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I am not sure the best place to put this but I thought @DEANand the other oldies may get a kick out of it. My dad has been telling me stories for literally my entire life about the time he went to a Cowboys/Colts game back in 1981 in Baltimore, that it was freezing cold and they couldn't see shit because their seats were so low that the players standing blocked their view. He used this gaming experience to refuse to ever go to another national sporting event, a grudge he still holds to this day. I was tasked with scanning hundreds of pictures his (recently passed) mother had in shoeboxes, and I found two pictures from the game. At least he wasn't exaggerating about the view. Imagine what seats this low would cost in 2022.

Lucky is the gal who Has a couple sons who'll Share a bank account With their old mommmmm! They! Are! Fam! Ly! Guyyyysss!

I read it as Punk’s legal team discovering they had a way to go after Colt’s mom and using that to bully Cabana/Colton into dropping the lawsuit.

Going to the WWE show in Oakland today. I'm excited. live wrestling! Yay!

It was, but at the same time I wonder if that was the intention of the comment. I kind of read it as Colt talking a lot of shit about legal action and when Punk threatened the same in return, Colt then brought up the shared bank account as a reason to dissuade Punk from it. Maybe I just interpreted it wrong. The whole thing just seems very odd. The Elite seem like a pack of spoilt brats who like to talk shit and Punk seems like a guy who can't handle that sort of thing anymore and has zero tact. I don't condone the rant and what follows, but looking at things from his perspective, as an actual major star coming in, he could have been the stereptype of a guy who only works main events, never loses and never shows weakness, but he's worked with younger talent, made them look good and has brought new eyes to the product while outwardly promoting a positive image of the company. If he'd genuinely tried to be the team player and then this shit started, I could see why that as a guy already known for having a quick temper, that this might set that off. The Bucks have openly said that they push people's buttons to get a response, going back to the Booker T thing over a decade ago. Or the shit they used to do on Twitter, but they do strike me as guys who really don't like it when people bite back at them as well.

That's the whole point, though, right? If Japanese people want to eat "authentic" Chinese food they can go to Yokohama or Kobe or Nagasaki's Chinatown areas. Or they can go to China. In America, they are straight up looking for deep-fried, sauce-smothered American style Chinese food. That's something they can't easily get in Japan. Also, everyone who visits Japan should try Japanese style Chinese food, particularly Osho's gyoza, chili shrimp, and mabo tofu (not a spelling error). It's fantastic.

Even if they could google the names on some sort of factual basis, the lingo is what would get them. Wrestlers have their own carny but so do we.

I want AEW to change Kenny Omega's gimmick into a zombie now he has been bitten and have the Elite and Kenny bite people to turn them into zombies. They can culiminate with a big 10 man tag at the show nearest to Halloween.

Best match in AEW history. *****.

Stokely said a lot of things, who could keep track?

Not sure if this should go here or in the main thread, but Malakai Black issued a statement on instagram concerning his current situation- “All. Firstly thank you all for your messages, know they are being read and appreciated. With all the turmoil going on in the landscape of Professional Wrestling I took the time to think of my words but also needed to wait until conversations between mine and AEW’s camp had come to a conclusion. Firstly, I dislike reading parts of my private conversations between myself and AEW in regards to my mental well being on the internet. These conversations were private and not meant to be shared with the public. As by now most people realize I am a very private person and do not feel the need to have stuff like this out on the internet. If you’ve been following me longer than a cup of coffee you’re aware I’ve spoken about them prior but would like to be the one deciding when this finds it’s way to the public and not through someone else’s mouth, as with anything through the lips of someone else: that story gets distorted. Secondly, to be in line with the above, they also need context: I did indeed ask for my release, the last 2 years of my life have lended to a lot of set backs. Both me and my wife have been affected by uncontrollable actions from the outside that resulted in loss of life, medical set backs, career jeopardizing, the suicide of a close friend and a close family member almost losing their life, then experiencing an injury that I was sure was the end of my career. I spend every week going through several sessions of rehab, dry needling and therapy just to be able to walk and compete. Now this being the tip of the iceberg and with the combination of the promises in my professional field that were not upheld which resulted as a combination of all of these to a complete demoralization of life and career. This decision had been in my mind for the past six months. It’s hard to really put a finger and say ‘this was the moment it all went wrong.’ But I can tell you after many years that I have learned from a rational point of view to see when I need to hit the breaks; which is what this is. Perhaps once my mind settles on certain things and processes the last 2 years a bit better I will convey (via a different platform than written out) what the exacts were that happened, and have a more informed conversation about them. For now know that I am good, and am taking, for the first time in 22 years, a few months to recalibrate the last 2 decades of my life. Lastly, I have read a few narratives online in regards to my ‘release’, mental health and my personal life that I can summarize swiftly; if it didn’t come from me, it didn’t happen. Stuff about conditional releases, stuff in my marriage or using said mental health to leverage the other when as I said before that part wasn’t even going to be part of the public conversation are false. My marriage is fine, I am fine. It is just time to make sure those things stay that way. Once again, I appreciate your support and we will see each other soon enough. MB”

