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Yeah, that was Larry Holmes leaping onto Trevor Berbick back when Larry was in the middle of his boxing comeback (or 2nd boxing comeback cause he retired after the second Michael Spinks fight, came back to fight Tyson a couple years later, and got absolutely demolished). Yes indeed, the whole thing was lifted from some pro wrestling angle. Basically, Larry Holmes and Trevor Berbick fought when Larry was champ back in the early 80s. Trevor Berbick, who had always been a super strange dude in and out of the ring for various reasons, about ten years later started blaming Holmes for Trevor's acrimonious split with his wife. Berbick claims that the night before or week of his fight with Holmes, Larry sent his (Larry's) mistress to Trevor's room. I guess he's implying sabotage and that he was too weak from sex to the point he couldn't beat Larry? I dunno. It's hard to make out from Trevor's thick ass garbled Jamaican accent. Anyway, Larry being a notorious family man who has been married to his wife for several years didn't like that obviously seeing as Trevor was trying to start shit in Larry's home as well. So at one of Larry's comeback fights in Florida (IIRC it was only on local TV in Florida, which tells you the level of who Larry fought given Larry's own name recognition), Trevor decided to make an appearance at the post fight presser and levied those accusations against Larry. Larry just sorta ignored it and played it off, but Trevor was extremely belligerent. That comes to an end. Then at some point, off camera after the post fight presser, Trevor ran into Larry face-to-face and Larry put hands on him and feet as well apparently. I think the same TV crew that picked up the post fight antics of Berbick started their cameras back up and caught the aftermath, which was some straight up WCW Nitro shit from 1997. Or WWF Raw from the same year cause Larry Holmes came leaping off that car like Stone Cold Steve Austin and flying karate kicked the shit out of Berbick (IN COWBOY BOOTS!) and on camera this time.

Rampage has, recently, been my favourite AEW show because it's been the show that hews most closely to the goofy old school AEW that I loved so much and miss so dearly. Particularly in the sense of just throwing wrestlers together to have fun or great matches. This weeks show felt VERY Sports Entertain-y to me. To a disconcerting degree. The focus seems to be shifting hard toward "why are they fighting" and away from the fights (ahem) per se. I was massively bummed out to see that Nigel was on commentary today. I think I need a whole big Navel Gazing post to explain why. I'll do one, eventually, when I have the time and inclination. (Basically, I like my characters to be more honest, my bullshit to be more *obviously* bullshit and I am not looking to satisfy my nostalgia cravings when I am watching current wrestling. It might make sense if and when I go on and on about it). As it turned out, though, Nigel was mostly fine. His refusal to pronounce "Vikingo" correctly aside. The main event was predictably great, but I really really wish they had ended on the wonderful show of respect and allowed at least one match to just exist as a fine match, rather than making *everything* into angle advancement. Probably today I am predisposed to be a bit negative, though. Personal stuff... FEEL FREE TO SKIP IT: On the upside: Happy Birthday to Dump Matsumoto, The Greatest Heel Ever! Also: Metalik, HBK, and Hulk Hogan don't do jobs, brother. Everyone knows that! Maybe I'll post an amusing/ historical picture of Giant Baba here later..

All I know is that I switched to showers after the first time I saw My Cousin Vinny, because elementary school me knew it was time to put childish things away and Marisa Tomei needed a man.

