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YOUR ALL-NEW WRESTLING BOOK THREAD


OSJ

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On 3/18/2018 at 11:27 AM, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Pure Dynamite is my favorite wrestling book, but Liam's Pillman book now sits firmly in the #2 spot.

For total amount of historical data, I give it to Yohe for the Strangler Lewis book, for subject matter I'll go with Pure Dynamite, as Billington was one of my "don't miss a single match" guys and watching him live in little joints in Seattle and Portland was amazing. However, for being remarkably well-written and by far the biggest bang for the buck, Liam takes it with his Pillman book! I've written and edited a whole lot of books, and being somewhat egotistical, I break down other books into three groups: (#3). I'm glad I didn't write that! Covers about 90% of stuff. (#2). I could have written that. Covers about 90% of the 10% that 's left. (#1). I wish I had written that! In this case covers 99% of the rather minuscule 10% that was left. Finally, I don't even assign a number to this group because they are so rare, but these are "I don't think I could've written that on my best day!" I don't give that shit up very often, but Liam's book floats between there and #1 depending on what sort of mood I'm in. Well done, my friend, well done, indeed!

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10 hours ago, C.S. said:

You guys act like there were only shitty models during that era, but there were some good wrestlers too. I agree, though - there were definitely more shitty models than good wrestlers.

In AJ's book, she talked about how frustrating it was to be passionate about wrestling because that was seemingly used against her.

One of the biggest problems was that the women who were actually good wrestlers didn't get much of an opportunity to show it. I was thinking of this when I heard that Lisa Moretti was going into the WWE HOF, between GLOW, POW, and WWE what a horrible waste of a great talent. I'm grateful for what we did get to see, but damn it, she could have done so much more if allowed to. For fuck's sake she was trained by Mando Guerrero, poor gal was born twenty or thirty years too early. Imagine what she'd be doing today if she were 26 or 36, not 56.

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4 hours ago, Casey said:

That's not how you spell Beth Phoenix and Natalya.

They were betters acts and characters than LayCool? (Which is what I said.)

Not even close.

Better wrestlers? Yes, of course. (Although I always found McCool to be pretty decent in the ring - at least for the standards of the time.)

 

3 hours ago, Victator said:

I kinda poke fun at them during that time. But some were good and the others worked hard. Even the models who stayed worked hard. So anything I say is in good fun. 

A lot of AJ Lee's stuff comes across as hollow with how she buried anyone she worked with. Actions say more than words. 

How did AJ bury people? Do you mean her so-called "pipe bomb" promo, or something else?

I'm pretty sure that was just a way of highlighting Total Divas and creating a storyline between her and them.

'Course, she and Punk seemed to have a perpetual chip on their shoulders, so it wouldn't surprise me in the least if she really did consider herself "above" the other women (which is both understandable and arrogant).

 

3 hours ago, OSJ said:

One of the biggest problems was that the women who were actually good wrestlers didn't get much of an opportunity to show it. I was thinking of this when I heard that Lisa Moretti was going into the WWE HOF, between GLOW, POW, and WWE what a horrible waste of a great talent. I'm grateful for what we did get to see, but damn it, she could have done so much more if allowed to. For fuck's sake she was trained by Mando Guerrero, poor gal was born twenty or thirty years too early. Imagine what she'd be doing today if she were 26 or 36, not 56.

Agreed. Ivory was criminally wasted.

So was Molly Holly.

Ironically, Molly is inducting Ivory into the HOF. I imagine they probably related to being pushed aside.

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5 minutes ago, Casey said:

LayCool were cookie cutter generic prima donna Diva gimmicks. I saw nothing special in that act, besides their chemistry, but Phoenix and Natalya has good chemistry too.

Yet, half of the women today would benefit exponentially if they had characters as defined as LayCool was. "Generic" would describe them far more than LayCool IMO.

Anyway, how the hell did I become the sole defender of Lay-frickin'-Cool on this board? :lol: I doubt I put as much thought into them when they were actually around. I did like their "mean girls" heel act though.

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9 hours ago, C.S. said:

How did AJ bury people? Do you mean her so-called "pipe bomb" promo, or something else?

I'm pretty sure that was just a way of highlighting Total Divas and creating a storyline between her and them.

'Course, she and Punk seemed to have a perpetual chip on their shoulders, so it wouldn't surprise me in the least if she really did consider herself "above" the other women (which is both understandable and arrogant).

The promos and matches almost always made the other party look bad. I don't think she considered it burying. But when every promo is about how shitty your opponents are and you beat them convincingly, you are 2003 Triple H. 

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Hope nobody minds a cheeky plug for my new book Purodyssey: A Tokyo Wrestling Diary. Blurb's below and you can get it in print and Kindle at Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07C8L3DFG or on your local Amazon). 

purodysseykindlecoverfinal.jpg

Quote

Twenty years after his first voyages to watch wrestling abroad, writer John Lister finally made it to Tokyo. Purodyssey shares the experience of seeing 14 shows from 11 promotions in just eight days, visiting venues from the Tokyo Dome to a converted pharmacy. It also details encountering Japanese culture in person for the first time.