Halloween Havoc 1996 notes: Dean Malenko/Rey Misterio Jr. is a wonderful opener, though you don't need me to tell you that. They work in some nice wrinkles and counters that are clearly based on each wrestler knowing the other a bit better based on past matchups. That's one of my favorite pro wrestling tropes and it isn't used consistently enough. The transition into the second Malenko control segment is a good example because Malenko has been headscissored out of the position that he's in about a billion times before, but this time, he sees it coming and uses Misterio's momentum to hit a side slam instead. They also got me on a 2.9 sequence at the end that was really well-worked. The actual finish was amazing - both guys countered each others' killer moves (the top-rope gutbuster for Malenko, the top-rope rana for Misterio), and Malenko improvised a top-rope powerbomb that he'd never used before to get the win and the gold. Awesome, awesome match. The crowd is initially hot for DDP/Eddy, and it's good to see. Then, after the initial brawling, they start working holds. Things quiet down. They needed more brawling and bombs early because I think they got over the blood nature of this feud successfully. Working headlocks, even with both guys working for counters and struggles, probably wasn't the right way to go. You've got two guys with explosive offense and a heel in DDP who is a fantastic stooge. Then again, what do I sound like telling a top-10 pro wrestler ever and a guy who'd go somewhere on my top-100 list how to work their match? I will say again that it's clever how Nick Patrick's favoring of DDP in a string of matches over the past few weeks ends up mattering narratively; I can't remember if it's stated outright or merely implied, but Hall and Nash leaned on him to be favorable to DDP to try and sway him to join the nWo when the time came. DDP almost fucks it up by pushing Patrick, but he makes up with him by shaking hands. It's a quality spot. DDP's offense is so good that it's turning him face. He probably needed to tone it down a shade because he's such a good scumbag, but then he hits a nice lariat or gutbuster or pancake, and the crowd is like "that guy is nice." I also dig his in-ring vocalizing. I feel like DDP doesn't get enough flowers. Eddy does, as he should, and his selling and bumping during DDP's control segment really puts across how dangerous DDP's offense is. It's so dangerous, in fact, that we don't get a late reversal-fest and DDP doesn't have to finagle it onto Eddy. He just escalates his endgame offense until all that's left is to hit a Diamond Cutter for three. Someone wins a monster truck. Randy Savage does the drawing himself. He does a drumroll and is really locked into being the best promotional person ever for a guy who has been traumatized by his ex-wife trying to reconcile with him these last few weeks. He flirts with the winner in an attempt to get a ride in her newly-won truck. Savage is the BEST, and you all know this, but yeah. He's so great. What a showman. You know who's not a showman? Dean Malenko. He cuts a victory promo that is the downer to the Macho Man's upper. The Giant is more over as a face than Jeff Jarrett. Having Flair come out to support Jarrett at ringside was a canny move to try and cut this reaction off, but it didn't quite work. It doesn't help that the Giant looks awesome in launching Jarrett a couple times, including on an impressive-looking beal. I just think Jarrett past the age of like 22 is a natural heel (though again, Single Dad Jarrett is low-key one of the most sympathetic faces ever). Flair yelling at Jarrett to get up and beat the Giant's ass is pretty great, though. Jarrett works his ass off bumping and selling and throwing some very high dropkicks to the Giant's face on his comebacks. There's a fuck finish, but it's fine. I actually think it sets up future Jarrett and Flair matches for The Giant nicely. Jarrett/Giant should be the final matchup for the now-vacated U.S. Championship if the booking gets right. Ted DiBiase cutting interviews with nWo members in the crowd, standing under an nWo banner, is a great visual. I love that this stairwell with the nWo banner is not only an interview location, but that the nWo enters coming down the stairs. Syxx/Jericho is as good as you might imagine. The early exchanges are worked at Smackdown: Know Your Role-type speed and look great, but Syxx actually works like a mean heel too, whipping Jericho into the rail and mudhole stomping. He's not out here to the the most athletic athlete ever as a heel. We get a bunch of shots of the Dungeon of Doom in the crowd; the Dungeon shouldn't still exist. They are pointless in late-1996 WCW. Kevin Sullivan being on TV in October of 1996 is absurd. Anyway, I totally dig Syxx's heel control segment, and when he relinquishes control to Jericho, it's with a wild corner bump off a whiff. Dusty uses the term slobberknocker on commentary. The only issue with this match is Nick Patrick slow-counting