No you're good cause the only time it's been referenced in the last twenty years was one of those list shows The Best Damn Sports Show, Period had about 15+ years ago of all the wildest moments in sports or craziest moments or whatever random list they came up with. They just played the kick and the "Larry Holmes kicked and punched me!" part before that. You saw like five seconds of it. The other boxing moment I remember from that same show was the Mitch "Blood" Green/Mike Tyson nightclub incident. Mike tells the story much better on his podcast, but in summary, Mitch was high out of his mind on PCP and Mike basically had to literally almost kill him for him to stay down. Mike basically ran away cause he thought he actually murdered a man. The aftermath was Mitch did survive (thankfully), but the right side of face looked like hamburger meat. Oh and speaking of managers and crazy shit: Since I heard JR bring up his name on a Raw from 1996 I watched not too long ago, Rock Newman would have been a perfect fit for pro wrestling. He was what the Nation of Domination should have been instead that weird ass five to six months where they had like a Puerto Rican dude and a white ex con as like 2/3 of the group and then two white dudes following them in their posse. Rock has since been reborn as an online talk show host for a (sometimes very educational and insightful actually) program he hosts on the campus on Howard University. However, before that when he was managing Dwight Muhammad Qawi and more famously Riddick Bowe during his rise and subsequent fall as Heavyweight champion, Rock Newman had ALL the fucking heat in the world. I dunno but there is something about a black dude with ZERO melanin who is the absolutely proudest black man ever. I guessed that along with some of his behavior rubbed people the wrong way. All I know he was perhaps the most entertaining manager in boxing (save for Butch Lewis probably). My favorite moment personally and somehow maybe not even top five craziest Rock Newman moment* is the moment in the first Riddick Bowe vs. Elijah Tillery fight. Bowe was a contender on his way up after fighting on the 1988 U.S. Olympic team with names like Kennedy McKinney, Michael Carbajal, Roy Jones Jr., and eventual rival Ray Mercer. Tillery was basically just a fringe contender guys like Bowe fight on the way up. Anyway, Bowe was winning the fight and for some reason it got heated after the bell to end the round. It got heated to the point where Elijah Tillery starts KICKING Riddick Bowe and probably accidentally invents MMA. Bowe retaliates a little. Then, things start getting hairy. Tillery backs up towards the rings to evade Bowe, Rock Newman who had been just sitting ringside facing the hard camera jumps on the apron to stop Tillery from going after Bowe, Tillery's trainer or manager then INTERCEDES on the behalf of Tillery and grabs by the leg or maybe part of the waist Rock Newman who himself has his arm wrapped around Tillery's neck. The momentum from Tillery's manager/trainer pulling Rock backwards sends Elijah Tillery UP AND OUT of the ring on some Royal Rumble shit and almost looks like Rock lifted Elijah Tillery out of the ring and suplexed him. Rock is not a big man at all and this is the era where most of the heavyweights are huge individuals. Thus, visually, it looks fucking INSANE. You see Elijah Tillery and then five seconds later, HE DISAPPEARS! Vanishes. Once you watch it, you cannot stop replaying it. It's going live rent free in your head. *Okay, the crazier Rock Newman moments that I can think of just off the top of my head: 1. The Fan Man incident, which had to be #1 by default. It's probably the most infamous moment in boxing outside of Down Goes Frazier, Ali's celebration after the first Liston fight, Tyson biting Holyfield in the rematch, No Mas, Jim Lampley's spine chilling "IT HAPPENED...IT HAPPENED!" after Foreman's upset of Michael Moorer in 1994 which I just watched and his excellent money quote afterwards ("...Moorer becomes the 68th man, in 26 years to have fallen before the professional fury of George Foreman"). Rock hit the "fan man" with one of those giant brick phones. REPEATEDLY. 2. The Bowe/Golota I pier six brawl that lasted a good ten minutes. It could be 1a just for the mayhem, but it's two cause Rock was just a contributor of many. 3. Starting shit at the Bowe/Pierre Coetzer pre fight presser conference protesting Apartheid. Larry Merchant got so angry he started caping for white people to the point it was ridiculous. You would NEVER hear a commentator do that on an MNF or Sunday night football broadcast or anywhere and get away with it. Merchant crying over perceived race baiting and almost inadvertently supporting Apartheid South Africa is something even Vince didn't do until almost six years later. 4. He got into it with manager of Ray Mercer on Tuesday Nights Fights after a tuneup Bowe had getting ready to fight Mercer. Just like Bowe vs. Lennox Lewis in the pros, Bowe vs. Mercer never actually happened so that's the only keepsake of it never happening.

