JUNE 2019 WRESTLING DISCUSSION - Thread 2

[mattdangerously]

I don't want to tip-shame anyone, but the next time you eat out, keep in mind that here in 'Merica, the standard hourly wage for servers is $2.13 an hour, and has been for literally decades. And you never know what extenuating circumstances the server you have on any particular night may be going through. I've waited tables in a couple of different restaurants, and at one point, I was constantly dealing with the fact that at least one of my parents had cancer. So I may have been a little on edge. (I mean, I'm also kind of a misanthrope, so I'm not going to pretend like rainbows and unicorns were shooting out of my ass normally.) So please keep in mind how important tips are to a server's ability to make a living wage.

[DreamBroken]

Regardless of whatever heat between them, I loved the Alexa/Sasha series of matches in summer 2017. Some of my fav matches from both.

[Niners Fan in CT]

I've never had a terrible experience like @Nice Guy Eddie there were a couple times where the establishments were moving at a snail pace but it's usually a Friday night or we just out of the theater or a game and the place is packed so it's understandable. You know going in it's going to be a wait. 

But that brings me to this point.  I don't actually like getting the food or drinks too quick either because talking is at least 50% of the reason I'm there.  I don't want to have an app and then 5 minutes later to entree is on the way.  

[SirSmUgly]

Yep, people in many professions have all sorts of extenuating circumstances that might make their work performance worse. What can I say? If you want a living wage as wait staff and you don't want to unionize, then you have to work hard for the tip that you need to make your wage livable. 

I appreciate the restaurants that just raise their prices and give staff a livable wage. It's a bit of a trend in the Seattle area, and I appreciate it. I'd rather that you just bake the increased cost of giving your workers health care into whatever price it is that I'm paying for my duck confit instead of having everyone try to shame me into giving, I guess now it's 25%. 

Tom Douglas's restaurants up my way tried it by mandating a 20% gratuity for each bill, but that stopped, I think because people don't like being told what to tip. Honestly, I'd rather just pay more for the food to give workers a living wage and then tip what I think you earned via your service on top of that. 

To shift this back to wrestling, both restaurant workers and pro wrestlers should unionize, IMO. Fuck yeah, I support that. 

[odessasteps]

12 minutes ago, West Newbury Bad Boy said:

Vince’s “no wrestling during advert breaks” edict makes Nitro girls look like rocket science. 

Does that mean they dont do the Inset box showing the match on SD during ads anymore? 

[Peck]

"Patterson with the Stump Puller..." - Vince McMahon, All-Star Wrestling (4-26-80)

 

Sorry, I had to interrupt the Sasha/tipping discussion.

[SirSmUgly]

The best thing in pro wrestling right now is Contra Unit. I mean, the best thing in the wrestling that I watch.

They do all the wild '80s heel beatdown shit that I love. I would love to see them wrestle the Fantastics. 

Actually, that might be the fantasy matchup that I'd most love to see right now. 

[Niners Fan in CT]

I think the best thing in wrestling is WWE Hidden Gems.  But Contra Unit is cool. I like MLW even if I miss it some weeks. 

[odessasteps]

I would nominate 

1. Barbaro Cavernario 

2. The Studcast 

[SirSmUgly]

9 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I think the best thing in wrestling is WWE Hidden Gems.  But Contra Unit is cool. I like MLW even if I miss it some weeks. 

I started watching MLW because someone posted a Contra Unit tag match here a few weeks ago.

I'd been trying to get back into wrestling by watching New Japan on AXS, the AAA channel on Pluto, and the WoS revival on Stadium, but MLW is right up my alley. It's a nicely-paced variety show. 

I don't know much about WWE Hidden Gems, but when it comes to older wrestling stuff that I haven't seen, I'm into whatever show comes on the FIGHT channel on Pluto late nights that shows random classic wrestling bouts. I can't remember the title right now. I watched a dope Lawler/Savage cage match in Memphis the other night, they've shown some Gorgeous George stuff that I've really enjoyed, they've even showed Otto Wanz stuff from Germany that made me interested in seeing more of his stuff. 

Edited June 24, 2019 by Smelly McUgly

[Craig H]

Until AEW gets going, I would say that yeah, Contra Unit is consistently one of the best things in wrestling right now. Moxley unleashed is up there too. Re-watching the gif of GoD shitting on the ROH tag titles is also fun.

[mattdangerously]

41 minutes ago, Smelly McUgly said:

Yep, people in many professions have all sorts of extenuating circumstances that might make their work performance worse. What can I say? If you want a living wage as wait staff and you don't want to unionize, then you have to work hard for the tip that you need to make your wage livable. 

If forming a union was really that easy, then Sally Field would only have one Oscar, and wrestlers would have unionized decades ago.

[Nice Guy Eddie]

48 minutes ago, Smelly McUgly said:

Yep, people in many professions have all sorts of extenuating circumstances that might make their work performance worse. What can I say? If you want a living wage as wait staff and you don't want to unionize, then you have to work hard for the tip that you need to make your wage livable. 