all Jericho's pin attempts so that Syxx can kick out, but efficiently making the count on a Syxx spin kick. Syxx got hammered right in the face at some point and is bleeding in his mouth. Great match that deserved better than a shitty heel ref angle at the end. Luger cuts this wonderful, dumb fiery babyface promo in which he uses gardening metaphors effectively. PUT THE BIG GOLD ON HIM ALREADY His match with Arn Anderson is interesting. Arn just wants to beat Luger up, but Luger specifically wants to destroy Arn with the Torture Rack, so he targets Arn's back. It's fascinating because usually, these strategies would be reversed based on the face-heel alignment. Arn ends up attacking Luger's back solely out of prudence once Luger eats an Arn spinebuster and sells his own back injury. Eventually, Luger destroys Arn's back with a chair on a ref bump, but that's cool since Arn did the same to Luger on a Nitro a couple weeks before this one. Luger gets a submission off the Torture Rack, but Luger takes a little extra time to let Arn go, to the delight of the Dungeon of Doom and most of the rest of the crowd. Good stuff. I love WCW-ass WCW matchups. They're part of what makes WCW a special thing. Faces of Fear vs. Mongo and Benoit is one such matchup. Meng and Mongo have a shoulder block war! Barbarian and Benoit beat the shit out of each other! Jimmy Hart, Woman, and Debra are the best seconds a pro wrestler could ever ask for! Man, when pro wrestling is good it's good. I wish we could get Meng and Mongo as a tag team and also in a buddy cop movie where they uncover corruption in the force and then beat up a bunch of rogue cops and then somehow both win dual mayorship of the city and led it into a new age of prosperity. Anyway, Mongo's successful Halliburton shenanigans and a Benoit headbutt put paid to Meng. The Dungeon jump out of the crowd and beat up the Horsemen. Benoit fights valiantly, but falls to the numbers game. Arn, Flair, and Jarrett are nowhere to be seen after Arn's stretcher job from the last match. It's a good segment in a vacuum, but Sullivan/Benoit/Nancy is a weak angle. In the alternate universe where Pillman re-signs with WCW and doesn't roll his vehicle, we'd have a much better situation because Pillman would have been good enough to carry a decent feud with Sullivan. Hall and Nash get Diesel and Razor chants against Harlem Heat. Boy, the crowd wants them to be tag champs so badly. As we start this match, Tony notes that Savage was way more chipper than normal recently during the monster truck drawing and is hopeful that it means that Savage is focused. I'm so glad someone said something about Savage's mood being incongruent with how he'd been acting the past few weeks! I liked this match because it observes three C's of wrestling that, when applied together, I am very into: clubbering, cheating, and cocky taunting. Sherri slaps Hall, who kisses her in response, and it gets a massive RAZOR chant and Tony saying "Well, she asked for it," and I am overwhelmed with the very good, the bad, the pro wrestling-ness of it all. Stevie Ray gets a hot tag that wins the crowd over once he throws Hall at Nash. The crowd's into the Harlem Hangover, too, but Parker getting unnecessarily involved and giving his cane up to Nash for what ends up being a tainted Outsider victory is great, too, and pays off Harlem Heat not wanting Parker to join the management team. This was - you're not going to believe I think this - a fantastic match. Hogan's got his ridiculous hairpiece in and says YO YO YO, so I guess he gets that he sucks and that he needs to lean into his corniness. He shills a bunch of bad movies that he's in before his match with Savage. At least now he's a heel who steals other people's catchphrases instead of a face. I should probably appreciate a stalling cowardly heel act more than I do. Maybe it depends on the stalling cowardly heel. I mean, Hogan is acting like a dorky, out-of-touch coward, as he should. Maybe I just never want to see this guy again? Maybe watching his putrid WCW face run (the first one) was too much for me? I don't know. The crowd is hot for it! The flaw is in me, I think. You know what's not flawed? Savage shilling for Slim Jim on his tights. His Halloween-themed tights. Liz comes down to the ring wearing a dress that is well-cut, so that's also something! I guess my lusting over Elizabeth's lovely bust is a sinful feeling that needs to be repaid with celestial punishment because not five minutes after she comes down, Hogan hangs a full moon when Savage pulls his tights down. I deserved it for going fully Smellynetico. Anyway, the crowd is hot, but I do not like this match or any of the bullshit Liz-involved shenanigans therein. I guess Steve Austin saw Nick Patrick refuse to count three and decided to knock out and make the ref count three himself if it ever came to that, so at least that's something. OH NO, RODDY PIPER ? FUCK FUUUUUUUUUUCK This show made me want to play some WCW/nWo Revenge, so I think I will.