I'd be content with ROH titles being strictly for ROH TV and defended only on ROH TV. And title holders being ppl (mostly) exclusive to that show. ROH seems to be in a difficult spot right now. The need to save costs and record before and after Collision is a major issue with this product's presentation. Empty houses being the GLARING problem. Cutting down the live taping portion to a half hour before and after could help. Classic arena style lighting might help. And for fuck sake, certainly cutting out 90% of the squashes would help keep or draw a crowd. Tighten the show to a 60-90 minutes. An hour of in-ring with lots of promos and packages. Also, is WBD cock-blocking from a weekly ROH report on one of the TV shows? It would help the show to be fucking acknowledged in some meaningful way. Also, it might help to stop featuring the forgettable Win Loss records if it means worrying about farming Squash victories and protecting low card talent. And here's a wild idea - have the shows actually feature the Champions! MJF as Tag Team Champions is indicative of how out of touch and off the mark this side project is right now. So too Joe showing how meaningless the TV Title is. Lastly, move ready talent (as in, having put together a compelling act) like Athena and Billie Starks along to 'TV' when ready. Clearly, barely anybody is watching this middling show let alone paying for it. It's fucking mindboggling how Athena/Starks, two of their best workers, are kept in obscurity on this lame duck show while the AEW Women's Division continues to struggle.

I really enjoyed this episode of Rampage (minus Roddy) very glad that Velvet is back and its nice that she did do consecutive jobs. Weird thought we all know the JR story about telling Vince about Asian porn sites to get Gail Kim hired. Do you suppose Bruce had to show Vince Joanna Angel videos to get Ruby hired. Very solid match between Starks and Vance. I don't get how some people hate Preston but think Wardlow is some can't miss main eventer? I think both guys are solid muscle hosses, but I do think both have an upper midcard ceiling. Congrats on the baby girl ROOOSH glad to have you back, looking forward to you hitting JD Drake tonight! Weird thought, given Joe and Punks and MJFs history.... it would make a sort of sense for PUNK to be The Devil... Nice main event not too much to add but I would like to see some of these Lucha guys get storylines. Kinda feels like they get thrown out there like an old episode of nitro that had the 8 man scrambles or just to lose. I enjoy Nigel and though he meshed very well with Tony. Total Jesse Ventura vibes for me

I was down for a "Lauren Boebert's mom" joke, until I saw where he actually did a paternity test to prove it wasn't true. Which actually makes me sad.

Re: Rampage Starks v Vance was a solid opener. I like both Bill and Starks as singles, and as heater hoss/singles, but as a tag team they’re offering far less than a Championship team oughtta. They have little cohesion as a tandem, and their run seems to be featuring more Starks singles than tags. Is elevating Ricky enough to justify? Oh, and Bill was excellent on commentary. I’d love to see them move the straps back to an actual team worthy of the gold. Jericho promo was good. This Lionheart babyface run is featuring far better promos than his regular standard bratty High School comedy shit. And sold, how do I see this DDT Takeshita bout? Nana/Callis promo was terrific. Heel manager collaborations are a beautiful thing. Jarrett and Co promo was good. Lethal would be better served not looking like shlub during his TV time. Dress the part of a champion. Ortiz has been doing well with his minutes. I hope he can find a new partner to rescue him from singles job duty. I skimmed passed Velvet v Soho. Please make Velvet a heel. Roddy segment/Kingdom Squash was excellent. Roddy is killing it, and the Kingdom are making the opportunity count. The Roddy/Kingdom/Andretti/DARIUS! promo was also solid. Daniel Garcia promo setting up a match with Andrade, fuck yes! Totally into this Angelo Parker/Ruby/Saraya/Daddy Magic sports and entertainment! Kommander/Vikingo v FTR was tremendous. Get the straps back on a worthy team. Terrific fun on Rampage this week. Re: Dynamite Excellent as expected MJF v Danny Garcia opener. OUTSTANDING Mark Briscoe video! More of These videos for more of the matches. Sell the matches!!! I'd love to see this company really get behind Mark Briscoe in a big way. He's an outstanding talker and worker. He's got IT! Darby/Sting v Outrunners did what it needed to. Toni Storm/Hik-a-roo segment was terrific. Finally, a good Toni Storm segment after dragging this excellent character thru the bad comedy mud. Looking forward to Toni being the championship gold standard again. Swerve v Penta was terrific fun. Hangman run-in was strong. This has been sloppy shitty storytelling, but they finally got to Strickland getting his comeuppance for the senseless (creatively and every other way) home invasion. Jay White promo was a little less than it needed to be. Street Fight video package was a bit lame, but god bless AEW for seeing the value in giving time to Video Preview Packages. MORE MORE MORE. Dug the Young Bucks/Jericho/Omega promo. Very into this bout. Samoa Joe v Keith Lee was fun. All things considered, Keith Lee is probably best suited in a tag situation. Let’s get the Pretty Boy Killers with Taylor happening again, pronto. Joe rules. Give em the belt. Ugh, less into the silly surrendering of the ROH TV Title. OC promo was fine. I skipped the Gunns v Bollywoods. Nice intensity in their promo post match. Mox promo was his standard fun. Skimmed Julia Hart v Red Velvet. The Division booking continues to struggle with these meaningless stories. Who fucking cares who’s friends with whom? How could I possibly be invested? Can we light the fire on Willowmania already!? Mariah May promo was kinda fun. Would’ve been a lot more effective if they showed a little video package of Stardom highlights prior to her Toni obsessing. Happy to see some fresh new talent to move passed this pretty rough and forgettable era of the Division. Mark Briscoe v Jay White was fucking excellent. The angle to close was fine, but if I’m honest, I don’t really give a shit about this Masked man/team. I did feel a little glee seeing the Assclaimed take a beating for their irritating comedy segments and shitty trios matches. Great show! This felt like a nice bounce back from the last couple weeks.