The book also includes a comprehensive yet concise guide to the practicalities of visiting Tokyo for wrestling, including ticket buying, transport and key Japanese phrases.

About the Author:

John Lister is a professional freelance writer who has been writing for wrestling publications since 1990. Author of Slamthology and Turning The Tables: The Story Of Extreme Championship Wrestling, he formerly worked for Power Slam and The Fight Network and is now a regular contributor to Fighting Spirit Magazine.

 

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1 hour ago, JNLister said:

Hope nobody minds a cheeky plug for my new book Purodyssey: A Tokyo Wrestling Diary. Blurb's below and you can get it in print and Kindle at Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07C8L3DFG or on your local Amazon). 

purodysseykindlecoverfinal.jpg

 

John's book is also on Kindle Unlimited in case that gets some folks off the fence...

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I found a bunch of books on Amazon for a kindle I will be getting soon but was wondering if they were worth it as I didn't see too many of them mentioned, although I could have missed that so dear posters, how are these?

Tony Atlas

Eric Bischoff

Gary Michael Cappetta

Bill DeMott

Jerry Jarrett

Bruno lauer

Steve Lombardi

Bobby Vlaze

Adrian Street (any of them)

Lance Storm

Dr. Death Steve Williams

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2 hours ago, davekool666 said:

I found a bunch of books on Amazon for a kindle I will be getting soon but was wondering if they were worth it as I didn't see too many of them mentioned, although I could have missed that so dear posters, how are these?

Tony Atlas

Eric Bischoff

Gary Michael Cappetta

Bill DeMott

Jerry Jarrett

Bruno lauer

Steve Lombardi

Bobby Vlaze

Adrian Street (any of them)

Lance Storm

Dr. Death Steve Williams

Bischoff's was okay, but keep in mind it was written while he was still in the E, so you're not going to get a whole lot that hasn't been said already, no deep secrets.

I didn't care for Cappetta's, he just put himself over as the best announcer ever the whole time. I'm not a fan of his, so that made it worse for me.

Laurer's was mostly stores of road trips and him being a gofer for Sid, it's....hit or miss. The chapter about the crash with Joey Marella is pretty depressing.

 

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6 hours ago, davekool666 said:

I found a bunch of books on Amazon for a kindle I will be getting soon but was wondering if they were worth it as I didn't see too many of them mentioned, although I could have missed that so dear posters, how are these?

Tony Atlas

Eric Bischoff

Gary Michael Cappetta

Bill DeMott

Jerry Jarrett

Bruno lauer

Steve Lombardi

Bobby Vlaze

Adrian Street (any of them)

Lance Storm

Dr. Death Steve Williams

Out of this list, the only ones I've read are Cappetta and Bischoff.

I'll go against the consensus on this board (so far) and say that I personally consider the Cappetta book one of the best wrestling books I've ever read. Unlike the Bischoff book, Cappetta's career was over by this point and he had no reason to hold anything back. He's honest without being sleazy.

Bischoff's book is like being stuck at a boring corporate board meeting, and as others have already pointed out, you aren't going to get much from it because it was written while he was still in the E.

Warning: Lombardi's book only works on tablets (Fire or otherwise) because it's a literal re-creation of what the physical book looks like. It will not work on a traditional e-ink Kindle. Very stupid.

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On 3/27/2018 at 10:10 PM, Victator said:

I enjoyed the Cappetta book. The story about Undertaker and Buzz Sawyer was a real glimpse into Undertaker as a person. I did not agree with him on everything, but you can say that about anyone. 

Was it the story about how Taker paid Buzz to train him and they only had one session where Buzz taught him how to lock-up before Buzz skipped town with all of Taker's money?

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On 3/27/2018 at 1:28 PM, JNLister said:

Hope nobody minds a cheeky plug for my new book Purodyssey: A Tokyo Wrestling Diary. Blurb's below and you can get it in print and Kindle at Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07C8L3DFG or on your local Amazon). 

Thanks. I see it's available through Kindle Unlimited, so I've borrowed it. Sounds like a lot of fun.

BTW, speaking of KU, I just finished Jeanie Clarke's book. It's mostly about her massive drug problem, so it's quite depressing. The only difference between Jeanie Clarke and Melanie Pillman as parents is that Jeanie's kids still like her.

The book's page count is padded with a lot of by-the-numbers recaps of Austin's career.

Austin never physically abused Jeanie - or at least there's no mention of it in the book - but there are a lot of other tidbits about Austin and others.

I'll spoiler tag them, in case people are interested in reading this. All in all, despite the depressing subject matter, there are some good tidbits. (This sentence is repeated at the end because the board is refusing to let me edit anything after the spoiler tags.)