@Dolfan in NYC

User name and avatar combo checks out.

@Dolfan in NYC right now

Jose Aldo has retired from MMA. sad to see him go. his WEC run was absolutely legendary. https://www.mmafighting.com/2022/9/18/23359417/jose-aldo-retires-from-mma-released-from-ufc-contract

It's the third incarnation of WOW! Since 2000, many things have happened in the development of Women's Wrestling in the United States. Fit Finlay trained Divas to actually wrestle and transformed a hideous sideshow into a legit wrestling division. The WWE dabbled in bringing in some of the best of Japanese Women's Pro Wrestling. And in the last decade, the US indies have nurtured and produced some of the best pro wrestlers to grace the squared circle. In 2000, WOW was a slight response to the sleazy bullshit the WWE putting out while also being the standard bearer of the Fabulous Moolah/Judy Martin style of women's wrestling- as Bambi, who was trained by fuckin JOYCE GRABLE, and Peggy Lee Leather, who was trained by the Fabulous Moolah, trained a bunch of strippers and models to wrestle like women would wrestle in the 1970s. Thus it was good basic wrestling that created a couple of good matches between the constant hair beels and monkey flips. The second incarnation was more of an ode to the IMPACT! KnockOuts division- with Thunder Rosa, Giselle Shaw, Kiera Hogan, Harlow O'Hara, Willow Nightingale, JesSICKa, Nikita Lyons and Tessa Blanchard. Blanchard had some really good matches and there were some other pretty good matches, as the rest of the burgeoning roster were on the cusp of being good and would prosper in the next couple of years in AEW (Thunder Rosa, Kiera Hogan, Willow Nightingale) and especially IMPACT! (Giselle Shaw, Kiera Hogan, JesSICKa)- and Nikita Lyons, who has really blossomed in NXT. Then AXS decided to cut it's non IMPACT! wrestling and Tessa Blanchard went insane and now- HERE WE ARE! The third incarnation. They have some kind of deal with CBS so who knows how long this will be on the air. Will this be a breeding ground for AEW, IMPACT! and WWE like the last incarnation or has the big companies already figured out how to get the most talented under contract now? LET'S WATCH! I will try to figure out who is who under the awful WOW gimmick. David McLane is still there giving out the hilariously dated gimmicks, but he also likes good in-ring action so he is a mixed blessing. The Tonga Twins! Oh man, cagematch.net is not helping me out. I don't recognize these gals so HERE WE GO! Randy Rah Rah isn't 45 years old, so she is the new Nise Randy Rah Rah! I'm glad David McLane still has the teenage boys and 37 year old virgins of America's fantasies at the heart of his gimmicks. Though a 45 year old in a cheerleader outfit would be a possibly different demographic. Chantilly Chella is Ray Lin of Blond Force Trauma. I wonder if Heather Monroe will show up at some point. Either way, this is three folks I am seeing for the first time. Chella is the first face in peril of the NEW ERA! Randy Rah Rah is great as our Robert Gibson. She's fun! Tonga Twins with TWIN WRECKED EM! Twins with a Samoan Drop for the win over Randy Rah Rah. RANDI RAH RAH! That was good. Okay, Coach Campanelli is my new favorite of the NEW ERA! Kandi Krush had a very dramatic video introduction. Coach IS Larry