I think I remember the bright tye dye dress shirt. I didn't have one particular shirt I wore to shows and husky guy with glasses doesn't exactly narrow it down at a wrestling show.

Rampage was good this week. If you didn't watch the FTR/Vikingo & Kommander match you should find it and do so. This match was everything I love about AEW. Great action and lots of near falls. I don't know how Mexican wrestling politics work, but AEW needs to do more with Vikingo. That was a lively crowd for him during the match.

My first show was WrestleMania 1 on Closed Circuit movie screens at the Philly Spectrum when I was 15. The best part of that show was when Bruno ran into the ring to clean house, my mom was jumping up and down and cheering because she loved him from when she was a kid. From there, I went to lots of Crockett shows at the Philly Civic Center, WWF shows at the Spectrum, and Pro Wrestling USA shows at the Meadowlands. I saw Stan Hansen beat Rick Martel for the AWA title at the Meadowlands at one of the PW USA shows, we saw Hogan/ Orndorff in a cage at the Spectrum, and the Crockett shows were always awesome. When my first girlfriend dumped me, my dad and his best friend took me to a day in Philly that wrapped up in a Crockett show at the Civic Center where he and his friend got a contact high from all the weed being smoked in the upper level. That show had a Magnum/ Tully "I Quit" rematch and a Barbarian vs Sam Houston squash that looked so brutal the woman sitting next to us was having a fit screaming that Sam was getting killed while her boyfriend was trying in vain to tell her it was all just a show. The Civic Center also had a superfan, an African American dude who dressed up like Flair and just walked around "WOOOing" all night at every show. Everyone called him the Black Nature Boy and this was years before Scoot Andrews. I also went to Starrcade 86 in Greensboro. I convinced my dad to drive me and my pal Joe from Jersey to North Carolina on Thanksgiving to be third row as my favorite wrestler, Jimmy Valiant finally beat Paul Jones and shaved his head in the last match of their three year feud as Manny Fernandez hung above us in a shark cage. Also, when Tully screwed Dusty out of the TV title in that First Blood match some drunk redneck in the third row a section over from us threw his folding chair at the ring. He then drunkenly tried to mimic sitting down on an invisible chair before security dragged him out kicking and screaming. It was the funniest thing I ever saw at a wrestling show. Years later, my ex and I were at In Your House Mind Games for that Mankind/ HBK match. That was a blast. Then I started going to lots of ROH and JAPW shows between 2004 and 2006 where I met Pete and Ray. The ROH Rexplex shows were all great. I saw three ROH shows in NYC including Joe vs Kobashi. I got to see Vader at a JAPW show once teaming with Mike Awesome against Joe and Dan Maff. ( I think those were the teams, all four were in the match). I saw Generico and his crew debut at JAPW. I also got to see a few shows at the Armory including the Generation Next tent show, the night Joe lost the belt to Aires, the start of the CZW feud with the six man and the end of the feud at COD. I also was at the show in upstate NJ where Punk won the belt to kick off The Summer of Punk. Since I've been in Colorado I've been to a bunch of WWE house shows, a RAW, one TNA show that drew like 185 people with Joe vs AJ on top, two Dynamites, and couple of indy shows. The last WWE house show was in Denver last year and i took my nephew and his friends. It was fantastic and the kids had a blast. Edit: Sorry to list like almost all the shows I went to, but they were all the best. I never didn't have fun at a show.

