El-P

No Way Jose is the new Fandango/Adam Rose. Ember Moon has an interesting look. So does her opponent. Crappy music though, but that's the case for a lot of people. Finisher looks cool although there's so much possibility to blow it, dunno if that's a very good idea. Too much of a "modified" stuff to me. Still, curious to see what they do with these two. Bobby Roode's entrance is ridiculous in a good way, but again, the music is gloriously awful, but not awful enough (as if a Paul Orndorff way "Wonderfuuuuul "). Funny how Roode is basically himslef from TNA and pushed like a star, while La Sombra is getting the WWE facelift and looks like a mexican hipster jobber. That tag match. Excellent to great. The Revival have no look and are kinda fat and are simply a great tag team. Dawson using the fake punch into a DDT from Arn warmed my heart. Terrific run to the finish. Match of the night, easily. Asuka vs Bailey was good, but nothing special. Not impressed with how Bailey sells the beating once she gets back on offense. Well, her facials are excellent, that's why she's a terrific babyface, but after getting beat on so much with brutal kicks, she just kinda got back on offense. The no-selling kinda bugged me too, although "Hit me in the head !" was bad-ass. Don't feel these two are clicking that well, their matches are not as good as they probably should be. Bailey in the main roster should out-sell any other shitty babyface they have if treated right. Nakamura's entrance, people. Wonderful. Joe is the best Taz eve, basically, although I don't like that crew cut in HD, doesn't look too good. Excellent match. Nak does so much less than he used to do in NJ, he adapted so well so quickly. Put him in the main roster and he puts everyone to shame, this guy should main event Mania. Although of course, after that awful SummerSlam show I'm not sure I want to see this actually. Again, funny how Joe is good old self Joe from ROH/TNA while Nakamura is a 100% New Japan product and they actually let them be who they are. Makes a shitload of difference. Super fun show again. I could do without some WWEism in the production, but these are the only really enjoyable (hell, watchable to begin with) WWE shows to me. When is the next one ?

"This is awesome". Pro-wrestling as artistic skating. Mike Oles was right !!!!

Holy shit. I totally should have gone to bed just after Sasha vs Charlotte, which, at the end of the day, is still probably the best match of the show. I'm SO glad I didn't try to stay awake to see that great Roman Reigns vs Rusev match. Ok, so this is Rusev & Lana turing babyface and officialy becoming Savage & Liz, right ? It has to be. Because if not, what the fuck. Already complete bullshit than a freaking angle on the PPV. The camera work is still killing everything BTW. Lana's outfit was the highlight if that second half. Eva Marie's non entrance. Damn straight. She's got an official troll gimmick. That's pretty awesome. Now they have to figure how to make it work inside the ring... Bottle of piss. Ok. The Demon's entrance has jumped the shark a lot time ago, but at least he's getting that title. Well. Oh. Didn't watch Ziggler vs Ambrose. Come on. Orton still has nothing to bring to the table. Brock does suplexes. Fuck, Brock was so unique at first, ad now every match of him is like Dan Severn vs Yoshiaki Fujiwara from Climax 96. That suplex city bullshit has made him a total gimmick worker instead of an actual spectacle. Terrible match. Oh, blood. Fuck me, Shane is gonna get more attention now ? BROCK VS SHANE AT MANIA, HELL IN THE CELL !!!! Terrible show. Mania was bad, but this was awful. You know, a 2 and a half hour NXT PPV with a great last hour is perfectly acceptable. These mega overlong WWE PPV's really don't do that dull as fuck product any favors. Cena vs AJ Styles will be the staple of self-conscious epics for year. I don't want to see any match like this, ever.

Cena's acting was the worst this side of "Sorry, I love you". WWE self-conscious epic at its all time worst.

they did it last night. Not at all. Nak doesn't work like he was in New Japan, doing a lot less actually, but the Joe match was excellent. Code Red... Cena needs to dig up the Canadian Destroyer at this point. The submission exchange is sad.

Usual "kick out of finisher / rince / repeat" WWE self-conscious epic. I'm in no hurry to see Nakamura or Joe get thrown into this shitty formula.

