2012 Pro Wrestling Thread

I think one other time on Raw, they showed his wife, which, although we're not in the kayfabe era, is still a little surprising, considering women still cheer for Cena.

 

Count me in the group that thinks Cena has outdone the Rock on the mic during this buildup. However, I thought both were pretty awful last night on the live spots. I like how they are framing Cena's need to win but I just didn't get on board with his in ring stuff last night. The end of the show was pretty brutal in my eyes.

Surprised to see Jericho get a clean pin on Punk.

I'm happy for Santino because I really like his character but it's become pretty evident that he can't pull off a decent match in the ring. He had the same amount of moves as Brodus Clay.

So much for the push for Kofi. He goes from getting a little juice with a solid performance in the Chamber to being Santino's bodyguard essentially? Weak and disappointing.

The Ryder/Eve thing is going nowhere.

I'm probably in the minority but I'm somewhat intrigued by the Orton/Kane program.

 

The crowd ruined the Rock/Cena "confrontation" (for lack of a better word) last night. They couldn't make up their mind what they were booing, but dang it they were booing everything.

 

It's blatantly obvious Rock is "selling" for Cena in these promos.

 

If he is, he's doing a poor job of it. And it would be surprising if he is, because his character is one that keeps up his bombast all the time, regardless of what his opponent says.

Foley alluded to it in one of his books when he was trying to get Rock to appear humble enough so that Foley could eventually turn heel on him. Rock just kept insulting Foley in character enough that Foley finally gave up. Rock later admitted he was afraid to look humble because he thought he'd be looked at as Rocky Maivia again. It took a while for him to be comfortable as a babyface.

 

Here's another review that I just finished typing. Hopefully you enjoy it.

WWE Wrestlemania 5 Review
Wrestlemania 5
April 2, 1989

Hercules vs King Haku w/Bobby Heenan
Hercules was originally brought into the WWE by Freddie Blassie to be in his stable. However, soon afterward, Blassie's health was poor enough that his days of traveling with the WWE was over. As a result, the debuting Slick acquired a good portion of Blassie's talent, including Hercules. Slick with Hercules only lasted around a year before being sold to Bobby Heenan in late 1986. Things were pretty great for the two for around two years before Ted DiBiase offered Heenan a large sum of money (In a briefcase) for the contract of Hercules. Hercules didn't have a problem with it until DiBiase let on that Hercules was going to be his slave. Hercules turned face and feuded with DiBiase until the Main Event II in February. With only about a month and a couple of weeks before Wrestlemania, the WWE throws Hercules in a match against the one member of the Heenan family who isn't busy - King Haku. The match is short, but they manage to get in a few good spots. Near the end, both men misses big moves from on top of the ropes. With Haku missing the splash last, Hercules picks him up and hits a bridging side suplex for the victory. An odd match to start off the show. Typically, you'd wait until later in the show to do the big man vs big man matches. The pair did end up putting together a better match than you'd expect. The final few minutes were exciting and the right man went over to start the show off on a high note. This would be the beginning of the end for Hercules though. From this point on, he doesn't really do much as a face despite starting off so strong. There's even rumors that he was originally going to be the third member of the Mega Powers. 2 Stars.

The Rockers vs The Twin Towers w/Slick
This is the Wrestlemania debut of the Big Boss Man and the Rockers. There isn't really any backstory to this match. The Twin Towers had been feuding with the Mega Powers for the last several matches while The Rockers had been wrestling the Brainbusters nearly every night. The Rockers control early on with them taking cheap shots on the Twin Tower outside of the ring whenever they're not paying attention. Jannetty eventually makes a mistake and is bear hugged by Boss Man while Akeem splashes against Jannetty. Later on, the Rockers are heating up with their trademark double team moves. They go for double missile dropkicks, but while Jannetty connects, Shawn badly misses. By the way the camera picked up the image, it looked as if Shawn landed on Boss Man, making the botch okay. Shawn goes back up top for a seated senton to a standing Boss Man, but Boss Man catches him and without pausing turns him around and falls down to give him a power bomb. It's a pretty awesome spot. Akeem is tagged in and hits Air Africa (The 747 splash) on Shawn to pick up the win. I really loved this match. As good as Shawn can be against most wrestlers, I enjoy him most in the underdog role against big men. The match was fast pace, had some good spots and gave a good showing for both teams. As much as I would have rather seen the Brainbusters vs The Rockers on this show, The Twin Towers did well enough to still keep me happy. 3 Stars.