 
  • Jeanie's mother was an alcoholic and they grew up poor and constantly on the move.
  • Chris Adams slept around and did drugs, which led to the end of their marriage - but they remained great friends, which is how they were able to work together in wrestling later on.
  • Jeanie was great friends with Gino Hernandez, did drugs with him, and found him "asleep" in the apartment but did nothing more than knock on the door. She didn't want to call the police ahead of time because they'd find his drugs. He was dead.
  • Adams forced Austin to cancel another booking, only to stiff Austin on a payoff - promising $100 but delivering only $40. Austin never trusted Adam again and cost Adams a spot in WCW. (The WWF wasn't mentioned, but I'll assume the same pattern was repeated there.)
  • Dusty named her Lady Blossom because her breasts were blossoming out of her blouse.
  • The Iceman and "Don't let your tea get stone cold" stories are repeated here.
  • Austin 3:16 was an angry response to Jeanie Clarke's newfound religious beliefs, or at the very least, he got the idea from a religious shirt Clarke made.
  • Austin was a huge mama's boy and didn't tell his mother he split from his previous wife, was with Jeanie, and Jeanie was about to have a baby until the day before the baby was born.
  • Austin's mother was a controlling bitch who never fully liked or trusted Jeanie. Austin was too timid to stand up to her.
  • With that said, he agreed against his mother's wishes to a church wedding and to be baptized. During the Baptism, he slipped and fell, and the entire church laughed at him.
  • Jeanie spiraled into drugs after they moved to a secluded Texas house and she felt trapped, caged, and had no friends or family to turn to.
  • Jim Ross once remarked that Austin should "keep that young woman in the kitchen."
  • Austin neglected Jeanie to hang out with his neighbors - two massive racists who used the n-word, hated Mexicans, etc.
  • Those same neighbors tried to kidnap the kids from Jeanie and bring them back to Austin.
  • Eventually, Jeanie moved them away to England. Austin barely made an effort to call on birthdays, holidays, etc. Basically, he became a deadbeat dad.
  • Debra was a controlling bitch, and Austin seemed afraid to trigger her temper.
  • Adams died. Toni died. Everyone was dead.
  • Jeanie had a major drug problem. Her kids finally got her help.
  • The book has lots of quotes from WCCW and WCW personalities - Terri Runnels, Terry Garvin Simms, but not Terry Bollea.

All in all, despite the depressing subject matter, there are some good tidbits.

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10 hours ago, cwoy2j said:

Was it the story about how Taker paid Buzz to train him and they only had one session where Buzz taught him how to lock-up before Buzz skipped town with all of Taker's money?

Yeah and Taker had to share a locker room with him in WCW. So he is keeping his distance because he wants to murder Sawyer. I think he said it out right. 

But WCW was his big break and he did not want to get fired. Sawyer was fired anyway so the problem solved itself. 

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I liked Eric Bishoffs book. So much has been written about WCWs demise that it was interesting to hear his side of it. Not saying I agree with every decision he made but I feel having read it I understand his logic behind many of his decisions  

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12 hours ago, Victator said:

Yeah and Taker had to share a locker room with him in WCW. So he is keeping his distance because he wants to murder Sawyer. I think he said it out right. 

But WCW was his big break and he did not want to get fired. Sawyer was fired anyway so the problem solved itself. 

I totally forgot that Taker was in WCW at the same time as Sawyer.

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I think he was there way longer than a lot of us realize.  I remember going to a WCW house show in the LA Forum in January of 1991 - this would have probably been the first show I went to live as a kid - and Buzz Sawyer worked a dark match.  Kevin Sullivan was watching from in front of the curtain and wearing a pink izod shirt with the alligator and shit that totally killed his gimmick to me as a kid.

Looking at the results, a guy named Johnny Payne Sawyer wrestled a different dark match - was this Buzz doing an appearance to get a relative a look?  IIRC they announced that guy from Bad Street USA for some reason.

It was weird going to a show then and having three dark matches of guys that weren't on TV and the only one that ever was being Buzz Sawyer.

 

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Re-reading Capetta's right now, and it has a decent amount of backstage type stuff(Haven't gotten to WCW yet) about (W)WWF and indy bookings and the contrast between Vince Sr. and JR. If you can get it relatively cheap I'd say its a fun read. Not in the best, but certainly not the worst either. This thread prompted to re-read Dynamites and the Stampede book.  In Dynamite's he doesn't come across as that bad too me. Maybe its just in the way he tells it, playing down his faults in the situations(like the Rougueas) and acting like a victim. Bitter, sure but not as bad as he was. When read back to back, you read more about his abusive ways, and the roid rages that he had and the domestic stuff as well. Not disputing Pure Dynamite's quality, but you need the other book for a balanced picture of the man. Not that you admire the man described in Pure Dynamite, but its far from a complete picture of the asshole he was/became.

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