Looks like old Cena to me. I've seen AJ Styles have way better matches with Kid Kash during my TNA 2004 watch.

Damn Sasha. Wait WHAT ? 0-3 ? This will be a feel good show I guess. It's already too long too. Give me Rusev vs Reigns already so I can go to bed and watch the rest tomorrow, no way I'm staying up until 5 in the morning for this.

Ah ah ah ! That troll pin by Jericho after a botch spot. I don't give a shit about Enzo & Cass, so good. Hey, make Jericho & Owens sing "We're not the mountie !" on their way to the ring, Owens can be Oulette & Jericho can be Jacques. Sasha Banks vs Charlotte was pretty good, but way too much instance of Charlotte simply anticipating spots pretty grossly. That setup for the counter to the top rope Razor's Edge took forever and was way too obvious, and after that botch spot I was in fear. Oh yeah, *that* botch spot. Scary as hell. Hope Sasha is well. And... ok, so she already had the big win before SummerSlam, and now she jobs the title clean in her first defense ? Boss booking... *yawn* Maryse is ridiculously hot. Miz is just ridiculous.

Enzo & Cass are The New Age Outlaw coupled with Kid Kash & Lance Hoyt. I couldn't give less of a fuck. The annoying sing-along catchphrases and shit, are we in 1999 again ? You know Cass will get the Diesel push eventually and Enzo will be the next whatever comedy figure. Holy shit, Jericho does look like a guy straight out of Boogie Nights ! Old and sleazy. Awesome look. Fuck, I got used to the NXT camera work, I have to ajust. Thank god I'm watching it in French, so the announcing is really fun at least (Agius & Chereau)

That would be meta and hilarious.

Exactly. Plus you can argue that doing so, WCW broke the mold in giving lighter, smaller workers an exposure and credibility that the WWF never was able or willing to. Does anyone think WWF would have got their hands on guys like Eddie, Benoit, Malenko, Jericho & Rey (much less pushing them near top of the card) if these guys had not been a big part of those exciting and hot WCW undercards during the hottest Nitro years ?

And teach him how to work too.

Of course. He made them even bigger stars of course, on a national and international level. But he took every big star from every territory. If you narrow it down to the people he created from scratch, there isn't much left actually. Warrior… But it's beating on a dead horse. (funny how NXT today is basically a bunch of guys who already were stars elsewhere. I mean, are we gonna say in 5 years that Trips & Vince made Nakamura a star ?)

No. We're just pointing out why Parv is full of shit and double talk with his own criterias. It's fun. To some extent. Funny no one talked about the Mastunaga Brothers, because really : Mastery over crowd: 10 (CRUSH GALS) Innovation: 10 (they invented joshi puroresu as we know it) Angles: 10 (CRUSH GALS) Quality of Cards: 10 Finances: 10 (during the glory years, hell yeah) Talent spotting / New stars: 10, at the very least. So yeah. The winners are : the Matsunaga Brothers.

Nice to see this with fresh eyes, after almost a decade of not watching that kind of stuff. Could they have cut 5 minutes or so near the end ? Sure. Would one or two headdropping spot could have been cut out ? Of course. But still. You've got young punk Akiyama not being able to take it to tank-babyface Kobashi until he kicks his right knee from under his knee. Then Kob says "Oh, that's how you play it young fucker ?" and drops the bomb, followed by Aki not taking it and dropping the bomb himself. Then soon comes the brutal work on the arm, which Kobashi will masterfully sell for most of the match. Kob is such a great babyface. So yeah, at one point during the long finishing stretch, they could have cut some crap out (around the time they go outside). But the last five minutes are complete ace work. It's wonderful to hear the crowd go up and down and up and down and you get a really good sense of escalation. Final Hammer in the final coffin, and that's that. Excellent match with some great moments.

Herb Kunze. Now, that's a name I haven't heard for a lonh while. Yeah, he was Meltz boy.

Hilarious. John just answered "Not too directly" about SKeith and then you dig an old post from two years (aren't you a bit obsessive ?) where he just details why SKeith was influenced "not too directly" And then you act like it prooves you right. *facepalm* You're soooo full of shit, it's not even funny. Well, it is. Kinda. (save yourself the "90's boys to the rescue", that gimmick is old already)

Fuck masculinity. Next step : transgender world champ coming out to Psychic TV. Embrace the future.

