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[SEPT 2019] WRESTLING DISCUSSION


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2 minutes ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I don't know how rich they were back in whatever it was 2004 or whatever. I don't think it was until the mid-2000s were they started to earn most of their wealth.  They were wealthy but I would have the say the McMahon family was wealthier than them during the 90s, McMahon was already a billionaire by what 2000. 

Vince was a billionaire right after going public, but the stock dropped a ton in the mid-00's and he wasn't close to it until a few years ago.

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Just now, Brian Fowler said:

Grace called pro wrestling performance art, and, at the risk of pissing people off, I can't come up with any way to say that's not true.

I was thinking about that but also when Seth was getting into shit about him being the best performer and she chimed in sarcastically with who is the best at fake wrestling or something to that effect hours later. That was more eye popping to me than the performance art stuff. If it was coming from someone who wasn't wrestling in promotions people have heard of or just a fan I probably wouldn't bat an eye. But if you're attitude is well my profession is fake so I mean nothing matters really, that shouldn't really sit well with anyone. This is coming from someone who may be pushed in the future. Why should I give a fuck about her now if she don't care? That Kevin Nash (I'm just picking a name as it could be any number of the past too cool for the room guys from the past) "well it's all fake bud" nonchalant attitude is off putting. I'm not saying you do what Seth did, but um, don't call your profession phony.

11 minutes ago, odessasteps said:

I wonder if Ronda would have gotten as popular if Gina had continued to fight and not make film(s). 

She probably would have been more famous if she beat Gina first rather than Cyborg. Gina was an ok fighter, but between magically making catchweights specifically designed for her and being a fairly one dimensional muay thai fighter larger than everyone else, she would have got trounced sooner rather than later. Gina knew that was the end of the line.

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I agree actors don't treat their profession like "ahh it's just movies, it's just green screen,  who gives a fuck."   They get together and throw huge elaborate banquet dinners and award ceremonies to celebrate the art and then someone is presented an award and they are up there crying giving their speech and everyone in the actors section of the audience is clapping/crying and looking like this is the most important fucking thing that's ever happened.  

If wrestlers are going to view their art as dumb fake bullshit that's an issue. Why would anyone else take them seriously if the performers themselves think it's dumb. I'm not saying wrestlers should go on Twitter and discuss it like we discussed The Wages of Fear in film class but I've always been someone who thinks of wrestling more as an art rather than Hornswaggle and poop jokes.  

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1 minute ago, Niners Fan in CT said:

I agree actors don't treat their profession like "ahh it's just movies, it's just green screen,  who gives a fuck."   They get together and throw huge elaborate banquet dinners and award ceremonies to celebrate the art and then someone is presented an award and they are up there crying giving their speech and everyone in the actors section of the audience is clapping/crying and looking like this is the most important fucking thing that's ever happened.  

If wrestlers are going to view their art as dumb fake bullshit that's an issue. Why would anyone else take them seriously if the performers themselves think it's dumb. I'm not saying wrestlers should go on Twitter and discuss it like we discussed The Wages of Fear in film class but I've always been someone who thinks of wrestling more as an art rather than Hornswaggle and poop jokes.  

If Bill Goddamn Goldberg went on Leno in 1998 and told everyone "well it's just all fake and me and Terry Bollea are great friends in real life. Steve Austin seems like he would be fun to hang out with", how much steam would come off of him in terms of him being a superstar? Imagine Steve Austin doing the same and telling everyone on Regis and Kathie Lee that Vince is a swell guy and he hugs him everytime WWF has their Christmas party. People would tune out in droves.

Jordynne Grace is suppose to be this imposing giant powerful female wrestler. She could be a superstar if she was booked correctly. However, her attitude is indicative (from what I've seen as a casual fan which is important if you want convert casuals into hardcores) that she has no aspiration to be one. She wants to wrestle, get paid, and go home. Nothing wrong with that, but we're having a much larger discussion about why that might be problematic. After All In, I was cheering for her. Now..knowing what I know, if I accidently turn on Impact on AXS one day and see her, she is "I'm a phony wrestler doing performance art" lady now. I didn't put that label on her. She did.

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The irony of the whole Jordynne Grace stuff is that for someone “playing a character”, she isn’t even in the top 5 female characters in Impact.

Tessa, Taya, Rosemary, Madison and Alisha are all far more rounded and well played ‘characters’ and none of them are on social media admitting to playing a part.

Impact for all its flaws, and there are thousands of flaws, does give their wrestlers chances to develop their gimmicks.  

