2015 Pro Wrestling Thread

Nice! Although he floundered a bit once he got to A-ball. Baseball Reference page on him: http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=poffo-001ran

 

On that '73 Orangeburg team, he was managed by Jimmy Piersall.

Maybe that's where he got the crazy persona from.

 

Weird. I always assumed he was a volleyball player.

 

Don't mess with Brock Lesnar's burger.

 

Yes, it's weird that you pee sitting down.

 

Observer from Jan. 19:

- Hogan will be inducting Savage into the Hall of Fame, with Lanny “The Genius” Poffo accepting the honor on Randy’s behalf. Once Lanny consented to DVD interviews over the past year, it was widely seen as inevitable that Randy would get the nod soon after, since the family’s resistance was the only barrier to his induction.

Undertaker or Sting were back-up plans for induction this year, but both will likely be put in future classes, since the company is running a bit short on clear #1 headliners to induct. Savage is the first headliner to not be alive at the time of his induction. (Eddie Guerrero was #2 in 2006, behind Bret Hart.)

- WWE shuffled its announcing teams, with Raw now featuring Cole, Booker T and JBL. Smackdown will be Cole, Lawler and Byron Saxton. It’s believed to be the WWE’s first step in phasing Lawler, 65, completely off TV, similar to how they did it with Ross. The PPV announce team will still be Cole, JBL and Lawler for now.

- A rating isn’t in for Raw, but they did 3.89M viewers, which is strong considering it was head-to-head with the college football championship. Impact debuted at 359,000 on Jan. 7 – lower than what they had on Spike, but triple the usual prime time ratings for Destination America. As expected, the 359,000 figure is roughly half of what they got on Spike. Lucha Underground had 33,000 viewers on Jan. 7. ROH is doing between 350,000 and 400,000 viewers if you total up their various syndication figures.

- Depending on the outcome of the Toyko Dome show sales, Jeff Jarrett and Global Force Wrestling have an agreement in place to do the same thing for AAA (Mexican promotion) shows. AAA has also changed their plans, and will have weekly shows next week, after originally planning to be off until March. No information has come out yet about how the Toyko Dome show with Ross broadcasting did.

- Lucha Underground is negotiating with Ross.

- Tadarius Thomas finishes with ROH on Jan. 30. He’s 33, and said he’s looking to get back into MMA, but WWE has also expressed interest in bringing him in for a tryout.

- Bully Ray is not under TNA contract right now, but it’s widely believed that he’ll be back. They were unsuccessful in luring Alberto Del Rio in for an appearance on the Destination America debut. Rob Terry and Shark Boy have been released / not renewed.

- Amazing Kong is back in TNA, despite telling people in November she’d never go back. She has a bad back, so it’s unknown how long she can stay in the ring.

- In an example of WCW style “booking,” Christy Hemme gave birth to a baby girl four days before the recent Impact taping. She wasn’t shown on camera, and the birth wasn’t mentioned. Morale was high for their first show back, but petered toward the end of the night as talent realized the same bookers / creative was in charge.

At the end of his TNA write-up, Meltzer goes on an exasperated rant about creative as well. He noted that he has to have a notebook / computer out to keep track of the angles for TNA, and even with that, they often drop or continue things in ways that make no sense. He notes that ROH has basically surpassed them in every way, except dollars spent.

- NBC has signed a boxing deal, with the first show on March 7 in primetime. Al Michaels and Sugar Ray Leonard will announce.

- Jericho is on a 17-show deal, until March 1. All of his shows will be house shows, and he’s not scheduled to be on TV. Hogan was on Talk Is Jericho recently, and like most things Hogan, most of the stories he told were a mix of BS and the truth.

- AJ Lee was initially supposed to return on Jan. 5, but her neck injury has been slow to heal. She’s advertised for Jan. 24, but it’s unclear if she’ll make it.

- WWE is close to a merchandising deal with Tapout.

- Flair is doing a UK speaking tour in May.

- All four seasons of Tough Enough are now on the Network.

 

Tough Enough is on? Holy cow. Must've missed it. I was catching up on some early Nitros. I also checked out Tuesday Night Titans since I'm not quite old enough to remember that. I watched one TNT and had to quit because I couldn't quit ralphing on my living room floor from witnessing Greg "The Hammer" Valentine's wife oiling him up for a massage (with Vince there to interview).

 

Speaking of TNT, drop whatever you are doing and go watch the infamous clip of Paul Christy as a magician on Youtube. It's on the list of all-time trainwrecks in WWFE history.

Supposedly, Christy said he was drunk when he did this. Okerlund and Lord Alfred's reactions in this are priceless.

 

Oh, and more Christy awesomeness. Before the end of his career, in which he was a WWF jobber, he was fairly prominent in the 60s and 70s. He worked for Angelo Poffo's (Savage's and Lanny's dad) territory, where he was a heel with a valet, who was also a wrestler, and like Savage and Liz, were a real-life married couple. He was actually good friends with Savage (he claimed he was his best man at his wedding to Liz), and I found this unreal clip of him being interviewed, by, if all people, Lou Thesz.

It Came From YouTube Classic: Paul Christy Eats a Microphone

One wonders if Savage got the idea of doing the "abuse the valet" thing from Christy.

 

I don't know why, but I'm actually looking forward to Raw tonight. I want to see what comes of the reunion, most of all.

 

So what are the odds that they ditch their plans for Reigns to win the Rumble and we see Bryan or someone else get to take down Lesnar at 'Mania?