Maybe the WWE is going for the teabagger equiv of wrestling fan: those that aren't MMA fans and want "purity" in their pro wrestling.

 

John

Is Vince McMahon actually schizophrenic or is it just Dave and Bryan's reporting about him that makes it seem that way? I mean we go from Vince McMahon apparently trying to get UFC banned in Europe because he's so scared about what happened in North America repeating itself in their largest overseas market to Vince McMahon supposedly being in complete denial over UFC 111 costing him tons of WrestleMania buys in North America to the WWE creative team writing a "fuck you" segment at UFC on Raw.

Dave said something in the Observer that made sense. Vince can't acknowledge UFC as competition because it would make them look like they're getting absolutely destroyed by a competitor. I get that. But then Dave also talks about how Vince has his head in the sand regarding UFC and is in denial about them. That doesn't make so much sense to me for the reasons stated.

I got the impression that it was more public denial than internal denial.

That's what I'd figure, but then Dave writes things like,

 

"McMahon is clearly in denial of this trend."

 

"The difference is clear, although Vince McMahon, who is straight forward, surprisingly so at times, when it comes to assessing the core business, is in great denial about it."

Yeah, that's why I'm confused. My gut feeling is that Dave is lulled into a false sense of security by Vince McMahon's straightforwardness on conference calls. Just because he speaks surprisingly honestly most of the time, doesn't mean he's always truthful. He may just be picking and choosing his spots. The fact that they've got a stock answer for dealing with this question that every high ranking corporate official utters when asked about it suggests that they're aware of the issue and not in internal denial.

Is Vince McMahon actually schizophrenic or is it just Dave and Bryan's reporting about him that makes it seem that way? I mean we go from Vince McMahon apparently trying to get UFC banned in Europe because he's so scared about what happened in North America repeating itself in their largest overseas market to Vince McMahon supposedly being in complete denial over UFC 111 costing him tons of WrestleMania buys in North America to the WWE creative team writing a "fuck you" segment at UFC on Raw.

Vince may be crazy but he's not stupid. He publicly used to say the same thing about WCW not being competition, but of course he knew better. As far as Dave's explanation goes, we all know that he sometimes has trouble um, ya know, trouble, ya know ... you know .. yeah, like, um, making things, ya know, like understandable.

Is Vince McMahon actually schizophrenic or is it just Dave and Bryan's reporting about him that makes it seem that way? I mean we go from Vince McMahon apparently trying to get UFC banned in Europe because he's so scared about what happened in North America repeating itself in their largest overseas market to Vince McMahon supposedly being in complete denial over UFC 111 costing him tons of WrestleMania buys in North America to the WWE creative team writing a "fuck you" segment at UFC on Raw.

They never reported that

Define "reported." Oliver Copp posted it on the F4W board and Dave Meltzer confirmed it.

Todd Martin's Raw is Moon Landing Hoax Shoot report for May 17th

 

During the show they aired three spoofs of commercials. Spoofing a commercial makes you come across as bottom of the barrel lame, uncreative and low rent. It’s a commercial. It’s not high art. If you want to do a spoof, by all means spoof a movie or a song or a current event. And f you want to do a fake commercial, you should at least be able to make up your own 30 second premise rather than ripping off a three year old joke from freaking Visa. Congratulations, you’re miraculously even lamer than Date Movie.

They did a backstage vignette with Buzz Aldrin. Buzz had all this merchandise all over his office and was plugging his iphone application. It came across kind of sad to see this man who was involved in such a seminal event in human history shamelessly hawking this tacky crap on Raw. Oh well.

Todd Martin should not taunt the Happy Fun Ball.

I was just about to post the commercial spoof rant. I've never heard anyone use anything like that bit of ridiculousness as a talking point in my life, and he comes off as some sort of pop culture snob in the process. Date Movie (just like the other Aaron Seltzer parodies other than the first Scary Movie, which, at the time, was perfectly fine and benefited from the source material that it was parodying a lot more than the recent parody movies) wasn't bad because it was a parody, it was bad because it it was a genre-destroyingly bad movie. Plus, for all of SNL's inconsistency over the years, their commercial spoofs have been the most consistent part of the show at times, as well as being compiled into prime time specials many times, so...whatever, it's Todd Martin and he's a fucking moron.

