2016 Pro Wrestling Thread

Is that the night Hardy was high or drunk?

 

Dan Gelston, who works out of Philly, is essentially the AP's "pro wrestling guy." He's done a lot on WWE and TNA, and stuff like The Rock and Hogan's returns to WWE.

 

Hell, CBS Sports has a story up about Cena on the front page. I know ESPN usually has something, but I can't remember if I've ever seen anything on CBS.

 

About 20 years ago, I bought tickets to a show that was advertised as a TV taping (would have been Superstars) plus a main event featuring Steve Austin and Shawn Micheals vs. Bret Hart and Sid.

Turns out Raw went live every week a week before this show and for whatever reason, Superstars wasn't filmed. We ended up with a substandard house show and all four of the main event no-showed. Ended up with a cage match between Farooq and the Undertaker. It was a complete ripoff but at least Taker was there.

But we weren't offered refunds.

 

Possibly both.

 

As Baron said, yes.

 

I'm sorry, you'll have to be more specific with that question.

 

Was there a night back then that Hardy wasn't high and/or drunk? I think the question should be, "Was that the night Hardy was tripping balls in a wrestling ring?" That at least narrows it down some.

 

I can't listen to the intro of Smells Like Teen Spirit without thinking to myself "Self High Five!" anymore. It's just impossible.

 

Observer from Jan. 11:

- Cena’s injury is believed to be a torn labrum or rotator cuff. The normal recovery time for that is six months, but he’s come back quick from every other injury he’s had. Meltzer notes that he and several other guys switched to “Olympic style” powerlifting years ago, and now, all of them have had shoulder injuries – Cena, Cesaro, Hideo Itami, Mojo Rawley, Clayton Jack and Sami Zayn. It’s unknown if it’s the workouts themselves, or if it’s the workout plus bumping, which powerlifters obviously don’t do.

- Shinsuke Nakamura, AJ Styles, Karl Anderson and Doc Gallows all gave their notice to New Japan, and all have signed WWE deals. They were going to be surprise Rumble entrants, but now that the news has been widespread, the plan might have changed.

Styles technically hadn’t signed his WWE contract yet, but it was believed that it would get done, and he has no future ROH or New Japan dates. With a multi-year WWE deal, he would have medical coverage, which could have been a swing factor, given his age and health.

While New Japan’s big Toyko Dome show for 2016 received unanimous praise from fans, they have a long-term booking style and the loss of all four throws them into some chaos. Kenny Omega is now probably the top foreign star in New Japan, and while he’s good, he’s not at Styles’ level, and he’s been in Japan longer than Styles. New Japan does hold the worldwide trademark for Bullet Club, so it’s likely that the name will be changed to Balor Club or something else.

Nakamura is a huge star in Japan; there isn’t really a comparison for WWE landing a star of his caliber from that company. Kenta was the lead star of NOAH, but that promotion was fading and he had always wanted to go to the WWE.

New Japan only has one-year contracts, even with major talent. This leaves them vulnerable to contract raids, although they tend to be very loyal to performers – keeping them when injured, not cutting as deeply as WWE does during bad times. WWE, in contrast, has 5 to 8 year deals with major stars, and even 3-year contracts for tryout or new talent. New Japan also doesn’t have a development system like NXT, and they’ve traditionally not signed younger foreign talent, instead only bringing them over after they’re done in other promotions.

Anderson had been contacted by WWE years ago and he turned them down, but clearly he made up his mind some time ago, since he’s gotten tanner and slimmer (the WWE look) in recent months. Gallows was solely in “right place, right time” – he’s over as part of the package deal, because otherwise, he probably wouldn’t be back in WWE.

WWE might not be done raiding New Japan talent. It’s believed Rocky Romero (as a trainer and wrestler), Bad Luck Fale and Tama Tonga also got offers. The latter two would be top guys by default if they stayed in New Japan now though.

- Meltzer kind of ranks the promotions, based on their business prominence. 1) WWE / NXT 2) New Japan 3) ROH 4) TNA 5) Lucha Underground 6) Global Force Wrestling

- Cena’s injury has kind of thrown the booking in disarray. There isn’t a clear direction for Jericho, Del Rio is now in a feud with Kalisto, and who knows how it effected the Mania build? There are a million rumors and nothing concrete from company sources.

- Ethan Carter III became TNA champion at its Jan. 5 show, pinning Matt Hardy. Worse, it did only 255,000 viewers, with another 90,000 on the replay, despite them building toward the date and with a station that had more clearances.

Returning to TNA for the debut were Storm, The Miracle, Mike Bennett and Maria. If you had been following TNA, you wouldn’t even know Storm left, since he was still in taped footage. Storm signed a two-year contract, after being on WWE TV twice; it was a rare gaffe by WWE.

- Taryn Terrell, 30, a.k.a. Tiffany, a.k.a. the former Mrs. Drew Galloway, left TNA as of Jan. 4. She has remarried a motorcycle stunt man and said she’s found religion.

- Splitting up the Dudleys, and having Bubba go heel (similar to his Bully Ray run in TNA) has been discussed, but not confirmed yet.

- WWE is going to send some talent scouts to mainland China.

- Zach Ryder, 30, is dating Emma, 26. She stole his heart. Woo woo woo, you know it.

- Natalya had been out of action with a broken ankle. She thought it was just a strain, but after it didn’t get better with rest in November, they x-rayed and determined it was a minor break.

- Banks is also out with an injury, although there are no details on it yet.

- Konnor of the Ascension has a dislocated jaw, and he will also miss time.

 

Sting to be the first inductee into the Hall of Fame this year. It's well deserved, but there are folks out there who don't like it because his WWE tenure has been so short. They don't get the concept that the WWE Hall of Fame has -- like it or not -- become the de facto Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame.

The guy should be in the Hall, even if his WWE resume is so short.

 

I kind of figured his brief WWE run was mainly for this purpose.