's poochie?", believing his own hype. All, of course, while lacking all of Dusty's many conspicuous good qualities : creativity, ability to work the mic and connect with a crowd, fundamental love and understanding of wrestling, etc. etc. etc. It just seemed from watching that somebody had distilled the worst elements of Dusty and tried to see how much they could make it worse.

Having recently completed watching goodhelment's Death of WCW comp and rewatching his Four Horseman comp, 2 observations : 1) I wonder what would have been the effect on Russo's career if Reservoir Dogs had never come out. I really think he is convinced he is Quentin Tarrantino, a guy who used to run a video store who believes that rehashing storylines from a lot of b movies into a different setting makes him some sort of genius. 2) Vince Russo is the Dusty Rhodes of suck.

I remember on DVDVR joking about how Tommy Rich made his meth dealer his manager. Somebody then informed that they were at those shows and, yes, that's exactly what happened.

Are there any available pics of Mr. Donnie?

And then they sent him to ECW where Tazz messed him up real bad.

Yeah, that angle got a quick drop. John Actually, I don't recall Liz being mentioned again after Mania. Can anybody recall any appearances between Mania and the divorce?

They didn't even job him out, he just vanished from the program after 2 low key appearances.

similar to this, Kizarnie. Months of promos, then they throw him out there as part of MVP's losing streak gimmick, he made one more appearance in a battle royal and then out. Loch Ness in WCW got much the same treatment as the Yeti. Loch Ness is at least defensible because he retired from wrestling and went back to England due to health problems. Whether that's before or after they decided to job him out is unknown. The bigger question is why bring in 50 year old Giant Haystacks who was really only known in England and give him a big push instead of someone young? IMSMR, Hulk Hogan personally asked him to come out of retirement to be his next big feud ... then completely failed to put him over in any way when he showed up. His few ring performances after that were so bad they quickly jobbed him out to the Giant then sent him home. His health issues didn't occur until later (or perhaps that was only when they were made public).

similar to this, Kizarnie. Months of promos, then they throw him out there as part of MVP's losing streak gimmick, he made one more appearance in a battle royal and then out. Loch Ness in WCW got much the same treatment as the Yeti.