Hagan

I hung out with Shelton Benjamin in a strip club. Nice guy. Also got drunk with Eric Watts from Tough Enough at 'Mania a few years back. He sat talking to my table for a while. Said, I quote, "fuck the pussy. I'm gonna sit and talk wrestling. I'm a fan like you guys." This is the problem with modern wrestling.

I don't see it ever being a story one way or the other. If they hired him, it would never be acknowledged at all. It might be a mainstream news story for like two days or so but nothing that would drudge back up the scandal. On another note, I watched the last few JBL and Cole Shows (with Renee Young). Pretty funny stuff. I find it hilarious that basically for as much as they push the online stuff on TV, it exists in a completely different universe from the TV shows.

Dave and Bryan's porn/vibrator discussion was something.

it's interesting how diplomatic Austin is. I don't think I've heard him legitimately shit on someone yet.

Just finished the 50 Years of WWE. That is one awkwardly put together piece. The pre-expansion stuff is really good (including a trip to Larry Land), but then the narrative definitely gets wonky. Extraordinarily odd segment on Owen's death. Not that he doesn't deserve more exposure and honors, but his death is almost framed as being the "end of the Attitude Era," which definitely isn't the case.

Apparently the international market can't handle the 3Birds. I'm really enjoying Luke Harpers's work. Nice fucking Michinoku Driver there.

Yeah, I'm probably ignorant of this but didn't the RnR's basically invent the "face-in-peril, hot tag, house of fire" routine? Or, at the very least, they basically perfected it. And considering that it's the layout of every tag match ever, that should say something. It's weird, both teams are so linked together. I mean, shit...the RnRs were awesome in SMW against the Bodies too

Listening to Cornette's podcast made me wonder what's the reason for the Midnights being the Observer HOF and not the RnR Express? I mean, I'm sure it's been argued to death in various places but I wonder if there was a just a commonly held assumption. Is it just that Cornette as manager puts the Express over the top?

True, but there's always the "one time too many." I was flabbergasted when so many people supported him over the Jon Jones thing, but he seems to have gotten a lot of media backlash over his behavior after this one. And since I'm typing, I honestly don't know how to fix the scoring. You can't do Pride-style because that's going to put way too much emphasis on the last bit of the fight, and it allows for far too much emotion. Half-points can work but it starts getting wonky with that. Even the 10-8 or 10-7 is ineffective with just a short round fight. Let's say a guy just knows he gets a 10-7 round in the first round. You think he's going to stay aggressive? You can't get rid of rounds (though that would solve the issue). I guess we need open scoring, but I just see this system as so entrenched. But yeah, I would have given Johnny the first round, but how can you say a 5 round split-decision, where a contender loses two rounds fairly clearly to the champ (who inherently gets the benefit of the doubt), is an outrage? "Oh man, it's a fucking bullshit that Johnny didn't win this very narrow, closely fought fight."

Just finished the Slayer interview. Decent, but was hoping for crazier metal stories. Punk on Maron was pretty good, though limited by Maron's lack of wrestling knowledge. Nothing on it that you didn't get from Punk's DVD or other profiles but entertaining. We need Punk on Austin to really delve into the cool shit. Konnan's had some fun shit recently with Alvarez and Mark Madden on. Madden had a dumb talking point about how the two guys that know most about wrestling are Jim Cornette and Jim Ross don't have jobs. Literally, who do people think that Jim Ross and Jim Cornette would put in main event spots? Do you really think that guys that look like John Cena, Randy Orton and the Big Show aren't your main eventers, especially as all three are charismatic (Orton in a, uh, more subtle way) and are great at WWE-style wrestling. There's this weird thing that being fired from WWE if you're in creative automatically means you're a genius, or that being released by them means you're an awesome wrestler. I tried with Cornette's. I dunno. He's entertaining to hear talk but that is a negative, angry dude about everything. His story about being thrown out of Canada was really funny though. I'm afraid he's going to turn into an Ole Anderson-type where he just shits on wrestling all the time. Actually, I think it might have been on another podcast but his whole rant against Santino Marella was absurd. His whole thing about "if I was a guy walking around with a puppet on my hand as a joke, I'd kill myself. And that's all Santino will ever be known for," makes me doubt how much Cornette really knows about wrestling. The point of the game is to draw money, get over, entertain the crowd, and not kill yourself and your opponent. Marella's this generation's HTM or Hacksaw. He's done better than like Matt Morgan.

With the random shout out to Jarrett on Raw, it got me to thinking who are the living stars or even well-known mid-card guys, who legitimately have a bridge burnt with WWE? Even guys who were so anti-WWE a few years ago and bashing everyone like Road Dog and Billy Gunn came back. Of course, Bruno made peace. Warrior is inevitably going to be in the HOF. Mickie was persona non grata a few years back and they brought her back this week. Sable came back. Heyman was damn near thrown out of Titan Towers and he came back for another run. Hogan's probably coming back. So, who is never getting even a cameo on a DVD? Really, it seems like maybe Chyna might be the only one. Maybe Jim Cornette too, though I assume he'll show up on the Network at some point. I could imagine various ways that Jeff Jarrett ends up with a Legends Deal. I guess, Ken Anderson is pretty much blackballed but he was never really much of a star. So, is there any other star that is completely shit out of luck on ever being back in some fashion? Also, who do you think the next "Hell has frozen over" comeback is? Aside from Warrior and Hogan.