Yeah, sure. WWF drew a lot more people, ratings and money in 94-95 than WCW did in 96-97. That's factual. That red hot Razor vs Jarrett feud in 95 under Diesel vs Sid was much more substantial than Benoit vs Sullivan under the nWo in 96. Eddie vs Rey at Havoc 97 is nothing in term of hot undercard match next to Razor vs I.R.S. in 94. Self-evident indeed. ..... for fuck's sake.

Not the run. But the gimmick. Save for the accent, it was basically the same. But of course, you're ignoring my point. How is Bischoff making Diesel, the biggest failure as WWF champ ever, and Razor Ramon, WWF upper midcarder when WWF wasn't drawing shit, into true STAR drawing shitloads of money different from what Vince did with Rey/Eddie/Jericho/Benoit (except those really didn't draw shitloads of money in WWE) ? Still waiting for you to make sense and stop the double talk.

I see you basically just added "new star" next to "talent spotting" just to justify your point. You're a riot. BTW, what about the fact Vince let Hogan & Savage go because they were "tool old", despite what Jerry Jarrett was telling him, and Bischoff finding a way to make them relevant again in 96/97 and the biggest money machine ever this side to New Japan ? Jericho & Chris Benoit would not do that kind of business, not at this point (well, it's not like they ever did in WWE either, but that's beside the point, Eddie, Rey & Jericho were main event and star material). Any credit for that ? Another thing : should we give credit to Vince for making Diesel & Ramon, whom he basically took from WCW with more or less the same kind of gimmicks (really, look at Vinnie Vegas and the later days Diamond Studd) ? And should we not give credit for Bischoff to make them STARS with the nWo angle (like Vince did with Rey/Eddie/Jericho, on a lesser scale) ? Or does that work only in one way (Vince = God = 10 / Bischoff = Evil = 0) ? Goldy ? Still 0 ? Lex Luger flopping in WWF and being a star again in WCW ? Raven being the most over upper mid-carder in WCW at one point / not doing shit in WWF ? DDP ? Bischoff not getting credit for DDP ?? REALLY ????

Well YOU can't give Vince credit for Austin and then deny Verne credit for Hogan because "Verne didn't make Hogan a star, Hogan made Hogan a star. Verne even initially wanted to book him heel. Hogan was a huge phenomena pretty much despite Verne, not because of him." Which applies as much or more to Austin. Bingo.

You don't know shit Parv. You can't even read right. I just did give him credit for The Rock. I also give him credit for pushing Austin, although we should all agree that Vince's vision for Austin sucked dick and it was not until Austin made himself a new image and Bret requested to work with him that he began to see something in him. Bischoff didn't give Jericho his start in the US. Corny did. Then Heyman did. Same with Eddie. Same with Benoit. Same with Rey. They all got over big in WCW, which is why they were a big deal already when they jumped in WWF. Did they gained profile there ? Of course. Should we credit Vince for spoting their talent at first ? Ah ah ah. You're just putting stuff in your own little predetermined boxes, as you always do about everything.

I love how Vince gets talent spotting 10 in the 90's while Bischoff gets 0. Hilarious. Yeah, WCW did not bring Eddie, Benoit, Regal, Jericho & Rey Jr. to the major leagues, he didn't find Goldberg at all, he also didn't make a failure at drawing Diesel & Razor Ramon into money machines for a while. Meanwhile, who did Vince "spot" in the 90's ? Duke Droese ? Henry Godwin ? He basically signed bunch of WCW rejects and worked from there, lucking in on Austin while he was cutting his own legendary promo (and not really getting serious about him until Michaels threw a sissy fit). His big project was Mero. Yeah, he did spot The Rock and a bunch of guys who would make the Attitude Era (Venis, D-Lo, Edge, Christian, Hardies & such), in big parts thanks to Jim Ross & Jim Cornette (who also played a major part in why Foley, Austin & Goldust were signed).