I appreciate the restaurants that just raise their prices and give staff a livable wage. It's a bit of a trend in the Seattle area, and I appreciate it. I'd rather that you just bake the increased cost of giving your workers health care into whatever price it is that I'm paying for my duck confit instead of having everyone try to shame me into giving, I guess now it's 25%. 

Tom Douglas's restaurants up my way tried it by mandating a 20% gratuity for each bill, but that stopped, I think because people don't like being told what to tip. Honestly, I'd rather just pay more for the food to give workers a living wage and then tip what I think you earned via your service on top of that. 

To shift this back to wrestling, both restaurant workers and pro wrestlers should unionize, IMO. Fuck yeah, I support that. 

Scott Steiner should be the one to start the push for that.

Edited June 24, 2019 by Nice Guy Eddie

[SirSmUgly]

4 minutes ago, mattdangerously said:

If forming a union was really that easy, then Sally Field would only have one Oscar, and wrestlers would have unionized decades ago.

I didn't say that it was easy. I said that if you want commensurate pay for your labor, that's an option you have if you want to be wait staff. 

Your other options as wait staff are to be very good at customer service so that you consistently secure the tips that you need to supplement your base wage or to choose work at a restaurant that has guaranteed a living wage for staff and has somehow baked that into the menu.

And of course, you could also choose to instead enter a profession that doesn't foist the onus of providing its workers a living wage onto the customer so that you can earn what you'd like to earn. 

I guess that "try to get me to give you 25% gratuity on each order I make no matter the service because you really, really need it" is another option, but I wouldn't suggest that it's your best option. 

2 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Scott Steiner should be the one to start the push for that.

Eh, I'ma need to see what he pays the staff at Shoney's first. There's got to be a better wrestler-turned-restaurateur out there to do this. What does Abdullah pay at his restaurant?

 

[clintthecrippler]

Watching Crockett Cup 86 this past week and then WWE Stomping Grounds tonight, it finally dawned on me and I put two-and-two together.

Baron Corbin is to 2019 WWE what Black Bart is to 1986 JCP.

He is a perfectly fine heel wrestler to have floating around the lower edges of the midcard and be a JTTS.

But holy shit, no one wants to pay money to see him in the main event, even if his purpose is just to get beat up and lose.

Baron Corbin being in the main event scene despite the most stacked talent roster in terms of in-ring work would be like if Magnum TA didn't have the car wreck, won the NWA World Title at Starrcade 86, and his first challenger instead of Flair, Tully, Arn, or Nikita, was fucking Black Bart.

 

[Nice Guy Eddie]

7 minutes ago, Smelly McUgly said:

I didn't say that it was easy. I said that if you want commensurate pay for your labor, that's an option you have if you want to be wait staff. 

Your other options as wait staff are to be very good at customer service so that you consistently secure the tips that you need to supplement your base wage or to choose work at a restaurant that has guaranteed a living wage for staff and has somehow baked that into the menu.

And of course, you could also choose to instead enter a profession that doesn't foist the onus of providing its workers a living wage onto the customer so that you can earn what you'd like to earn. 

I guess that "try to get me to give you 25% gratuity on each order I make no matter the service because you really, really need it" is another option, but I wouldn't suggest that it's your best option. 

Eh, I'ma need to see what he pays the staff at Shoney's first. There's got to be a better wrestler-turned-restaurateur out there to do this. What does Abdullah pay at his restaurant?

 

I wasn't serious about Scott Steiner pushing to start a union. Jokes don't translate well to text. Abby doesn't pay anything because his House of Ribs & Hepatitis is closed.

Edited June 24, 2019 by Nice Guy Eddie

[SirSmUgly]

2 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

I wasn't serious about Scott Steiner pushing to start a union. Jokes don't translate well to text. Abby doesn't pay anything because his restaurant is closed.

I knew you were joking, breh, and joked back a bit, but I didn't know that Abby's restaurant was closed.

I've only been to ATL once in my life, and never got around to going there. That bums me the hell out. 

[southofheavy]

As long as Scott Steiner comes into my bar and straightens out middle-aged white boys who take the phrase "No, we don't have Coors Lite" like a bat to the fucking skull and middle-aged white women from the suburbs who can't handle the world "No" period, he can lead the charge and I'll follow him into the breach any day of the goddamn week. 

Take it from a pro wrestling fan and a bartender: Y'all really don't have a damn clue how exactly punishing this job can really be. I take a lot of pride in what I do, I enjoy what I do, and I bust my fucking ass. I work four nights a week and make great money. I get to leave work at home. There's a lot of pluses to working in this industry and I'm not ignorant of that, by far. 

At the same time, I get no paid time off. No insurance. If I want to take a vacation, there's paying for it, and then there's losing money on top of it by taking the time off. I'm on my feet up to ten hours straight with no break and in the process of serving one customer, I get hit with something to do by two or three others. Then there's dealing with customer expectations, drunks, assholes, coworkers, bosses, etc. People have a sense of entitlement and flex their "power" over me in a lot of subtle fashions, on top of controlling my wages, despite their shitty behavior. That's regardless of whether they're aware of it or not. Also, I'm not a woman. I ain't got shit to complain about compared to them. 