Brutus Beefcake vs Ted DiBiase w/Virgil
As I said, DiBiase had just finished up a feud with Hercules. Meanwhile, Brutus Beefcake had finished up a long feud with Outlaw Ron Bass on the first SNME of the year. So despite both men being two of the most over wrestlers in the WWE at the time, they didn't have anything booked for this show. Sadly, it doesn't go any better for DiBiase and Beefcake. It's just random fighting without any real story to the match. After ten minutes that felt like fifteen, they end up fighting on the outside until both are counted out. This match is really just depressing. Beefcake wasn't a great wrestler, but he had shown that he could put on some good matches with a great opponent. DiBiase was more than capable of doing just that. It's as if they both knew that the match didn't matter, so they didn't put any effort into it. It shows. 1 1/4 Stars.

The Bushwackers vs The Rougeau Brothers w/Jimmy Hart
The Bushwackers had just debuted in December 1988. I don't believe there's any story behind this match other than to spotlight the WWE's newest team. The match is painstakingly long and doesn't offer anything that you wouldn't have seen in any other Bushwackers match. Raymond Rougaeu is pinned after taking the battering ram. At least if you're going to book the Rougaeu Brothers, let them hit some of their great moves. If nothing else, the match can entertain me for a few moments. It's a shame that the talented Rougaeu's were married to the Bushwackers until Raymond retired. A match against the Hart Foundation would have been so much better. 1/2 Star.

The Blue Blazer vs Mr. Perfect
This is the Wrestlemania debut for both men. It's also the debut of Perfect's singlet. He still needs to add the color to the back of it, but he's starting to look like the Mr. Perfect that we know. After some stalling early on, Blazer hits some nice moves including a baseball slide to a Perfect on the outside. Blazer manages to get in a really nice twisting belly-to-belly suplex. That's the extent of Blazer's success though as Perfect nails the Perfect Plex soon afterward for the victory. Not quite as good as I remember it, but it's pretty short with the stalling early on. However, they managed to get in a good amount of fun moves that leaves me happy with a match for the first time since the Rockers/Towers match. I did a little searching and found that the two had several other matches against each other. One of their matches went nearly eighteen minutes. I can only imagine how great that is. Unfortunately, most likely only two of their matches were ever broadcast on TV. One was at MSG that could possibly be out there somewhere, but the other is from an Italy house show that was taped by an Italian network. The chances of that one ever seeing the light of day is low. Anyways, it's a good match for what it was, but I would have loved to see more time. 2 1/4 Stars.

Demolition (c) vs The Powers of Pain and Mr. Fuji - Tag Team Titles
The first of three title matches. This one really heated up at Survivor Series when Mr. Fuji cost his Demolition the match. By the end of the match, Fuji was with the Powers of Pain resulting in the first double turn on PPV. During a title match between Demolition and Powers of Pain, Mr. Fuji interfered and attacked both members of Demolition with his cane. That match was taped on the night of The Main Event II, but due to time restraints, it was cut out. The match was eventually thrown on the Coliseum Home Video "WWF Strong Men". Anyways, since Fuji loved to interfere, he was added to the match to make it a 3-on-2 handicap match for the titles. However, if the Powers of Pain wins, they're the champions while Fuji will just go on to keep managing them. Demolition has a pretty easy time with the Warlord and Barbarian early on. Once the heels finally gain control, Fuji comes with with short bursts of offense before tagging out. This would turn out to hurt the teams as Fuji tags in to his a top rope leg drop, but misses. Fuji makes another critical mistake by accidentally throwing salt in the eyes of the Warlord. With The Barbarian and Fuji hurt on the outside, Warlord is giving the Demolition Decapitation to retain their titles. I can perfectly understand if people hate this match. It's just two big lug teams hitting each other. However, with Demolition being my favorite tag team ever and the Fuji turn at Survivor Series being my favorite turn ever, I have a soft spot for this match. It was pretty basic, but they knew how to tell a story. While watching it, I couldn't help but think that they missed a step in the booking. In the entire saga of the Demolition vs Powers of Pain, they managed to break it down into some good chapters. However, for Demolition's big win, it feels as Demolition should have won back the tag titles. While it does make Demolition look really dominant by fighting this entire feud without losing the belts, the satisfying ending could have been even more of a good moment if Demolition won something more than just a match. Demolition makes history with this match by being the only team to leave two straight Wrestlemania's as champions without having lost the belts between the two matches. In fact, this is the longest tag title reign in WWE history. 2 Stars.

