Professional wrestling thread

It aired live in Canada and will run on USA on Thursday. USA has always preempted Raw for the dog show, and Prime Time Wrestling before that.

 

Guess I missed it last year when it happened, because I forgot all about that. I wondered why it wasn't on my DVR. Thanks.

 

WWE announced its first Hall of Fame member on the show last night ... Dusty Rhodes. Wonder if Goldust will introduce him? Or, perhaps the Midnight Rider?

 

I'd be shocked if it wasn't Flair introducing him, seeing as how he was Rhodes' biggest opponent. It'd be nice if Magnum T.A. did the honors, but he's probably too obscure for the kids.

That's one nice side effect of WWE's dominance in major pro wrestling: Dusty probably wouldn't have gotten this kind of treatment otherwise, because I doubt WCW would have come up with a legitimate Hall of Fame of their own (I'm guessing he's in the Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame, but even if it's more legit than WWE's, McMahon knows how to throw a party).

 

Dusty didn't help, but Jim Crockett was his own worst enemy, spending insane amounts of money, trying to go national without the proper infrastructure and moving JCP from Charlotte to Dallas.

I was born and raised on Mid-Atlantic, and had it not tried to grow past its pants, it might still be around in some form. Jim Cornette was convinced (in the Flair book, I think) that if Crockett had focused on running the Carolinas and Virginia and dropped the idea of being the WWF's main competition, they would have owned the region to this day. I tend to believe him.

 

I'll give him a half-pass on Ronnie Garvin, only because they were committed to the idea of having Flair drop and regain the title quickly, and nobody wanted to be the next Tommy Rich or Kerry Von Erich. Of course, if Garvin is the best option you have, perhaps you should shelve the idea in the first place.

And I don't know what's sadder -- the Black Scorpion gimmick or the fact that 15 years later, major wrestling promoters still hype big surprises without actually confirming the person to play the part, resulting in underwhelming or non-sensical payoffs ("it was MEEEEEE, Austin!")

 

I think Dusty also wanted to have Rick Steiner win the belt off Flair--back when Steiner had the little hand puppet.

 

While Garvin had the personality of Chris Masters, he and Flair had some entertaining and hard-hitting matches. They'd slap/chop the hell out of each other to the point where, even the non-wrestling fans in my family would stop and watch the match.
Garvin was a lame-duck champ from the beginning, though, so they never should've put the strap on him to begin with unless they had planned to give the belt to another heel not named Flair.

 

If I remember the story, he wanted Flair to job in five minutes on a PPV, back when five-minute non-squashes were rare and Flair was still doing 60 minute draws with Steamboat and Windham and pretty much anyone you threw at him. That was more a fuck you than a real plan, but still. And they wouldn't even let Flair job the belt to Luger on his way out, which would have been a damn sight better than the cobbled-together Luger-Windham double-turn match in Baltimore where everyone took a giant shit on it while chanting "We want Flair!"

 

Don't mean to change the subject, but I downloaded last night's RAW (someone from Canada uploaded it on the sites last night) and, I gotta admit, it wasn't half bad. Here's a few of my thoughts:

WARNING!!! *******SPOILERS AHEAD**********






() I was actually entertained during the Trump-Vince interplay. Trump actually cuts a better promo than 90 percent of the WWE roster is allowed to (for that matter, K-Fed did as well ... I think it's cuz the writing team is probably less strict with them so it comes out naturally). After last night, with the added "hair vs. hair" stipulation, I'm actually looking forward to the match at WrestleMania.

() I enjoyed the continuation of Flair vs. Carlito. I know Carlito was being jobbed out to Khali in 15-second squash matches over the weekend, so if his program with Flair can eventually lead to a push, it'll be worth it. Plus, seeing Flair cut some classic promos has been great!

() I hated Umaga destroying Rhodes and Piper right after they announced Rhodes going into the Hall of Fame. Can't Vince be the bigger man, just once, and let someone enjoy their moment in the spotlight (Rhodes) or in front of their adopted hometown (Piper in Portland)? Also, it kind of sucks for Umaga, who had a great program with Cena, to get saddled with beating up old timers.

() I'll admit, when I first heard Batista vs. Undertaker and Cena vs. Michaels were the two headline matches for WrestleMania, I was completely underwhelmed. I even contemplated not ordering 'Mania, which would have been a first for me. However, WWE has done a phenomenal job building toward these two matches. Plus, it was great to see Batista and 'Taker destroy Cena and Michaels to end RAW. Too many times, SmackDown has been made to look like the second-class brand (when, in fact, it's probably been the better show for the last 6 months). SmackDown deserves some time to shine and they got it last night.


Finally, there was a backstage segment talking about Ashley's Playboy shoot. I actually have a face-to-face interview set up with her next Monday at 11:30 a.m. Needless to say, I can't wait. Yooooooowza.