I really hope this mean Danielson in Minneapolis

i've decided on my "nonsensical pick to be the devil"... Swerve Strickland Because whatever is going on in the Swerve-verse has to be convoluted and angle-tastic. Don't even need to bring back Tattoo Guy and the Other Dude to be the goons. Maybe Swerve just absorbs Roddy's Friends.

We have the G1 at home!

Nice.

There's also footage of a very non-impressed Gordon Solie having to deal with Jimmy Hart on the GCW side of that Memphis talent exchange. I don't know how good the acoustics of the Omni were, especially if it was empty in 1984, but there were Ronnie Garvin vs Wahoo McDaniel matches around that time in GCW that must have sounded like live ammo rounds going off

FTR vs Vikingo/Komander was very well put together for what it was. I liked the idea that FTR didn't want to be wrestling that match after things broke down but they couldn't stop Komander/Vikingo from keeping things moving. As a one time thing, I didn't mind it for a FTR dynamic (though i generally hate how most tags over the last ten years break down mid-way and never come back). I would have liked it more if there were 2-3 minutes of it after the hot tag with that same feel of things just getting out of hand in a way that they couldn't control and then FTR would find a way to take back over and settle things back down for a second bit of heat before it broke down again, but what are you going to do, right?

Bill was already noticeably better during his time in Impact. I think getting canned by WWE was a big wake up call for him. It's just taken a while to sink in that this isn't the same guy that ran around with Enzo, and now he's actually featured as a champion. I'd say Skye Blue has shown the biggest talent jump this year. The endless losses to Ruby and Toni didn't make for good tv, but no doubt it's greatly benefited her in the ring.

Well I mean Duggan is the same way. He was never Mr. Intelligence, but he could still cut a strong promo within reason of what his character was. I don't think Vince wanted full on caricature like Duggan would become later on, but that walking tall All-American patriot being fully fleshed out is more a territory character and not something you would have saw as WWF moved deeper into national expansion. Duggan had to tone it down to a more 2D character. Anyone remember when Haku was cutting promos just like a regular dude? Then at some point he could no longer talk and then just became full on savage in WCW. He did a reverse Headshrinkers.

You gotta love total pro Cosell almost getting trampled but just ducking down and rambling out an anecdote about how Dan Rather got punched in a similar situation but responded "It's all in a day's work." I've seen a story that keeps coming up in my Facebook about someone else on the international crew bitching about Stan's stiffness in AJPW so I believe it was Dan Kroffat who just ended up legit stretching him and him settling down after that. Was that Austin Idol who did the interview about it? I can't remember. Anyway what I really want to know is James Mitchell's story on DOING COCAINE WITH A DISPOSABLE PLASTIC SPOON~!

Wouldn't call this movie "great", but it was absolutely a lot of fun and very charming. Iman Vellani as Kamala completely carries the movie, and if everyone else had matched her effort level, the movie would have been better for it. Ms. Marvel was easily my favorite D+ MCU show though, so maybe I'm biased. The cameos definitely worked in setting up other things rather than just being like "oh that person is here".

As best I can tell, the AXS episodes roughly three weeks to a month behind the date of the event. But, sometimes it's hard to tell when a specific match will be on since they seem to split up the big shows over several weeks/episodes. And yeah, you both have it right with respect to the match itself. As I was watching, I said to myself that it was a comedy match dressed up in no-DQ/falls count anywhere trappings. With bowling. Also, "Moxley bleeds" is a meme at this point. Don't really even mean that in a bad way.