Ronnie Garvin vs Dino Bravo w/Frenchy Martin
I don't believe there was any story to this other than both men being strong. In perhaps the oddest Wrestlemania moment ever, both wrestlers are introduced, but then Jimmy Snuka is introduced to the fans. Snuka comes out, poses in the ring and then heads back to the locker room. It would mark the return to the WWE of Snuka, but couldn't they have thought of a better way to do it? Dino Bravo sucks though. Ronnie Garvin wasn't much better in the WWE, but he at least tried. His matches with Greg Valentine were pretty great though. Bravo picks up the clean win after an inverted atomic drop and his finisher, the side slam. After the match, Garvin throws a fit and Garvin Stomps (The Orton Stomp for all of you kiddies) on Frenchy Martin. Garvin lost cleanly, so it just makes him look like a sore loser. Then again, with Bravo's connections to the mob, the referee may have been paid off and Garvin knew it. The match is about as "Interesting" as it looks. With how short it was, I wish this would have just been dropped with the time being given to Blazer/Perfect. 1 Star.

Strike Force vs The Brainbusters w/Bobby Heenan
Sweet. There isn't any issues between the two teams. Instead, the backstory is between Strike Force. Rick Martel was injured in a tag match against Demolition last July. During his time away, Tito Santana went back to being a singles wrestler. When Martel returned at the start of 1989, he was working all singles matches. The lead up to this match was that Strike Force wanted to see if the magic was still there. The Brainbusters would be their challenge to find out if they do. This is Strike Force's first match together (Including house shows since Martel's injury. Typical solid tag work from both teams early on. Martel turns Arn over into the Boston Crab. That's the move that Martel forced Jim Neidhart to submit to that made Strike Force tag team champions. Tully breaks it up with a thumb in the eye though. Fun moment when both members of Strike Forces locks the Brainbusters in a pair of Figure Four Leg locks. Woo. Things are going very well for Strike Force until Blanchard ducks a Flying Forearm from Tito (Tito's finisher) and Martel takes it. Martel spends the rest of the match holding his face while Santana does his best to hang in there against one of the best teams in history. Once Martel is back on his feet and in the corner, Tito crawls over to tag him in, but Martel turns his back and walks the apron to the other side of the ring. Soon, Martel throws his arms up in disgust for this tag partner and just leaves. Tully Blanchard's reaction is gold. It's such a small reaction and one that could go unnoticed. However, on seeing Martel leaving, Tully's mouth turns up in a half **** eating grin. Martel's exit gets the best reaction of the night from the crowd. Santana tries, but is easily put away with a spike piledriver or as Gorilla Monsoon calls it "Piledriver: Spiked". After the match, in the back, Martel speaks with Mean Gene claiming that he's been carrying Santana on his back for too long. He also admits that he didn't even want to team with Santana in the first place. With the amount of time the match was given, it's more of an angle than an actual match. But god damn, what an angle. This would mark the start of the long running feud between Strike Force and Martel's transformation into the Model. The match itself was good, but not as good as it could have been. It almost as if the WWE is teasing the viewer with showing this potentially incredible match, but only giving us one showing of it. Give them twenty minutes at a MSG house show and I'm sure it could have been a WWE tag MOTYC. Still, a good match with the start of an excellent angle makes this an easy thumbs up. 3 Stars.

Jake Roberts vs Andre The Giant w/Bobby Heenan - Guest Referee: Big John Studd
In some great old school booking, this feud grew out of the Roberts/Rick Rude feud. Andre the Giant would try and help out Rude whenever he could. Trying to even the odds, Roberts would bring out Damien, that's when he found out that Andre is deathly afraid of snakes. Former Andre the Giant nemesis, Big John Studd is the guest referee. Studd had just returned to the WWE and was set for a big push. Most of the match is just Andre choking out Roberts and Jake selling. One painful to watch moment has Andre losing his balance and struggling to not fall. The commentators are clueless as to what's going on, so they blame it on a stray high knee from Roberts. It takes several moments before Andre is able to regain his balance and stay up. Roberts goes to pull out Damien, but Ted DiBiase runs out and tries to steal Damien in the bag. Jake runs after him and the two fight in the entrance way. Meanwhile in the ring, Andre has enough of Studd and just goes to attack him drawing the DQ. Jake runs back and throws Damien in the ring clearing all of the heels out of the ringside. At this point in his career, Andre shouldn't have been in any singles matches lasting over a minute. His balance problems is just heartbreaking to watch. Maybe it's just because I love Andre, but I found the match entertaining to some extent. The ending was pretty bad, but with how bad Andre was, they needed to figure something out since it's unlikely that Andre could have believably taken the DDT. This would start the long feud between Roberts and DiBiase that would culminate in their Wrestlemania 6 forgotten gem. This was also supposed to begin the Andre/Studd feud part 2, but Studd's bad health would put a stop to his push before it gets going too much. Not a good match, but Andre tried. 1 1/4 Stars.