To sum it up: We're workers, just like you. This is a REAL job. It's one of the realest jobs you can have, and the fact that I don't have to have a degree to do it and I have to serve people doesn't make it any less legitimate. Never get that twisted and never fucking flex your power over me, because straight up, we're all in the same boat. We're on the same side, and most of us are trying really goddamn hard, a lot of times against circumstances you have no experience with or a goddamn clue about. 

Don't come at me about unskilled labor, either. You come back behind my bar and make a burger and fries while cracking six beers and making eight shots and cashing out Keno and not fuck any single one of those things up. Do it for ten hours straight. Then get some shit  about "You don't smile" or, well, anything, really. It sucks just as much or more as the job you hate and the boss you wanna backhand in the teeth. I'm right there with you. 

Bottom line is, a lot of the problems can be solved with this: The best thing on the menu is you reading it and making a fucking decision. 

Yes, there are some maniacs in my line of work, and some of us do suck. They don't last long. The rest of us take care of the rest and far more than you know every damn day. And we come in to your job and make it real fucking easy on you. 

Don't be Jim Cornette. Be Daniel Bryan. 

And if you sit down at my bar and say "Genichiro Tenryu", I'm buying you a round. 

 

Edited June 24, 2019 by southofheavy

[southofheavy]

P.S. I'm about to watch Daniel Bryan lock horns with Dozer and I'm stoked. 

Professional wrestling is the goddamn greatest. 

Edited June 24, 2019 by southofheavy

[OSJ]

4 hours ago, Smelly McUgly said:

I knew you were joking, breh, and joked back a bit, but I didn't know that Abby's restaurant was closed.

I've only been to ATL once in my life, and never got around to going there. That bums me the hell out. 

The food wasn't that good, the place was a converted 7-11 or other convenience store from the look of the interior. It was also in a really sketchy part of town, so bad that cabs would not be dispatched there after dark (as we discovered when we tried to get back to the hotel). It was a memorable evening although the great man himself wasn't there (I use "great" in all senses). Our party of twelve included the convention's Art Guest of Honor (we were on hand for the World Horror Con), and Alan had a midnight presentation to do, fortunately a cabbie stopped in for some grub and agreed to take five of us back to the hotel (and why not, it was like a $40 fare!) That left seven of us stuck at Abdullah's with no way to get anywhere. To the rescue, the lovely Asian woman who was the hostess (and turned out to be Mrs. Abdullah), offered to give us a ride in the Abdullah van if we didn't mind dropping off the cook and dishwasher first. Hell no, any ride's a good ride! We made it back to the hotel and mentioned that there was a party the next evening and we would be delighted if ABdullah would come as our guest, gave her our room number and figured a 80% chance of hearing from him as wrestlers tend to respond well to free food and drinks. 

Sure enough, next day about noon the phone rang and it was the great man himself, Kathy was the one that talked to him and he asked if he could bring a couple of friends, Cactus Jack and Teddy Long. She said of course, the more the merrier and told me he kept calling her "sweetie" and had an oddly high-pitched voice for such a big guy. Well party time came and I went outside to meet the trio when they showed up, wouldn't you know it, they no-showed...

 

RIP Abdullah's House of Ribs and Chinese Food, the world needs more places where you can get fried chicken gizzards, babyback ribs and a plate of chow mein.

Edited June 24, 2019 by OSJ

[The Natural]

1 hour ago, L_W_P said:

Corbin will win the title here.

Just like Sheamus 'accidentally' winning and Alexa Bliss 'getting lucky' in a table match, Rollins will slip and Corbin will win the title in a fluke.

We're on the same wavelength. I referred to those earlier.

[Casey]

I’m the biggest Rollins mark on this board by a long shot, but... man, he’s not doing himself any favors with his tweets about WWE having the best wrestling on the planet.

[LoneWolf&Subs]

3 minutes ago, Casey said:

I’m the biggest Rollins mark on this board by a long shot, but... man, he’s not doing himself any favors with his tweets about WWE having the best wrestling on the planet.

Then he corrected himself as the best wrestler on the planet. Listen dude...

 

...

 

...Davey Richards is still alive.

[The Natural]

10 minutes ago, Casey said:

I’m the biggest Rollins mark on this board by a long shot, but... man, he’s not doing himself any favors with his tweets about WWE having the best wrestling on the planet.

I honestly spat my drink out when I read Seth Rollins' tweets:

Fuck off, Seth.

Edited June 24, 2019 by The Natural

[AxB]

No, he's selling it short. Seth Rollins matches are the best pro-wrestling matches in the whole universe.

The WWE Universe, that is. In terms of planet Earth, nah. Someone alive who can do what Seth does, as well as he does, as often as he does? OK. Will Ospreay.