He's not wrong about the WWE's tendency of portraying "intellectual" characters as being unmanly. Whether that comes out as being weak, cowardly, effeminate, or whatever. The company's never been comfortable with the idea that brains could be equally important as pure brawn. With the notable exception of one Cerebral Assassin, naturally.

Found out today Elijah Burke has a small appearance in The Dark Knight Rises

With the notable exception of one Cerebral Assassin, naturally.

Who at one time wore purple tights!

I'm pretty sure they did have Rico wearing the same color combination.

I'm pretty sure they did have Rico wearing the same color combination.

I totally forgot about Rico, but he wore all kinds of stuff.

 

 

See, the fact that his banana hammock is pink here really isn't the "gayest" thing going on.

Mentioned this before but god damn are RF Video the worst producers of shoot interviewers ever. No follow up on anything, no clarification on anything, no attempt to get any in depth answers or stories, little to no knowledge of guys early careers, etc...

 

Watching the new Tajiri shoot and they've run through the first 8-9 years of his career, IWA Japan, CMLL, BJW (no mention of him working NJPW), Puerto Rico & his entire ECW run within a little over 20 mins. Not like Tajiri does, well, any interviews in English EVER so such a wasted opportunity....

So Damian Sandow finally had some in ring action on Smackdown...

I missed it & I've never seen him work before. He seems like a great talker, is his ring work any good?

So Damian Sandow finally had some in ring action on Smackdown...

I missed it & I've never seen him work before. He seems like a great talker, is his ring work any good?

 

 

He was going to do the "you're not worthy" act with Tatsu, who called him a chicken and caused him to run in and beat him up. I guess his deal is going to be that he is all calm and snooty until someone pisses him off.

Sandow is a very good worker

Mentioned this before but god damn are RF Video the worst producers of shoot interviewers ever. No follow up on anything, no clarification on anything, no attempt to get any in depth answers or stories, little to no knowledge of guys early careers, etc...

 

Watching the new Tajiri shoot and they've run through the first 8-9 years of his career, IWA Japan, CMLL, BJW (no mention of him working NJPW), Puerto Rico & his entire ECW run within a little over 20 mins. Not like Tajiri does, well, any interviews in English EVER so such a wasted opportunity....

I really really hate it when I'm watching or listening to a shoot and I feel like I know more than the interviewer.

 

I especially don't like it when they beeline to the WWF/E career or even worse make leaps to make connections with guys perceived as "important" like Stone Cold, Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels. Just makes me feel that the interview is being done by someone without a fucking clue.

 

If I had my way, every single shoot would be conducted by a panel of Loss, Dylan Waco and jdw.

Honestly, the RF guys are sort of the best of most evils. I'd rather have a complete chronological rundown than spending two hours on three stories. It'd be one thing if we heard a bunch of stuff by most of the guys interviewed, but if you have one shot at John Nord, I know what I'd prefer. To cover as much ground as possible, even if you don't get as much detail as you'd want on anything. What bugs me more are the "key" questions, like asking everyone in the world about the Von Erichs and how fucked up they were.

PWDiary did a pretty good shoot with Nelson Frazier/Big Daddy V/Viscera/Mable. They have only did 5 shoots though and seem to be out of business.

There's an article on Junior Seau in the current issue of SI. I found the following passage interesting:

 

Slackers, phonies and those with an air of entitlement had no chance with Seau. In 1998 the Chargers traded up one spot to draft Washington State quarterback Ryan Leaf with the second pick, then gave him a contract that included a franchise-record $11.25 million signing bonus. Early in training camp Leaf threw what would be the first of many interceptions, and on the return Seau flattened the quarterback. Some speculated that Seau was jealous of Leaf and didn't like that a rookie teammate was casting shade on his star.

 

"What a crock," says Billy Devaney, the Chargers' director of player personnel at the time. "The reason behind the hit was that a bunch of veterans had pulled a prank—they'd gone out to dinner and charged it to Ryan's credit card. They did stuff like that to first-round picks every year. It might have been a couple thousand dollars, and Ryan went crying to [general manager Bobby Beathard], saying, 'This isn't right. I'm not paying it.' When the guys found out Ryan had gone to management, they were so pissed. Normally [on an interception in practice] you stop and say no big deal. Well, Junior wanted to send a message. He hunted Leaf down and decleated him. The whole defense came over and high-fived him right away."

LINEBACKER'S COURT

 

Not only do they both have serious issues with concussions, pro football and pro wrestling both have the same idiotic jock/frat culture.

Not surprising given the proportion of wrestlers who were ex college footballers.

