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FEBRUARY WRESTLING DISCUSSION


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I wish they would have ran with the "Punk as a freelancer and being the WWE champion" angle a little more than they did. But I realize that was a farfetched idea from the beginning, we're lucky we got the Comic-Con thing.

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I think the whole problem with the whole Summer of Punk angle was that it all peaked too quick.  The climax (MITB PPV) happened within two weeks of it all starting, and there really nowhere to go but down from there.

 

The whole thing would have worked better if the title tournament had been a month long thing to build up its importance, and the final was held at SummerSlam.  THEN when John Cena wins, you have Punk come out to set up the next show.  The two have their rematch at the next PPV, Punk wins, you avoid HHH getting involved and you continue on from where it ended up going. 

 

WWE fucked it up by INSISTING that Del Rio HAD to be champion.  That pretty much derailed any momentum, since no matter what happened, that had to be the endgame.

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I think the whole problem with the whole Summer of Punk angle was that it all peaked too quick.  The climax (MITB PPV) happened within two weeks of it all starting, and there really nowhere to go but down from there.

 

The whole thing would have worked better if the title tournament had been a month long thing to build up its importance, and the final was held at SummerSlam.  THEN when John Cena wins, you have Punk come out to set up the next show.  The two have their rematch at the next PPV, Punk wins, you avoid HHH getting involved and you continue on from where it ended up going. 

 

WWE fucked it up by INSISTING that Del Rio HAD to be champion.  That pretty much derailed any momentum, since no matter what happened, that had to be the endgame.

 

 

Even though I agree the title tournament should have taken longer, not having Punk around while he was so hot would have been a mistake too, hence why everything was so rushed.

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I still for the life of me will never understand how one of the WWE's hottest angles in the past 10 years turned into a storyline that in just a few months became focused on HHH.

 

 

HHH latching himself on to hot angles and killing it dead isn't something new. If anything, everyone should have saw it coming.

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Has Mick Foley ever talked about steroids?  Just watched the "Loser Leaves Town" match he had with Eric Embry in World Class and he's 250 lbs, if that.  There was a period not long after that (mostly in WCW) where he seemed bigger every time I saw him.  At the time, I assumed he was taking something. 

 

Later, in the WWE, he kept getting bigger still, but that seemed more flab than mass.  He seemed to be putting on weight in those days.  In WCW, he seemed to be adding mass.

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Has Mick Foley ever talked about steroids?  Just watched the "Loser Leaves Town" match he had with Eric Embry in World Class and he's 250 lbs, if that.  There was a period not long after that (mostly in WCW) where he seemed bigger every time I saw him.  At the time, I assumed he was taking something. 

 

Later, in the WWE, he kept getting bigger still, but that seemed more flab than mass.  He seemed to be putting on weight in those days.  In WCW, he seemed to be adding mass.

Need pics for this one. I always thought he had the body of one of my aunt's.

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Has Mick Foley ever talked about steroids?  Just watched the "Loser Leaves Town" match he had with Eric Embry in World Class and he's 250 lbs, if that.  There was a period not long after that (mostly in WCW) where he seemed bigger every time I saw him.  At the time, I assumed he was taking something. 

 

Later, in the WWE, he kept getting bigger still, but that seemed more flab than mass.  He seemed to be putting on weight in those days.  In WCW, he seemed to be adding mass.

 

Mick talks about being traveling with Abdullah the Butcher in 'Have a Nice Day' at the time you are talking about and their time spent at the dinner table could be termed 'enthusiastic'.  He says he got up to 300 pounds before getting back into his normal working weight of around 260 in WWE.

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Wasnt Mike Awesome Related to Hogan? I remember reading that in an Apter Mag when he was on top in ECW.If he was as closely related to him as Horace Hogan was Awesome mighta got pushed alot harder and sooner than he did.

I had always thought Awesome was a Laurinautis.(no way I spelled that correctly )

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Mike Awesome is related to Hulk Hogan through marriage.

