GuerrillaMonsoon

Pretty sure my wife has offered to let me go over for my 40th. You, me, test cricket, black tar heroin and a never ending series of Penta matches?

And I think he's about to murder Travis Head

Oh I agree, the quicks are generally useless but Wood bowling in four over spells first or second change occasionally is best use rather than needing him to open the bowling for one long spell. Just asking for an injury.

If Stokes can bowl, Wood plays. Dunno if you can use him as the sole quick. Surely no way Bairstow keeps in India either

What's the schedule for 2027? If Bazball is successful in India, it's a success. For the time being I'd like to think it's a game plan that is still evolving. Don't have too many issues with it but you still need twenty wickets to win.

I had an interview with an insurer (....the one the Jets stadium is named after). Got offered the job, so I took my 13 weeks paternity leave early, thinking I'd collect two pay cheques at once. Contract took forever to arrive. We'd discussed salary, I was pretty happy with the bump. Saw the contract, they'd calculated it as being 65 hours of minimum wage a fortnight and an additional 40 hours of overtime a fortnight on top. I mean, I was probably going to do 2.5 hrs a day overtime in the role, but didn't like that it was contractually stipulated, could be used for constructive dismissal, and could fuck with my salary if they decided the overtime was no longer warranted. So I took paternity leave early for no reason, and we're really struggling to find a day care centre for when my wife goes back to work in two months. Most are either more interested in shaming us for going back to work too early (bills gotta be paid fucko), or just have no capacity. Found one that's just been built, spared no expense on the build, new centre, and it's in the shittiest part of town, and I just get the worst vibes when they keep trying to sell me on how there's a full time barista in the centre, feel as though they've overleveraged and are going to cut corners as a result. Hoping like hell one of the other centres get back to me soon.

Surely to really play it all out, the guy behind the gimmick goes on ANTIFA podcasts spruiking radical socialism and runs a commune in his spare time?

Nah, they had interim president Piper for a while after Monsoon got attacked by Vader, then Monsoon came back, and then Slaughter was the main guy in 1997. My question was whether he was still technically an authority figure from end of 92 to 97 just rarely seen and it was a continued duration. But think I've answered my own question by realising Slaughter left the company all together from 94 to 97

Yep - the Rocco stuff is really weird, in that they didn't really build LOD up to be on a losing streak or past their best (they saved that for another 6 years time), brought Ellering in, and THEN did the Rocco stuff. Hat on top of a hat on a hat. The Crush reactions are interesting in that the guy is clearly over, and you're right, the Cranium Crunch is super over when its being put on heels like The Mountie or Repo Man, and then when he keeps it on job guys after the bell, there's kids in the crowd looking really confused/disgusted at him.

Doing a rewatch of 92 Superstars and there's just so much shit thrown at the wall that just goes away and never really resolved. Some because it flat out sucks, others because shuffling chairs to accommodate guys leaving. In no real order: Kerry Von Erich reappears after Mania. The promos are weirdly religious for the WWF. You're kinda wondering where it goes. But he's gone soon after..(and then you see Bret's promo after beating Flair being very uncharacteristically God based and nope, it's just 1992). And replaced by poor KVE clone Lance Cassidy who just gets the deadest response ever. Not sure if the shitty 50s rock and roll music is overdubbed, but it doesn't seem to be and it's awful. He has a squash match with Tom Stone and nearly kills the dude with a slam off the top rope. They spend a lot of time building up to Sgt Slaughter vs The Mountie after the Mountie uses the shock stick on him. There's a few eight man tags here and there but Slaughter retires and becomes an on screen authority figure (again a weird one - this starts like after SummerSlam 92, he's on screen till about...late 93 maybe? Then never resumes the role on screen till like 97? Is it considered a continued role? He never went away for four years? Sid vs Warrior is built up for about a fortnight. Which then becomes Warrior vs Shango, which then gets dropped for Warrior vs Savage, Warrior/Savage vs Flair/Razor gets dropped with Warrior leaving, Flair leaves and at least does business with Perfect before leaving, which becomes Perfect/Luger which gets paid off a year later. Papa Shango vs Bret goes nowhere as they hot shot the title onto Bret. And I'm disappointed we didn't get refined character actor Bret Hart playing a zombie as promised. Shawn vs Bret gets sidelined after months of build up due to the last minute decision to move SummerSlam to Wembley. There's the weird little blow off ladder match on the Coliseum Video release, then Shawn beats Bulldog and we restart. There's a lot of time building up the Beverleys for the LOD feud which then becomes largely focused on Rocco instead, and then LOD leave the Beverleys high and dry. I don't recall the Beverleys being this featured as such big deals. I remember them looking like shit against the Bushwhackers at the Rumble and then just being job guys. The Jimmy Hart/Money Inc/Nasties/Disasters story is fun and a nice use of TV time. I see there's a Headshrinkers vs Nasty Boys brawl from Raw in 93 that I can't wait to watch. Crush is all over these shows and it's jarring. They initially debut him with these awful black and white vignettes of Baby Crush crushing things. His promos by today's standards feel like insincere heel but they're just inauthentic. Out of nowhere they start playing up "OH BY THE WAY DID YOU KNOW HES FROM HAWAII?" stuff. He's terrible in ring as a face. Using the head vice and keeping it on after the bell. He wrestles like a heel but does a heap of really cool athletic things like springboarding out the ring to the floor that pop the crowd along with his sweet entrance music. Why do they give this guy extended promo time when he is so awful at it? I wish we'd got more Savage/Razor in ring beyond the tag at Survivor Series.