Yeah, that's one of my "feel superior to everyone else" things in the gym as well. We have the belt squat & hip thrust I mentioned in prior posts that were new this year, and they came with their own different, rubberized weights. And none of the hapless fuckwits in my gym seem to understand how to rack weights. I want to make them all take a goddamn test so they have to answer, "You only put one kind of weight in one spot, so when you want to use that weight, you don't have to dig through others to get it, even if it means one side is all 25s and the other side is all 10s" and sign their fucking names to it. I also had to correct some fools - the same college kids I've bemoaned before - because they were trying to use ankle straps to do lateral raises and they couldn't figure out how to hook up the cables. It's like, duh, motherfuckers, the force is down, the cables pull down, the connections are down: you're gonna have to spin the metal hook on the straps DOWN relative to how you're lifting. That takes me about 0.4 CPU cycles of brain power to glance at and figure out and they half-assed it.

I mean there is always some footage that some international feed (usually like Sky sports) that catches something else so I wouldn't be surprised if there is more out there. However, in a world pre camera phones, I am pretty sure HBO caught the bulk of it. I mean if that happens and you're part of the camera crew, you're getting out of dodge. I'm actually surprised they caught what they did cause Lampley, Merchant, and I believe George Foreman as well got the fuck away from ringside and went up into an upper level of MSG to finish the broadcast. Matter of fact, it was still going on in pockets of the arena while they were trying to recap everything and go off the air. It was nuts. Funny that all this comes up cause yesterday afternoon having the day off from work, I watched the Larry Holmes vs. Renaldo Snipes fight at the Pittsburgh Civic Arena (being a Pittsburgh native, Kevin Iole said this was first fight he covered), which is one before I believe Holmes fought Cooney and actually not too long after Holmes fought Trevor Berbick. The TLDR version of it was this was just suppose to be another title defense for Holmes against a middle of the road contender on the road to his huge payday against Gerry Cooney, Snipes gives Holmes more trouble than expected, Snipes cleans Larry's clock on a knockdown, the referee doesn't stop it, Holmes eventually rallies later on, drops Renaldo Snipes, and the referee stops it. This was one of those fights where Snipes actually turned the crowd, which didn't know him at the time cause he was virtually unknown, in his favor and won them over. Howard Cosell even notes before the fight how the arena is only half full but Snipes is telling everyone who would listen this is going to be a closer fight than they realized. And it was. However, the post fight is where things turn ugly cause the Snipes is (probably rightly so) extremely livid with the stoppage given that boxing politics dictates Snipes shouldn't fuck up the Holmes vs. Cooney fight that had already been set up for March of 1982, which was four months after this fight. I mean we just got some recently like that with Fury vs. Ngannou and Fury vs. Usyk already being made (and now postponed again). Maybe Snipes was on to something cause Cooney was suppose to have a tuneup against perennial tough out Joe Bugner a couple weeks after this on CBS, only for that tuneup magically getting canceled cause of a Cooney injury, and both Holmes and Cooney went directly to the fight against each other. This was a best laid plans thing, and Snipes almost upset the apple cart. Just like what ABC use to do with the fighters on every broadcast if they had time, they would let Howard Cosell interview them. They brought a still very angry Renaldo Snipes and his conqueror Larry Holmes down to the broadcast table. Larry is actually very cool at first, but Snipes isn't having that as he feels like the referee screwed him over. He isn't feeling the sportsmanship thing at all. That's when this thing happens next and a riot breaks out in the Pittsburgh Civic Arena. https://twitter.com/RingsideSeatMag/status/1456992421905149957 This is only a piece of it, but it was pretty ugly scene afterwards. They caught what they catch and then promptly went off the air. Sidenote: Afterwards, we got an appearance from Corny's favorite man James J. Binns and his signature pinstripe suit seeing as the Pennsylvania commission oversaw it. He was Jack Tunney before Jack Tunney.

Marisa Tomei in that movie had 6th grade me showering 3x a day, but I digress. Also not putting Zimb down as childish for the record lol - I pictured it as a very luxurious, zen-filled situation. A little candle light, maybe smoke a nice J, and you fire up a bull rope match. That sounds straight up delightful.

