StretchMediatedHypertrophy

Whoa.

Agreed, but I doubt he would've been any less effective as champion without all the extraneous biker gang crap. He would have struggled to stay heel, as his primary schtick is too over with the crowds (such as they might be).

Not particularly, but Dixie had enough heel heat and Bully's act is over enough that it works okay.

Peter Griffin would have sold the leg on his comeback

*relistens* I think there's a slight mix, but I will concede that you (and the crowd for that matter) are right. They chose a different angle for the splash, but he's better sticking with the powerbomb and using the splash as the move he almost always misses a la DiBiase's reverse elbow and Bully Ray's senton. I just realised; shouldn't Adam Rose be doing the DiBiase reverse elbow smash?

People rag on the Ace & Eights, but the belt meant a shit load more on Bully than it does now. The whole thing is seriously fucktarded at this point; they've got the one guy who might draw something wearing a mask and calling himself Willow. I like EY, but him taking the title from Magnus doesn't help him. The title would have been better back on Bully, Roode, or even on Kennedy before dropping it to EY.

Hopefully Big E will pull out the Gorilla Press-Splash combo.

*relistens* I think there's a slight mix, but I will concede that you (and the crowd for that matter) are right. They chose a different angle for the splash, but he's better sticking with the powerbomb and using the splash as the move he almost always misses a la DiBiase's reverse elbow and Bully Ray's senton.

The 'Fat Batista' chant at Brodus doing the powerbomb was pretty funny, though hopefully it will just be 'Fatista' in following weeks.

I liked Mongo as a Horesemen. He was perfectly fine in the Lex Luger spot of the group. There was an awkwardness to him that was almost amusing, for about 2 minutes, but that's doing a real disservice to Luger. I've said it before about the DR/EE superplex spot, but that isn't even in the Top 5 silliest bits of that match. Psychology around superplexes has been dumb for 20 years.

I fear Hunico may be toast as a performer. The guy just can't seem to round back into form since coming back from injury. He seems bloated and slow compared to what he was. Which is a shame since he was like Superstars MVP for a short time and a much better performer than Sin Cara Uno. Now he's lost that snap to his stuff and he just comes off as there. He was always better as Hunico though - I'll make a judgement when he takes the mask off.

The other matches showed that Ziggler's mini-push is done, and I also suspect WWE are phasing out the Sin Cara gimmick. They'll just try again with Samuray del Sol/Kalisto in a year I reckon.

The difference is that Layla was in the USA for years so that's probably why she went mid-Atlantic. Paige either made a conscious decision a few years ago or else was brought up to talk that way, because she sounds more or less like she did when she was in the UK. Paige is just a girl who watched too much US TV as a child/teenager. She has always talked that way from what I've seen. Possibly, but the Knight family have been preparing her since day....lots of kids in the UK watch too much US TV.

The difference is that Layla was in the USA for years so that's probably why she went mid-Atlantic. Paige either made a conscious decision a few years ago or else was brought up to talk that way, because she sounds more or less like she did when she was in the UK. There are, I believe, almost 100 guys & gals in developmental. Obviously the quality would drop, but HHH could more or less replace the entire active NXT roster next week if he needed to. I hope Danny Burch gets a push on NXT. I do wonder how much legs the Ray WInstone gimmick has; he can't call people a cunt. He can maybe just be a really dirty heel and 'use the wing as a weapon' in the trad Brit stylee, but one can't help feel his best hope on making the main show is as a minor player in the long-touted Team Britain.

He basically got to collect his downside for 2 years; they gave up on him pretty much as soon as he dropped the IC belt to Cody Rhodes in August 2011. He was probably hurt by "The" Brian Kendrick's depush a little, but really he wasn't good enough.

Happy is the man who gets to write off his fetishwear as a business expense

John Cena is still the Being John Cena Champion. I think the way they sold it was fine given HHH is HHH and the 3 way was his second match and HHH was running interference, but it would have been better if the John Cena story arc had moved somewhere last night. But alas, not to be.

No Rusev in the Battle Royal; surely he will appear tonight.

From APW King of the Indies 2001 Day 1; the first time quite a lot of people saw him I imagine.

Lesnar is apparently expected to work Extreme Rules, but even if Taker wrestles 1 or 2 more matches it surely wouldn't be that soon (Personally I think the only thing he should maybe do is an elimination tag at Survivor Series, so he can go out like he came in). So do they go straight for Bryan/Lesnar? Hard to imagine, if only because it leaves Orton and Batista in limbo. But anyone else is a roadkill surely? RVD was a tricky early opponent for Brock Lesnar (He needed Heyman to run interference at KOTR and Brock also took a DQ loss) and he is supposed to be returning, so it wouldn't surprise me if that's what we see.

It would almost be worth bringing back the laptop GM gimmick just so Heenan could do it.

I really liked it when Fillthy Animals 2.0 used it as well, back when Spice was Rey Mysterio's 'onscreen girlfriend'.

Wellness Violation era or 'Smiles on faces' if you're being particularly snarky.

Would have sucked to have been done like that, glad Liverpool pulled out the 2-1 because I did not fancy this game one bit. If Tottenham win tomorrow, 5th place doesn't feel impossible - Arsenal are a spent force.