LP Steve

Ric Flair has truly arrived: he's an answer in today's New York Times Crossword.

Dick Murdoch breaking out the old Jose Lothario rolling avalanche! Not knowing the title history, I was genuinely surprised when Dick went over Jumbo. Fun match. Thanks!

On top of all that, DDP 's own wife had played a prominent role in several WCW angles, including one where SHE was being stalked by Scott Steiner. My memory is vague-- did they explain where the hell Kimberly was while DDP was stalking Undertaker's wife?

In the summer of 2010, we had a high school exchange student from Spain at our house. We sat down to watch one of Spain's World Cup games. Our student's English was very good, but I thought he might find it a treat to hear Spanish language commentary, so I tuned in the game on Univision. After ten minutes, he asked me to switch to the English channel because he couldn't understand a word they were saying.

Now I want to see Ed Carpentier versus Samoa Joe...

As I recall, Roop said that Funk was just repeating a story Slater told him, and the story was wrong. Roop's version is sort of "part two" to the story about the tape. After stooging out Roop and company to Fuller and the NWA promoters, Slater was given the book in Knoxville. Roop's opposition group kept trying to provoke confrontations with the Fuller promotion, challenging them to come to their shows and take them on. As part of that provocation, Roop went alone to one of those loaded NWA shows, bought a ticket and sat as close to the ring as he could, to make the point he wasn't afraid of them. After the show, Roop went to the bar where he knew the NWA wrestlers would be drinking. He was trying to put Slater in the position where he had to do something or lose face. Roop described the "fight" as kind of a damp squib. Slater came at him, Roop hit Slater a glancing blow with a blackjack, and they were sort of pulled apart. I do remember Roop saying that Dick Slater had never laid a hand on him "in anger." I find Roop more or less credible in his recollections. Your mileage may vary.

Not a whole lot that was surprising in Roop's interview. The tape was basically part of the Knoxville war. Roop, Garvin, and Malenko were running Knoxville for Ron Fuller, who was down in Pensacola trying to resuscitate that territory. Fuller's people in Knoxville were doing shady stuff with the payouts. Roop and Garvin were pissed and said, what the hell, let's just take over Knoxville. However, before they could make their move, one of their co-conspirators, Dick Slater, stooged them out to Fuller, who came back and sacked Roop. Roop, Garvin and company decided to go ahead and run opposition anyway. The NWA promoters came in, as they always did, and ran loaded shows (Andre, NWA title matches) against Roop's outlaw group. Roop's group petered out pretty quickly. The tape was their last gasp-- as Roop put it, a way to show the NWA promoters that we could hurt them. It never aired, and Roop pretty much forgot about it until last week. Roop's contention is that the NWA promoters were scared, not of an opposition group in Knoxville, but of Roop's plan to start a wrestlers' union. It's unclear whether the union thing was shared by everyone in Roop's group or whether it was just his hobby horse. He's going to be on the show next week to talk some more about all this. Bob Roop is a smart guy and fascinating to listen to. I'd recommend this-- Roop comes on about an hour into the podcast, if you don't want to sit through the whole thing.

FYI, this week's Breaking Kayfabe podcast (mostly vintage CWF discussion with Barry Rose) has Bob Roop talking about that Knoxville "expose the business" tape that surfaced a couple weeks ago. I haven't listened yet, but will report later if no one beats me to it.

Eddie just applied his finisher, the "Jersey Correction."

I know most people love the domed globe and think of it as the "classic" NWA belt, but this one was always my favorite. Probably just because I'm that much older-- I saw Rogers and Thesz wear that one to the ring in Jacksonville, fer chrissakes.

Flair looks suspiciously like Fred Blassie.

And why would you have the Fabulous Kangaroos on your card but have them working as singles?

Still Gordoning, I'd counter that playing possum is the true veteran move. Make your opponent think he's hurt you more than he has. Jim Brown walked back to the huddle after every play looking as if he'd just taken the Death Blow. That way, the opposition could never be sure when he was really hurt. I have no counter for your other point of impeccable wrestling logic.

Gordon Solie would have kayfabe sold that as smart strategy, a veteran taking advantage of every split second of available rest before kicking out. What's gained by kicking out at one?

Real name Tomomi. Billed as Tommy Tsuruta as a rookie in Amarillo.

As God is my witness, I thought I was typing an apostrophe there. I'm spoiled from having a proofreader to save my ass at work...

Hope this isn't a joke. Lothario in his mid-60s, early 70s prime was very, very good. Not at all the same type of worker as Michaels or Osprey, but good.

I rarely watch Raw, but saw the last hour and really enjoyed it. But I have a question about Reigns-- what's the deal with his finisher? Twice last night, Corbin was dead on the mat and Roman just kind of dicked around, gesturing to the crowd, waiting (I guess) for Corbin to get to his feet so he could administer the coup de grace. It went on so long that I was expecting at least one of the announcers to do the Scott Evil thing and say, "Pin him! Just pin him!" I know kayfabe is long dead but Jesus Christ, if the opponent is prone on the mat, why are you standing around waiting for him to recover?

Just as I scrolled onto the Hogan fireworks gif, "Rock and Roll Toilet" by the Soft Boys came on the radio. It absolutely works.

It really disturbs me that I have a pretty good idea of what Vince McMahon looks like when he's nutting.

I wonder why the fake number? Sixty sellouts of Madison Square Garden is pretty damned impressive. I grew up in Florida during Bruno's prime period and was always disappointed he never wrestled here, because the magazines made him seem godly. Like OSJ, once I saw him work, I scratched my head a little. But there's no questioning those molten crowds in MSG.

I was talking about the overall treatment, but you're right, Elwes (and maybe others?) talked about the pain. Would the pain have been so bad if he hadn't been wrestling 300 days a year? I just think that sloughing everything off on his acromegaly is a way of absolving people who should have been helping him but instead chose to enable him even after he was way past doing much of anything in a wrestling ring. Ultimately, the decisions were his but I didn't get the feeling that anyone near him was giving him good advice.

Actually, my reaction was meh. Fun to see the old footage. Hadn't heard of the Shoemaker guy, but he was okay here. Not surprised to see Kevin Dunn listed as an executive producer, because this was definitely a WWF-centric version of events, with what seemed like a third of the film devoted to Wrestlemania III. Vince being credited as the guy who discovered you could put wrestling on cable was funny, given that GCW had been on TBS for years before Vince went national. His innovation was figuring out how to cash in on the national exposure. But history belongs to the winners, so there you go. The only disturbing thing is that Andre's early death was treated as an inevitability due to the acromegaly. His raging alcoholism was treated as a wonder and a joke rather than a contributing if not decisive factor in his death.

No contradiction there. That's how they have a good time.

Is that the Italian Stallion taking both of those Buzz powerslams?