The Hart Foundation vs Greg Valentine and Honky Tonk Man w/Jimmy Hart
After four years wrestling at Wrestlemania, the Hart Foundation gets their first normal two-on-two match. Not long after Bret's face turn at Wrestlemania 4, The Hart Foundation dumps Jimmy Hart as their manager. This brought on a heel turn for Rougeau Brothers by joining up with Jimmy Hart. Despite feuding for awhile, the WWE decides to throw the Hart Foundation against two of Jimmy Hart's singles wrestlers. Valentine and HTM would be a future tag team, but right now they're just stablemates. Early on, HTM hits Shake, Rattle and Roll (His finisher) on Bret, but doesn't go for his cover. Nice spot as Bret whips Valentine into the ropes and when Valentine comes back, Bret slingshots Jim Neidhart over the top rope and shoulder blocks Valentine. With the referee distracted, HTM crawls to grab Jimmy Hart's megaphone, but Neidhart picks it up first. He throws it to Bret who uses it to knock out HTM. Hart picks up the win following a pin. As I mentioned, I wish the Hart Foundation had been booked against the Rougaeu Brothers. The match could have been pretty damn good. For this, it's decent, but hardly as good as the Hart Foundation's great Summerslam matches. Bret is still three years away before finally having a great match at Wrestlemania. 2 1/2 Stars.

The Ultimate Warrior (c) vs Rick Rude w/Bobby Heenan - IC Title
With Rude no longer in a feud with Jake Roberts, they needed something for him to do. Back at the Royal Rumble, these two had a pose down. Once it was clear that Warrior was going to win, Rick Rude attacked him. Pretty simple build up, but that's really all this needs. Rude tries to jump start the match by attacking Warrior, but he makes the mistake of kneeing Warrior in the midsection. Normally, that would work out, but Warrior's still wearing the IC title, so Rude just hurts himself. Warrior goes on the offense for a long time. Rude ends up playing the role of a human pinball in a pinball machine. While in a bear hug, Rude channels his inner Three Stooge and pokes Warrior in the eyes to get out of it. When he's locked in it again, he tries the same idea again, but the referee blocks it. Warrior carries Rude to the other side of the ring, but botches whatever he was planning on doing. It's around this point that my favorite quotes of the night occurs. After Warrior is shown biting Rick Rude, Jesse Venture yells in protest. "What business does Warrior have biting Rude?!" Gorilla Monsoon responding in a calm matter of fact tone "Maybe...*Long Pause* hungry." He either trips or loses his grip on Rude. Rude attempts the Rude Awakening, but the power of the warrior manages to pull Rude's hands off of his neck. After Warrior closelines Rude to the outside, he attempts to suplex him back in the ring. Bobby Heenan, who's been fairly quiet in the match uses this as a chance to trip Warrior up. After Rude falls on Warrior, Heenan holds Warrior's legs down to allow Rude to score the upset victory to become the NEW Intercontinental Champion. After the match, Rude runs to the back while Warrior presses Heenan up and lazily drops him down hard which legitimately hurts Heenan. I really love Rude and at times the guy looks like a million bucks. I'm not sure what it was about Warrior, but Rude shines the best against him. Unlike someone like Mr. Perfect, Rude knew how to sell in a big way without being over the top. The match wasn't a technical classic, but it was quite the story that was well done by both wrestlers. It's not as good as their rematch at Summerslam 1989, but I just find the Rude/Warrior matches all so entertaining. To my knowledge, this was the first WWE TV loss to Warrior (Despite losing some non-televised house shows). Yet, the way they went about it kept Warrior looking like a megastar and finally giving him someone who could be someone who could beat him believably. Anyways, a solid match and that just barely misses out on being one of Warrior's top 5 matches. 3 1/4 Stars.