FTR vs. Kommander/Vikingo was super fun. It reminded me of a peak NXT Takeover match. I'm glad they didn't go too long and just sprinted for 90% of it. I was already in love with the Ruby/Angelo story, but now there's tension between Saraya and Menard too? That's quality sports entertainment. Roddy popping out of his wheelchair to hit his finisher on some local jobbers is also quality sports entertainment. The Kingdom as a serious tag team never did anything for me, but Taven and Bennett are can't miss now. I kinda hope these guys aren't involved in the devil story because their act is perfect right now.

Missy is tweeting from the convention in NYC, lots of photos of her with a bunch of folks.

Tell him to do something with the Houston footage

This was totally charming, and it’s about as narratively neat as possible considering all of the moving parts. There’s a Trekkiness to some of it that I don’t recall seeing quite as much of in the other cosmic movies. I tapped out on Ms. Marvel after a couple of episodes, but Iman Vellani is delightful here. I like Nia DaCosta. I’m happy she made a solid movie, and I don’t think anyone’s going to blame her for the box office amidst the strike and all of the Marvel Studios hullabaloo in the media right now. The stuff they set up at the end was cool, but it’s kind of like speculating about AEW booking right now where I get fatigued even thinking about what’s next.

Loving the trip down memory lane to when I followed boxing during my teenage years. Being a kid during the heyday of Mike Tyson his dominance, that world, and reading about the history was as awe-inspiring to me back then as wrestling was. Speaking of Trevor Berbick, did we ever figure out if Nobuhiko Takada really shot on him in UWFI or if this was just a really well done work? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ru8DzzSBq2s

The whole intriguing thing about MJF and Cole was knowing one of them was going to turn on the other but not knowing who, when, or why? Then Cole punked his ankle and that metaphorical “who’s the bad guy” has to be represented by a literal dude in a devil mask. The devil really needs to be either Cole or MJF. MJF is more interesting, he could unmask after the goons attack Cole, but I don’t know who the goons would be. Cole makes more sense as the goons are obvious. The problem is they’re gonna drag this out til Cole’s healthy and that’s gonna be what? Double or Nothing? Regarding Hollywood Jack Perry, he needs to be back soon and return in a meaningful way (and TK should cut a check to Timberlake for the entrance music) It would make sense for him to pop up along Christian again and cost Darby, Sting, and Edge the match at Full Gear. Jungle Boy settles into the heel role under Christian’s tutelage. Feuds with Edge and/or Darby. Eventually he leads Luchasaurus and Nick Wayne to turn on Christian building to the Edge Christian retirement tour. Fuck, maybe he even wins the TNT title.

*Also one Big Ten official told a reporter that Pettiti considers this the biggest scandal in Big Ten history. Despite Sandusky. Dr Nassar. Dr Anderson. Dr Strauss.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JiV0__264zI You need to see this Kevin Owens promo.

Low Ki clearly isn't the Devil because the devil isn't wearing a suit and hasn't kicked anybody in the face randomly

Typical Japanese woman: generally tiny. Next to Giant Baba: REALLY REALLY TINY.

Let the love for that Rampage main begin in 3... 2... I said to myself out loud, "Kid, don't hit the table..." and what does Vikingo do? I just yelled "JEEZUS!" out loud like Zandig. Thank god he wasn't hurt.

Mr. America reportedly unavailable due to tour commitments with Metallica.

Even if most hate him these days, he's forever one of my favorites, I would absolutely love this if it were possible. He'd be a great fit. My personal Devil pick from outsiders/known free agents, is Sami Callihan. Switchblade Conspiracy~!

The 21 year old had to explain it to the 11 year old. That's where we're at here.

To be honest, as much as I love B&B, them hitting the indys or Japan for a year or 2 and coming back to AEW or ROH isn't the worst idea. We need to stop expecting talent to be lifers because WWE doesn't mind employing people like that. The business was built on talent moving around and not getting stale. Not on someone like the Miz doing in 2023 doing basically the same as he did on 2013.