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23 minutes ago, odessasteps said:

I wonder what either Tully or Magnum would say if Tessa wrote she was just an actress playing a part. 

What's funny is she might be someone who might do that. As much as someone like Cornette loves Tessa and might hate a Jordynne Grace, she's probably just as bad. She's a self admitted music theater nerd who wrestles men (including her boyfriend) from time to time. Not to drag @Craig H into this but I believe I saw him say she had heat with someone and that's why she isn't in WWE. From what I've seen, she seems like the biggest genuine sweetheart in the world who doesn't strike me as someone who would have the stomach with some of the bullshit commonly associated with pro wrestling rather than having heat with someone. So if she said she was an actress or some variant like Jordynne did, I wouldn't be that shocked even if she comes from a wrestling family. It doesn't feel like she's being forced into wrestling because of her last name or that she would be doing something else if it paid better like a Jordynne Grace, but I think she does want to march to the beat of her own drum and have a social life outside of wrestling. If you work for WWE or now AEW to be fair, that wouldn't be in the cards.

Edited by Elsalvajeloco
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2 minutes ago, Archibald said:

I don't really disagree with what he said nor do I have anything to add, but I was surprised how well spoken he is? He took rather complicated subject, didn't dump it down and managed to explain in few minutes it very clearly.

A little off topic, but I listen to a bunch of black political podcasts. There is one I listen to where the host (I guess that's the right term but he usually does the program by himself) is clearly a former or current pro wrestling fan. The one guy he frequently references is Al Snow, his philosophy on the wrestling business, and how Al Snow is that guy who constantly tries protect the business and keeps unwanted people out. I know a lot of people probably don't like him, but his reputation definitely precedes him because he is the LAST GUY I would think be brought on some of the stuff I listen to. It's fucking out of left field.

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I feel like Al was one of the great misused guys of his era. He had mic skills, a fair amount of charisma, could work a variety of styles, came across extremely likable on Tough Enough... But never really got above lower midcard.

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Though ironically, Al Snow is all over YouTube effectively shooting on and exposing the business. Funnily enough, I agree with a lot of what he says on the videos regarding working finishes etc.

His point around 'experience' is all very nice; Dunning-Kruger comes into play here and it is very easy to underestimate exactly what is athletically and, dare I say theatrically, involved in doing professional wrestling with a decent amount of competence. This is true. And it is also very easy to arrogantly question stuff like WWE booking when you don't really don't (want to) understand the machinations - but that isn't a phenomenon particularly unique to professional wrestling.

The truth is, as much as Al Snow might like us to pretend otherwise, in 2019 there really isn't anything about pro wrestling we don't know know - yes, there's a certain lived experience most of us don't have and maybe we'd be slightly more respectful if we did, but in 2019 I no longer think the hardcore internet fan is so much the problem.

As per below, I think it's interesting in the UK scene that there is a kind of settlement between the fans and the wrestlers where it is accepted that they collectively make the show. I'm not sure to what extent Al Snow would approve. It clearly requires a lot of humility, frankly, on the part of the talent, who train for years, watch what they eat, travel all around the country etc for minimal payoffs - to play a part in a collective creation they share with a bunch of smelly incels (though that's not completely true thesedays tbf). I could well see how it might grate tbh. But the UK actually has a wrestling scene which, although stylistically different to the 60s/70s golden era and in some respects technically inferior, I think 'the boys' can legitimately be proud of.

Cara Noir (The flavour of the month on the UK scene, Dean's a fan) is "performed by Thomas Dawkins" and coaching service offerings are a front and centre part of his website. As long as he commits to the role (which he does) when he's doing the show, that's fine - and tbh, that isn't actually much different from what Al Snow talks about in his training seminars. Kayfabe outside the business hadn't really been as effective as people liked to pretend for a good while anyway.                                                                                

(Edit: And no, I don't think Grace should be quite so undermining.....but if an actor went on Twitter and went on about how they were the absolute best and noone could touch them, then they'd get mocked by their peers and everyone else too)

Video on "Art & Wrestling" - (No embedding allowed apparently)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aal7c2KmBgo 

Additional: Where I can get 'a bit Jim Cornette' is with regards to TV. A TV audience is not co-creating the show in the way a live audience might be; there are things that can work in terms of the live crowd that you shouldn't put on TV - and WWE house shows do also reflect that.
 

Edited by ComingToAmerica
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I don't know what year some of you are living in, but Kim Kardashian has spent a large part of her time recently working to free unjustly imprisoned black people and reform the criminal justice system. She actually helped to free several prisoners (17 within a three-month period this year) and she went to talk to POTUS about it while the political establishment of the left spent the last two and a half years wringing their hands and accomplishing their usual nothing.