Jim Duggan vs Bad News Brown
Once again, I'm not sure if there was any back story to this. Since coming into the WWE over a year ago, Bad News had been keeping busy feuding with Bret Hart and more recently the Mega Powers. Similarly to the Twin Towers, with Hogan and Savage wrestling each other tonight, it leaves Bad News without anything to do. As for Duggan, he had just finished his feud with Dino Bravo that was spotlighted in a Survivor Series match (Duggan eliminated after using the 2x4 on Bravo) and the Royal Rumble in a six man tag with the Hart Foundation vs Rougeau Brothers. Brown nor Duggan are really known for their technical holds, so it's just an all out brawl. Bad News goes for the Ghetto Blaster, but Duggan ducks out of the way. Bad News takes the 3 point stance, but rolls out of the ring after being hit with it. Brown comes back in the ring with a chair, so Duggan grabs his 2x4. Wood meets metal, so the referee just says "To hell with this crap" and calls for the bell. Double dq. Duggan celebrates his draw after the match with a huge piece of snot hanging out from his nose. Classy. If Jim Ross was calling the match, he'd call it "Bowling shoe ugly" and it was. At this point in the night, I'm sure the audience would agree with me in just wanting to see the main event already. The match doesn't have any backstory, it wasn't good and there wasn't a finish. Just skip it so we can see the Mega Powers explode already. 1 star.

The Red Rooster vs Bobby Heenan w/The Brooklyn Brawler
Surprisingly, this was one of the better booked matches of the show. Terry Taylor had joined the WWE around the summer of 1988, but didn't have much success. That fall, Heenan wanted to show just how great of a manager he was. So through a series of long promos putting down how horrible Taylor was, he made the promise that he'd make Taylor a star. Even better yet, he'd make him a star despite having a horrible gimmick. Thus, the Red Rooster was created. Even though Taylor was getting wins under his new gimmick, Heenan was very outspoken about Taylor's flaws. Finally, things came to a head at Saturday Night Main Event when the Rooster had a match against Tito Santana. Rooster had enough of Heenan, so he turned face by attacking Heenan. Heenan, not one to take one of his wrestlers leaving so easily, starts an all out war with him. In comes The Brooklyn Brawler. Heenan is set to prove he can make an even bigger loser than Taylor into a star. The Brawler and the Rooster would end up having tons of matches against each other both before and after Wrestlemania 5. In fact, when you look at who wrestled each other the most in the WWE for 1989, I believe Rooster vs Brawler was in the top 5. Heenan comes out with the Brawler, but Heenan is noticeably still hurt from Warrior. Very short match follows. Rooster moves out of the way and Heenan takes a decent bump shoulder first into the ring post. Rooster easily covers him for the victory. Brawler attacks Rooster with a Northern Lariat before leaving with Heenan. It is what it is. It wasn't going to be a long match or anything. It's just a way of having the newly face Rooster beat up his evil former manager. Heenan was a great bumper back in the day and had Warrior not hurt him, I imagine we would have seen a face good bumps. It was effective, let's just leave it at that. SQUASH

Hulk Hogan vs Randy Savage (c) - WWE World Title
Miss Elizabeth is at ringside, but in a neutral corner. Despite devoting the last SNME to her to find out who's corner she'd be in, she announced that she'd cheer on both men. Gold digger. Savage starts off with some stalling until Hogan busts out some straight up wrestling holds that shocks Savage enough that he ends up in a front face lock. I love how Hogan would dust off some real wrestling holds every once in awhile just to leave his critics speechless. On the outside, Savage hides behind Elizabeth to draw some good heel heat. Jesse Ventura ponders whether Elizabeth should be punched for all of her headaches as of late. Savage gains full control, at one point posing while Hogan is on the mat just holding on to his foot in a pathetic way. After being knocked out of the ring, Savage has Elizabeth checking up on him. However, Savage has washed his hands of Elizabeth and nearly takes a swipe at her. Somewhere in all of the fighting, Hogan is busted open above his left eye. Back on the outside, Hogan goes to run Savage's shoulder into the ring post, but Elizabeth stands in the way. This allows Randy to push Hogan into the ring post. After Elizabeth checks on Hogan, Savage gets pissed again and backs her up in the direction of the locker room. Dave Hebner (I'm curious as to when he retired from being a referee. I know Earl was already in the WWE for a full year. I always assumed that Dave became a WWE official once Earl came in) orders Elizabeth to the back. Savage turns up the heel volume by hitting a double ax handle from the top rope onto Hogan, forcing his neck against the guard rail. An ode to Ricky Steamboat perhaps? Back inside, Savage chokes Hogan out for an eternity with both his hands and wrist tape. Hebner is really being relaxed with the rules in this one. Savage heads to the top rope and nails his flying elbow drop. 1...2...NO! Hogan kicks outs. The commentators play it up as Hogan being the first one to ever do it. Which has caused some complaining from IWC. However, George Steel kicked out from the elbow smash back at Wrestlemania 2. Hogan Hulks Up and after a few punches, the big boot and the leg drop, pins Randy Savage to join the very exclusive club of being two time WWE World Champions. May how the times have changed. I honestly love all of this so much. You had such an amazing build up that the WWE writers took their time with, a match that was very good and not just Hogan paint-by-numbers and a huge match feel. Not having seen this in years, I didn't remember how big of a match this felt like. Unlike so many of Hogan's opponents, Savage felt as if he was legitimately the second best wrestler in the company. It was the battle of the titans with Savage getting in a lot more damage on Hogan than Hulk got on him. This is exactly what a Wrestlemania match should be. The two top guys in the company, going at war with each other, after a long build to get to this point. In the day and age where Wrestlemania main events are put together just a month or two before the event, this feels even more great. Am I overrating this? Perhaps. But when it comes to my favorite build of all time and a main event that I feel no other Wrestlemania could top in quality in all departments for the first ten years, I don't feel you can overrate something like that. Even better of a story and match than I remember. My WWE MOTY for 1989. 4 1/2 Stars.