 

Oh, and he added this:

In spite of my criticism of the idea of them spoofing commercials, the vignettes themselves were mostly fine.

SO WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM YOU FUCKING IDIOT? Fuck.

 

Also, it was a series of Mastercard commercials that got parodied, not Visa. It was a really really ubiquitous slogan that contained the brand name in some of the most well-known commercials of recent years. Of course, we're talking about a WON HOF voter who's never heard of the the TV show that drove the success of the first Wrestlemania and acts like it's ridiculous that anyone would expect him to understand any pop culture references of note. He's like Anya from Buffy The Vampire Slayer if she had a penis and was a terribly untalented smarky wrestling columnist turned MMA reporter.

He'd rate your post down since he probably thinks Buffy was just some obscure movie from the early 90s.

Also, LOL at how he's offended at the VERY IDEA of spoofing commercials, but movies or TV would be acceptable. Hello dummy, they were spoofing commercials because it's a commercial-free Raw. I suppose you could argue that doing so kinda defeats the purpose of a commercial-free Raw (in fact the show was still formatted for ad breaks since it didn't air commercial-free in Canada) but to complain about the medium itself not lending itself to parody is an odd talking point, for sure. Also, to complain that what WWE is spoofing "isn't high art?" Did he expect a Thomas Pynchon parody on Raw? AND ALSO:

 

And f you want to do a fake commercial, you should at least be able to make up your own 30 second premise rather than ripping off a three year old joke from freaking Visa.

It wouldn't be a spoof then, would it? Jeez.

Guys, guys he is by all accounts a nice guy in person though!

 

Given him some credit this time last year he would have probably feigned no knowledge of Buzz Aldrin.

My guess is that Todd would have known Buzz Aldrin from schooling. It's some of the pop culture folks that pass him by.

 

John

Guys, guys he is by all accounts a nice guy in person though!

Oh who gives a shit.

 

With the snobbish parts of the latest stuff, I'd love to see how he'd react to indie film and cult favorite music references.

Guys, guys he is by all accounts a nice guy in person though!

Oh who gives a shit.

 

With the snobbish parts of the latest stuff, I'd love to see how he'd react to indie film and cult favorite music references.

 

Im just riffing on the defence/preface most of his colleagues give when the why the fuck is his a reporter for the site questions arise.

Everyone is sleeping on the real issue here:

 

Which is the more fleeting form of pop culture: TV or commercials?

He was a fucking douchenozzle before his attempted retirement but he's gone over the edge since they convinced him to stay by offering him a weekly spot on the podcast.

Guys, guys he is by all accounts a nice guy in person though!

Oh who gives a shit.

 

With the snobbish parts of the latest stuff, I'd love to see how he'd react to indie film and cult favorite music references.

 

Im just riffing on the defence/preface most of his colleagues give when the why the fuck is his a reporter for the site questions arise.

 

Oh? C&P plz.

Guys, guys he is by all accounts a nice guy in person though!

Oh who gives a shit.

 

With the snobbish parts of the latest stuff, I'd love to see how he'd react to indie film and cult favorite music references.

 

Im just riffing on the defence/preface most of his colleagues give when the why the fuck is his a reporter for the site questions arise.

 

Oh? C&P plz.

 

More audio if anything, Im working off memory if anything. Sorry.

They've actually answered "Why the fuck do you let that idiot Todd Martin write for your site?" questions on the podcasts?

They've actually answered "Why the fuck do you let that idiot Todd Martin write for your site?" questions on the podcasts?

Not in those words

 

But Ive heard Bryan and Ed In San Antonio who has met him give the exact same standard patter about him being a nice guy on radio shows as a side way defence of him.

I just did a brief search of the F4W board and all I could find in defense of Todd by Bryan was:

 

Todd Martin has written for CBS Sportsline, Sports Illustrated, this website, and appears regularly on The Fight Show and Mauro Ranallo's radio show. When the rest of you do that then perhaps you will also get weekly shows.