Well. That fucking wrecked me. In sure someone will shit on it because that’s happens, but I loved it. And I’m really heartbroken. Make more MCU TV like this.

I don't think I can point one specific show, but I was a regular at ROH shows in NJ, NYC, and Philly during the glory years and had some of the best times of my life. Maybe if I had to point to one show, it would be Death Before Dishonor IV, which had the ROH vs. CZW Cage of Death and a criminally underrated Pure title match with Nigel McGuinness vs. Roderick Strong.

SAG strike is over...

Oh yeah no argument here, you'd have to be a fucking psycho to take a bath in a hotel. You don't know what was very, very recently going on in that thing. If I'm on the road and I don't smell bleach in the hotel tub/shower I will 100% wear flip flops in there. I've seen too many good men and women go down to athletes foot over the years (now imagine sitting in it). Now obviously your deals different for medical purposes, but even if we get a handicapped room for whatever reason (it's happened twice completely randomly) or a room with a sauna, i'll adhere to the rule on the shower bench and throw a towel down before I sit if I don't smell at least one mustard gas ingredient @zendragonyou get it, man. You've got zen in your name FFS, how could you not

You need to shower after the bath, dude all the dead skin, oil, dirt that the bath will bring out of your skin

Fuuuuuuuuuuuck yeah. I popped for Yggdrasil and had to explain myself to the wife.

I have learned that you can tell who did and did not go to Michigan by reading the comments

Anyway, I loved the actual show (and I am in the group that didn't think last week was that bad). MJF-Garcia kicked ass and I hope they have many rematches over the years. MJF seems to be busting out a new move every match now. The cradle DDT thing he's been doing is NASTY. I still wish Danny had joined BCC. Darby and STIIIIING vs The Outrunners was obviously going to be a squash but I'm glad Turbo Floyd and Truth Magnum got to stooge it up for a bit. Best jobber team in the world. Still loving the Timeless Toni Storm character. Hick-Ah-Roo! Swerve-Penta started out pissing me off because it was 80% Swerve basing and selling for Penta and 20% mirror spots, but then during picture it got more even and Swerve took over after the break and things got crazy! I legit thought Swerve snapped Penta's elbow (and I was not rooting for that!). The aftermath with Hanger has me hoping for a good bloody street fight. The Golden Jets-Bucks thing made me laugh since Bucks got roasted hard. Match will be fun, and I guess it's a way for them to break up the Jets. Joe vs. Keith Lee made me think of Dean and the board's love of Big Meaty Men Slapping Meat. It was fun with Lee being in with someone his size, because it made his athleticism and power really stand out. I wondered if Joe would be able to pull off a muscle-buster, I maybe got my answer in the form of that nasty rear naked choke. Not a huge fan of vacating the title like that, but I guess we get a tournament. Serious OC is a little weird to me, but I love the idea that he finally cares about something (besides his Best Friends). Gunns squash...they were competing with MJF for the rotisserie chicken spray tan of the night. Not one of Mox's better promos but always down for some glorious pro wrestling violence. I guess it's too early for another Parking Lot Brawl. It's nice to see Red Velvet back, both in ring and to see her in general. Julia held her own, she really has come along. The splits and call back to the cheerleader days was a nice touch. Still not sure where they're going with the Stat-Willow-Skye-Julia storyline, but it's had good matches! I thought Mariah May was a rebooted Harley Cameron at first, she looks kind of like a cross between Harley and Toni Storm. I'm down with the obsessive fan storyline (and I guess I need to watch Sunset Boulevard and All About Eve now). Main event was MOTN even with that hot opener. Super competitive, lots of hard strikes and kicks, lots of MOVEZ, lots of character work. Many NASTY suplay in this match. Hoping the Devil storyline gets resolved soon. I'm still calling AADAAAMMM, with Strong, Kingdom, and a returning Kyle O'Reilly. Rampage looks to be a fun little show.

Imagine the product placement opportunities!

You could make the case somewhat for Only the Lonely being a serious performance. At least that's how I remember it. It has silly/funny moments but had plenty of serious, too. JFK had Candy in a flamboyant role but he certainly wasn't playing for laughs. I would say he was good in both.