Overall
It's not the greatest show and compared to the overall quality of today's Wrestlemania's, maybe not even good. However, especially back in 1989, this was pretty damn good. Your big matches (Title matches) delivered, while some of your undercard was enjoyable. Like most of these early Wrestlemania's, there's a lot of filler matches, but there's only a few really bad matches. The most disappointing aspect about the show is despite how much I loved it, it could have been so much better had some of the matches been booked differently. Scrap the Garvin/Bravo and Bad News/Duggan matches. Replace the Rockers with Strike Force to create Strike Force vs Twin Towers and Brainbusters vs Rockers. Replace Valentine/HTM with The Rougeau Brothers while dropping the HTM/Valentine vs Bushwackers match. Replace Haku with Ted DiBiase to make DiBiase vs Hercules while dropping replacing Haku with Ron Bass to make Beefcake vs Bass. That makes WM 5 look like:

Hogan vs Savage
Warrior vs Rude
Demolition vs Powers of Pain and Mr. Fuji
Rockers vs Brainbusters
Hart Foundation vs The Rougeau Brothers
Strike Force vs Twin Towers
Blue Blazer vs Perfect
Hercules vs DiBiase
Ron Bass vs Brutus
Jake vs Andre
Heenan vs Rooster

You're still having a lot of matches to give a good portion of the roster the big pay check. However, most of the matches mean something and the little extra time will help matches such as Blazer/Perfect end up being better. Rebooking aside, the WWE managed to put on a good Wrestlemania that unlike so many others from the early years, has more than one or two good matches.

Best Match: Hulk Hogan vs Randy Savage
Worst Match: The Bushwackers vs The Rougeau Brothers

 

Excellent stuff Gehrig.

One backstory thing about the Rooster/Brain match. Heenan wrote in his book that their time had been cut from a few minutes to 30 seconds because the brass was afraid of the show going too long. Supposedly, Taylor had complained, and Heenan told him that they were getting paid the same, so why complain if they had to work less.

 

Just out of curiosity, what would be the angle for it? Once wrestlemania is over, Rock is gone. Why would he sell the word battle leading up to the match. If it;s just about putting him over, he can do it in the match.

 

Rock maybe isn't gone after Mania. He's already been part of the buildup for the Mania in Jersey, saying he's going to beat Cena or some such thing.

 

There are five weeks of build-up for Wrestlemania, and they likely aren't going to let the two touch each other until the last Raw before Mania (if at all) ... so they can't go guns-a-blazing in every promo leading up to it. Cena has to win a promo battle or two to keep things up in the air.

Nothing I've seen illustrates The Rock has "lost it" on the mic.

 

Thanks, Baron. I've been meaning to read his book, just haven't gotten the chance yet.

 

Really? Does he seem to be up to his old standards to you? Not saying he's been awful but it just seems like he's at least a bit rusty. The one thing I always enjoyed about The Rock on the mic was that he had his catchphrases and his humor but in between he was great at advancing storylines and talking about the importance of taking out his opponent. He still has the humor and the catchphrases but the substance in between has been severely lacking in my opinion.