The Kardashians also revolutionized the way that women's bodies are presented in media - thicker women are in style now, in stark contrast to the heroin-chic models that had been dominating the fashion industry for decades. You can't open up Instagram or Snapchat without seeing their influence. Kim is absolutely a feminist icon and there are a LOT of young women that would make that argument - whose opinions on feminism, by the way, are far more relevant than the opinions of any dude, let alone one pontificating on a wrestling message board.

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There's a lot of women who would argue strongly the other way of course, and the way women's bodies are presented in media is still largely in alignment with the male gaze - if anything the preference for thicker women reinforces that (not that I really mind tbh), and there's no way the Kardashians are wholly or even primarily responsible for that.

But anyway, you can read https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1280&context=hcoltheses if you want to read a young woman actually try to formulate a solid opinion on the issue. Yasss!

 

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12 minutes ago, MORELOCK said:

I don't know what year some of you are living in, but Kim Kardashian has spent a large part of her time recently working to free unjustly imprisoned black people and reform the criminal justice system. She actually helped to free several prisoners (17 within a three-month period this year) and she went to talk to POTUS about it while the political establishment of the left spent the last two and a half years wringing their hands and accomplishing their usual nothing.

The Kardashians also revolutionized the way that women's bodies are presented in media - thicker women are in style now, in stark contrast to the heroin-chic models that had been dominating the fashion industry for decades. You can't open up Instagram or Snapchat without seeing their influence. Kim is absolutely a feminist icon and there are a LOT of young women that would make that argument - whose opinions on feminism, by the way, are far more relevant than the opinions of any dude, let alone one pontificating on a wrestling message board.

I would not go as far with some of that (especially the thicker women stuff), but I will say that the media has helped rebrand a lot of what surrounds them and they've successfully parlayed that somewhat. 

Also, many celebs who are left leaning went to the WH or met those affiliated with Trump at least to discuss imprisonment of certain people and been proactive. Just because a few people get released doesn't change around mass incarceration. I'm not calling what Kim did a PR stunt, but she isn't exactly Michelle Alexander. That's above her pay grade.

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This seems like a fun disaster the more that comes out. Regarding the ambulance stuff and New Japan's show in New York. Who the hell would want to run in NYC after something like this?

Quote

The short version of the story as to why the New Japan show last night at the Hammerstein Ballroom started 90 minutes late, the ambulance story is pretty much legit, but it's far more than that. The company that usually provides ambulances for the building was called the morning of the show to say it was canceled.  Those backstage found out at about 5:30 p.m. and ended up getting an FDNY ambulance to the building in time for the show to start.  The Athletic Commission rep said that if there was a shooting nearby the ambulance would have to leave and wouldn't accept it or allow the show to go on.  A second FDNY ambulance came but it was the same story.  Two other ambulances ended up being brought in so at one point there were four ambulances there.  At this point the two FDNY ones left since the commission wouldn't accept them.  Then somebody tried to tell one of the ambulances (a commission person) that two weren't needed and one of the others could go, but those associated with the show asked, what if somebody needed an ambulance and thus, with only one, there wouldn't be one there, and the commission said they would have to stop the show at that point until the ambulance got back.  So they kept two.  They also had four doctors, three more than necessary, on their own including one that spoke Japanese.  At the time the video played, the two ambulances were there but the commission would not allow the show to start until they were in the back of the building and a stretcher was in the building, as they were in the front of the building when they wanted to start the show and were told they couldn't.  NJPW was also told the barricade couldn't be used to throw wrestlers in, no fighting outside the ring, no tables and no blading.  For union reasons, the show was supposed to end by 11 p.m. but we're told even with rushing the show, NJPW decided to run overtime even with the added cost.

 

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I am not sure that promoting the WWE to Fox with the Fiend randomly showing up at the end of commercials is a great idea but it can't be any worse than the other ways it has been done.  That Cooper manning segment with Carmella and R-Truth was pretty cring worthy

Although having the Fiend show up during Fox and Friends is probably fine because if anyone is used to handling imaginary Boogeyman it would be a Fox and Friends watcher

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2 minutes ago, Ryan said:

This seems like a fun disaster the more that comes out. Regarding the ambulance stuff and New Japan's show in New York. Who the hell would want to run in NYC after something like this?

 

1. I like how ANYONE can call and say a show is canceled and no one actually confirm this person is who they say they are.