I think I give the first round to Johnny, but honestly it's such a toss-up. It's a 10-10 round. The real loser in all this is Dana White. He basically came across as a less eloquent Don King. I firmly welcome more fighters letting him know that they're in charge, not him. Not that UFC isn't doing fantastic, but with all the various issues happening you wonder when he'll say or do the wrong thing one too many times.

Incredible main event. Holy shit. Rey didn't look good running, though. Loved Dolph's Double J strut (as well as shouting out Jarrett on Twitter after the match). This company is so weird. The tippy-top guys aren't really getting as much TV time as all the guys they (probably correctly) feel aren't PPV draws. Weird.

Dolphins vs Bucs. It's a terrible match-up, though with the Incognito scandal it may get a bump from it being a "news" event. I hate handicap matches.

Late to the party, but just watched the Fit Finlay doc. Incredible stuff.

This should be memorized by everyone. I hate all the talk about who is or isn't a draw, or who sells merch or doesn't sell merch. For a long time, the most-watched match in wrestling history was The Mean Street Posse vs The Stooges. It doesn't mean that Patterson/Brisco were bigger stars than Steve Austin. Seriously, the worst thing about the Monday Night Wars* was it caused fans to give a shit about quarter-hour ratings. Now people seem to base whether or not a guy is good or not, or whether he is entertaining or not, on if his quarter hour numbers gained 800,000 viewers. "I mean, I personally enjoy Daniel Bryan but his quarter-hours are flat. BACK TO THE MID-CARD TO YOU SIR." *aside from all the dead guys, the loss of an authentic number 2 promotion, and the existence of Vince Russo, of course

The New Japan/WCW thing was pretty much the main push for that Starrcade. It was all over the TV. WCW did a great job of introducing wrestlers to foreigners, or at least acknowleding that other countries had professional wrestling as well. Let's not forget the WCW/NJPW Supershow in the early 90s.

I see Reigns are the eventual babyface. Dude has that Batista vibe. He needs a moment where Hunter/Orton and the rest of The Shield are just beating the holy hell out of some babyface and Reigns bucks up instead of putting the coup de gras on the guy.

I just don't see Shawn vs Bryan actually happening. What it does look like is we have Orton vs Big Show and Cena vs Del Rio as our main event feuds for the next few months, Bryan/Punk vs the Wyatt's, and Goldie/Cody rotating against the tag rooster. The last two are perfectly fine but that's a stale top of the card (to say the least). Show has been great in this role, though.

The issue is that at this point the idea that beating HHH (if it happens) is a bigger deal than winning the WWE title. Even if it happens (and that's a long way away), what's Bryan going to do between now and then? And, honestly, we're about a few months away from a lot of big names and part-timers returning for the 'Mania push. I mean, any way this leads to Shawn and Bryan?

They did a non-finish last month just to have THAT finish. Man...that's no good at all. Tag match was the bees knees and Punk had a satisfying blowoff. I guess Punk moves back into the title scene. Honestly, if Bryan gets the title it'll be next year. And, I'll freely admit, they've fucked this up. Just a shame they blew a clean Cena job by getting way too convoluted in their story-telling. The idea of this being HHH's white hummer angle is right on. Where this should have been a simple case of plucky underdog babyface overcoming the odds and vanquishing the top heel wrestler and heel boss has now become this incomprehensible drama that involves the boss's best friend, a broke giant, the boss's wife, the boss's father-in-law, and, tangibly, five or six other heels and babyfaces rotating in and out, as well as bizarre shots at wrestlers who aren't even in the company and/or are retired. I mean, I don't think THEY even realized they were actually just doing a long-build for the fucking Big Show challenging for the belt. That's where we are right now.

WWE coverage is behind the paywall. That kind of sucks.

I've never seen the issues with that Hogan match. I mean, if it's 1986, it's like the best Hogan match ever. Were they supposed to go shoot-style? Michaels bumped like a pinball for him. Hogan was, of course, terribly broken down but still was twice Shawn's size so it wasn't that odd for him to be over-selling. Shawn oversold for EVERYONE. Now, the promo the next night was bullshit but that's a more complex issue. Unrelated: randomly just watched the Raw is Eddy Tribute. SO depressed.

Oh, and I love JBL but they need to reign him in. Him going off on random yelling tangents isn't doing anyone any favors. They need to pull a season 4 Eastbound and throw in a quick-witted babyface on there to bury him for a segment for all the stupid shit he's done in his career. Someone just needs to mention that "Always Pounding Ass" t-shirt.

Zeb bringing back Shoo Baby was awesome. Cena hype video got me pumped up, so it worked. And holy fuck was that last segment overbooked. I mean, can someone just point out in a promo that this whole angle began when Bryan beat Cena, who they're basically hyping as the resurrected Christ, clean in the middle of the ring? I get that heels are inherently delusional but the babyfaces and the announcers are treating it like Bryan is the underdog. He's basically beat Randy Orton EVERY SINGLE TIME they've fought this year (Pedigree aside). Orton might be the first heel to ever not be intimidated going into the Cell against a babyface. I mean, Bryan is getting the belt and is probably going to have a length CM Punk-type run while the tippy-top guys do whatever they do, which I'm more than okay with because he'll be able to have tremendous, lengthy title matches, but this angle has been so fucking backwards. They DID tease a Hunter/Bryan match, so that's something.