 

According to Meltzer, one of Awesome's aunts married Hulk Hogan's brother.  This aunt and brother had a son, who grew up to wrestle as "Horace Hogan."  So Awesome and Horace Hogan would have been cousins,  Awesome's father wasn't a Hogan, so Hogan's brother (Horace's father) was technically an uncle-in-law.

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I think the whole problem with the whole Summer of Punk angle was that it all peaked too quick.  The climax (MITB PPV) happened within two weeks of it all starting, and there really nowhere to go but down from there.

WWE fucked it up by INSISTING that Del Rio HAD to be champion.  That pretty much derailed any momentum, since no matter what happened, that had to be the endgame.
They Burried Del Rio by having him drop the strap back to Cena a few weeks later, at least Del Rio still has a littler steam winning the 40 man RR 8 months prior only to be a transitional champion 2 twice in a span of months. i dont think he every full recovered, If they werent going to give Del Rio a decent Push at that time It make them look even stupider buy taking the strap of Punk.

One of my favorite moments of the Summer of Punk was Rey winning the title and his match with Cena later that night after MiTB

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Whatever happened to Horace anyway?  He was so great in FMW, with his constant stream of profanity.

 

According to Wiki and Cagematch he hasn't had a match since 2002, apparently some dark matches for WWE. I never even knew that he had a developmental deal after WCW closed, to be honest. If I did, I forgot.

 

 

After reading your post, I watched Horace/Awesome/Oya vs. Headhunters and Leatherface from FMW. I really enjoyed the match, though I don't know that it isn't only because I've really only had time to watch current WWE lately. It was a brawl around the stadium, full of fat guys and weapons shots, so it might have been nice just to see something different for the first time in a while (full disclosure: I watched Impact two weeks ago from Scotland since I happned to be home on a Thursday night).

 

Anyway, it made me realize that I really have not watched enough nor do I have enough knowledge about FMW. Especially for someone who enjoys that style of match. Any recommendations/essential viewing?

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The problem with the Summer of Punk angle is that the beginning of the angle was so good. The angle really struck a chord and got so over. It attracted so much mainstream attention. I doubt anyone predicted that would happen and CM Punk was going to explode in popularity like he did. Remember the video Punk did where he showed up at Comic-Con to taunt HHH with the belt? No doubt they had more of those types of things planned.

The only problem is that the WWE's a business. They have to make money. They had to bring Punk back for SummerSlam since he was a huge draw, as opposed to him holding the title hostage until he was forced to come back for whatever reason.

The angle got rushed and they had to change it up. I thought that was pretty obvious from the start. It then got super complicated and Nash was terrible.

I also think it was pretty obvious Punk's first interview was set up to introduce Big Johnny as a character who was going to eventually con his way into power.

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Ask about FMW in the puro forum.  Bahu will hook you up.

 

In general, I enjoyed mid-90's FMW quite a bit.  Before the mid-90's, it tends to be all Onita, All the Time working the deatmatches against guys like Mr. Pogo.  Not much workrate there.  In the mid-90's, it starts to open up a bit and you get things like the Funk Masters of Wrestling (heel group led by Terry Funk).  Then the focus starts to shift to Hayabusa more, you get things like the awesome (and seemingly never-ending) Hayabusa-Gannosuke feud, Masata Tanaka rises up the card, etc.

 

Late 90's, you hit the Onita heel turn (complete with Bret Hart tribute tights), The rise of Gannosuke as a top heel, and finally Team No Respect.  No Respect might be my favorite heel faction not the 80's Four Horsemen,

 

After Team No Respect, the promotion turned fully towards sports entertainment and gleefully rocketed itself into oblivion, so the last few years are fairly skippable.

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And I also think they learned the lesson from the Summer of Punk with The YES! Movement stuff. It's a different structure because, in a way, the Summer of Punk angle BEGAN with the payoff (him beating Cena in Chicago). But the Bryan angle is a traditional chase -- underdog babyface keeps getting screwed out of chances to win the title, but continues to gain popularity as he continues the chase.

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