2. Most smaller MMA shows are like this. There  have been several times I've seen on like a LFA show where they have to pause an entire card for like 15-20 minutes so the ambulance can go to the hospital and then get back. And we're not even talking about NYC. We're talking about a casino on an Indian reservation in like Minnesota or Wisconsin or Oklahoma in the middle of nowhere.

3. The NY state commission is notoriously anal. It's not just New York City.

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52 minutes ago, Ryan said:

This seems like a fun disaster the more that comes out. Regarding the ambulance stuff and New Japan's show in New York. Who the hell would want to run in NYC after something like this?

 

So the whole “No fighting outside the ring”. Do they mean outside the ring area, or the outside the ring period?

Edited by LoneWolf&Subs
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2 hours ago, MORELOCK said:

I don't know what year some of you are living in, but Kim Kardashian has spent a large part of her time recently working to free unjustly imprisoned black people and reform the criminal justice system. She actually helped to free several prisoners (17 within a three-month period this year) and she went to talk to POTUS about it while the political establishment of the left spent the last two and a half years wringing their hands and accomplishing their usual nothing.

The Kardashians also revolutionized the way that women's bodies are presented in media - thicker women are in style now, in stark contrast to the heroin-chic models that had been dominating the fashion industry for decades. You can't open up Instagram or Snapchat without seeing their influence. Kim is absolutely a feminist icon and there are a LOT of young women that would make that argument - whose opinions on feminism, by the way, are far more relevant than the opinions of any dude, let alone one pontificating on a wrestling message board.

Kim K has nothing to do with thicker women being in vogue. First, a lot of the body positivity talk is a façade. Second, Kim's figure was mostly given to her by a cosmetic surgeon. That's not an indictment on her, just the truth. Third, saying she popularized fuller figures opens a major can of worms. Queen Latifah has been a celebrity with a plus-size figure for around 30 years, for starters. And she's a hell of a lot more talented/respected.

I'm going to put it out here: the Kardashians/Jenners co-opt Black culture and reap the benefits without dealing with the tribulations of being Black.

Kris Jenner took Kim's sex tape and turn it into a commodity on which to build the family empire. Kim was just the means to the end.

Kim has done good work with helping wrongfully imprisoned people get released, but many more do the same thing without the fanfare. That's not on her, because we as a society cling to celebrity any chance we get. But for large sections of us, she's not a revered figure and for good reason.

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1 minute ago, Burgundy LaRue said:

Kim K has nothing to do with thicker women being in vogue. First, a lot of the body positivity talk is a façade. Second, Kim's figure was mostly given to her by a cosmetic surgeon. That's not an indictment on her, just the truth. Third, saying she popularized fuller figures opens a major can of worms. Queen Latifah has been a celebrity with a plus-size figure for around 30 years, for starters. And she's a hell of a lot more talented/respected.

I'm going to put it out here: the Kardashians/Jenners co-opt Black culture and reap the benefits without dealing with the tribulations of being Black.

Kris Jenner took Kim's sex tape and turn it into a commodity on which to build the family empire. Kim was just the means to the end.

Kim has done good work with helping wrongfully imprisoned people get released, but many more do the same thing without the fanfare. That's not on her, because we as a society cling to celebrity any chance we get. But for large sections of us, she's not a revered figure and for good reason.

When I think full figured woman, I think of Ashley Graham or Marquita Pring or Tabria Majors. Kim is like 5 feet tall with wide hips and skinny to average legs. She is built like a wish bone. If anything, it's more about helping people get past cosmetic surgery shaming...which I just did I guess.

My bad. *shrugs shoulders*

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6 hours ago, Elsalvajeloco said:

What's funny is she might be someone who might do that. As much as someone like Cornette loves Tessa and might hate a Jordynne Grace, she's probably just as bad. She's a self admitted music theater nerd who wrestles men (including her boyfriend) from time to time. Not to drag @Craig H into this but I believe I saw him say she had heat with someone and that's why she isn't in WWE. From what I've seen, she seems like the biggest genuine sweetheart in the world who doesn't strike me as someone who would have the stomach with some of the bullshit commonly associated with pro wrestling rather than having heat with someone. So if she said she was an actress or some variant like Jordynne did, I wouldn't be that shocked even if she comes from a wrestling family. It doesn't feel like she's being forced into wrestling because of her last name or that she would be doing something else if it paid better like a Jordynne Grace, but I think she does want to march to the beat of her own drum and have a social life outside of wrestling. If you work for WWE or now AEW to be fair, that wouldn't be in the cards.

Wasn't me. I think I may have asked why WWE missed on her in NXT and someone else may have said that though.

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