Why are they mutually exclusive?

Didn't rate the Bairstow dismissal at all. When you compare it to mankad, at least the non-striker is attempting to gain a competitive edge. Bairstow wasn't attempting to take a run or gain any advantage. Feels very much against the spirit of the game. Also triggered - got out in a similar fashion in my last game - got hit on the hip, instinctively jogged toward square leg to try and shake it off and got run out. Don't really like the race to the bottom to see who can be the biggest cunt. The rules of the game are largely written with a view to interpretation and played within the Spirit of the Game, whatever that means to anyone, but that is becoming less and less common. Don't like that Australia do it AND still insist on having the moral high ground on lecturing the rest of the world on it.

Can Tony get the rights to the 90210 theme? Jack Perry coming out and posing under fans next to other sexy teens in their forties for an unnecessarily delayed period of time to that while his entrance video of him lounging on the top of his vintage car, playing football, and hanging out at the Peach Pit would be fucking immense. Have him finally win a title only for his agent, Andrea Zuckerman to start strike action on behalf of the SAG due to the discriminatory nature of the title defence. I want to see Hook throw a picket line inflatable rat on its head

Did I miss that or are you suggesting that? Either works for me.

I feel like they're missing a trick with the Moxley-Kingston-Claudio stuff. There's no real good kayfabe reason for Eddie to hate Claudio, and they're doing their best to tiptoe around "he didn't put me over in Chikara ten years ago". Eddie thinks Mox is blind to Claudio being a scumbag. Yet this is never really fleshed out. Something small like Claudio making faces at him over Mox's shoulder instead of just staring blankly in the background in segments. Why not tease that there is something going on, and that Mox is blind to it? That Claudio is a scumbag and maybe him and Yuta are going to fuck over Moxley, maybe it's Eddie being Eddie.

The signs were there he was going to stab Arn.

I can't stand real-life Brian Griffin Foley or Duggan. Lot to unpack apparently.

When I was nine, I met Davey Boy Smith at an autograph signing and I was really stuck for conversation filler while he signed my figurine so I asked if he used the running powerslam as a finishing move as it looked like a dog burying a bone. He looked at me really quizzically like this question hurt him to think about and then told me I was a fookin idiot. I remembered this experience when Shawn Michaels came to a Toys R Us in Australia three years later and just bowed my head and held out the store provided 8 by 10 for him to sign. I think he thought I was non verbal so he handed me an action figure still in the box instead. I found that action figure today clearing out some boxes. Davey Boy Smith was right.

"fuck off you fucking prick" indeed

I feel like there was a lot of battle royales on European shows that had a finish of DBS and two heels, miscommunication on a clothesline spot, DBS overcomes the odds and wins?

Ollie Robinson giving Khawaja that send off after Khawaja already made 140. What a fuckwit. Stick to Twitter.

Big Baller Brand Booker, Beal and Bald Spot

The show opener needed to tip it's hat to AWA and the Wrestlerock Rumble by having the Babyface and heel locker rooms song competing versions of Saturday Nights Alright For Fighting. Intersped clips of them in the studio wearing the noise cancelling headphones and fake reading glasses nailing this track down but also being fake-look how much fun we're having like Phil Collins in the Easy Lover video clip. Easy Lover should have been the theme for this show.

The spamming of surprise cameos at the end was a real not realising they're laughing at us not with us vibe. Everything that didn't have Michael Keaton on screen was a real hot mess.