There's an article on Junior Seau in the current issue of SI. I found the following passage interesting:

 

Slackers, phonies and those with an air of entitlement had no chance with Seau. In 1998 the Chargers traded up one spot to draft Washington State quarterback Ryan Leaf with the second pick, then gave him a contract that included a franchise-record $11.25 million signing bonus. Early in training camp Leaf threw what would be the first of many interceptions, and on the return Seau flattened the quarterback. Some speculated that Seau was jealous of Leaf and didn't like that a rookie teammate was casting shade on his star.

 

"What a crock," says Billy Devaney, the Chargers' director of player personnel at the time. "The reason behind the hit was that a bunch of veterans had pulled a prank—they'd gone out to dinner and charged it to Ryan's credit card. They did stuff like that to first-round picks every year. It might have been a couple thousand dollars, and Ryan went crying to [general manager Bobby Beathard], saying, 'This isn't right. I'm not paying it.' When the guys found out Ryan had gone to management, they were so pissed. Normally [on an interception in practice] you stop and say no big deal. Well, Junior wanted to send a message. He hunted Leaf down and decleated him. The whole defense came over and high-fived him right away."

LINEBACKER'S COURT

 

Not only do they both have serious issues with concussions, pro football and pro wrestling both have the same idiotic jock/frat culture.

 

I take this story as just more evidence that Ryan Leaf wasn't emotionally or mentally capable of being a starting QB in the NFL, not really anything against the players. When you have a job that is physically and emotionally demanding, you do things like that to rookies to test them out and see if they can really handle it. Obviously from that story and all the other things Ryan Leaf did before his football career ended, he couldn't handle it.

I made the mistake of discussing wrestling on a non-wrestling message board and I am constantly amazed how jaded some Attitude era fans are. People will shout till they are blue in the face how much of a bigger star Undertaker and HHH are than John Cena without any facts backing it up except that they used to watch and don't now.

I watched an episode of RoH television for the first time in awhile. Boy, that show is a mess.

 

WGTT/D-Line. This went 10 minutes for whatever reason. The announcers spent way too much time talking about the jobbers.

 

The Chikara six man was fun but Kevin Kelly didn't "get it" and sucked the fun out of the match entirely. The RoH fans also didn't get it as they were polite clapping at comedy spots, humorless asses Ultramantis Black did commentary and RoH should really consider using him full time. He did a good job. This got less than the squash match.

 

Ricky Reyes... I thought he was Low Ki for a second there. God, Jay Lethal sucks without the Black Machismo gimmick. RoH should let him do it, it would make the product more interesting.

 

The production is pretty shitty, you can't hear the crowd at all.

 

Davey Richards cut a promo and I considered slitting my wrists. I can say with complete honesty that the video of Kevin Steen stuffing his face with cake after he won the title was literally more interesting than anything Richards had done in the previous year as champion.

Not that I expect Jericho to do interviews pointing out how bad his comeback has been, but this reeks of a guy in denial:

 

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport...icle4330059.ece

"The feud was well put together and received critical acclaim from fans and critics alike."

 

 

.....like WHO?

I know people around here quickly soured on his return, but I haven't seen any criticism from more casual fans or reporters. His matches with Punk were genuinely well received.

From the shows I've seen, Jericho has been excellent lately. He stands out as far and away one of the best actor/promo guys on the roster still, Orton seemed so forced and wooden next to him in the duel PPV interview. The feud with Punk was nowhere near as bad as people said, the matches were great and the alcohol angle was really fun for me.

 

I'm very surprised at the stick he's gotten lately. Thought he was excellent in the four way last night too, his facials, his trash talking, his timing, he stood out to me as the best worker in the ring.

 

I haven't seen a whole lot of criticism of him, except from people on here, and this place is a real bubble in terms of even the general smart fan consensus.

The Punk/Jericho matches were generally regarded as pretty good, but I don't think too many people considered them MOTYCs. And tons of people crapped all over the CM Drunk storyline, especially the field sobriety test.

I can't help but wonder how different Jericho's return would be perceived had he just won the Royal Rumble as planned instead of it being hot-shot last minute onto Sheamus.

We weren't the only ones that didn't like the alcoholic storyline. And this board isn't a monolith.

I liked the Jericho-Punk stuff and thought a lot of the critics were really over thinking it (IE. "they were feuding about being the best and now it's about alcohol and Punk's family? It doesn't make sense!" which seemed to be a common complaint).

 

It certainly wasn't as awful as some people made it out to be. Where I thought the feud suffered was in Jericho's credibility and the outcome booking (loses Rumble, wins WM title shot battle royal thanks to interference from Cody Rhodes of all people, loses title match, granted rematch off-screen by Johnny Ace rather than the more logical result of Punk demanding the match due to Jericho's actions).

 

Oh well, can't win em all.