Zbysko stalling early! This is very NXT 2.0-level matches. Nobody is doing anything they don't know they are sure they can pull off. Coach works on Krush's hand. Krush has great facial expressions. They tend to edit a lot around her wrestling. Krush wins with a punch to the head! Is she the female Johnny B Badd or maybe the female Anthony Ogogo? Coach seemed like the one who knew her way around the ring. I'm assuming she is a California Indie gal or something. I don't know. BK Rhythm is the most David McLane gimmick to ever be a David McLane gimmick. Let's see how she is in the ring. I am fast forwarding through her RAPPIN'! Vivian Rivera and BK are not having there match all edited to hell because they seem to know their way around the ring. Rivera is good. Fun roll up for a win. Adrianna Gambino has a gimmick of being very Italian. It's the Beast! What has she been doing the last four years? According to cagematch.net, her last match was in WOW against Nikita Lyons in 2019. Is Gambino Mafiosa from DARK? She is the best in the ring of the episode. This is the best match of the NEW ERA! It looks like a real wrestling match and the Beast hits a cool Powerbomb for the win! Somebody runs in postmatch and hits a totally gnarly German Suplex that Beat takes right on her skull! The main event was good. It was better than your average episode of NWA Powerrr but not as good as MLW or NWA USA. It needs Tessa Blanchard to bring the real in-ring excellence but hope springs eternal.

AJPW 50 years They ran the Budokan, first time in 18 years and 7 months

Me too. @S.K.o.S.One of my favorite things about these is how it shows we’re all on the same page with a common wrestling vernacular.

Who cares about who’s an “actual star” when ratings, attendance and buy rates haven’t changed (if not declined). Sting, Danielson, Jericho, and Christian are “actual stars” by all measures and don’t really move the needle. They also haven’t deliberately buried the company for the whole world to see. And who’s to say who’s spoiled? A tag team that never had a major contract deal yet managed to completely shift the paradigm of how much non WWE-employed wrestlers can earn, or a guy who’s leveraged his WWE fandom for the last 7 or so years to be in positions they had no business being in? Without getting into anything in terms of in ring talent the Young Bucks are the first people I’ve ever seen in my life to go beyond the Indy scene into mainstream outlets like Hot Topic, selling out stadiums, and securing major deals for any company they work for. And I say this as someone who’s not the biggest fan of them in ring (Matt bothers me more for whatever reason). That takes real talent and drive when you don’t have billion dollar companies, PR teams, and agents behind you. No one has been able to turn a New Japan run into something world wide, so again I have to point out that that these guys are more “punk” than Punk, and that being an “actual star” is the only thing that makes these things possible.

Daddy Magic...YOU WANT A TASTE!!!

Lot of wishcasting here, not enough pragmatism. Punk being away for months is going to say more than most reports that are coming out now; with the latest regarding the Bucks rumors from SRS, it’s becoming more and more likely that Punk’s comments regarding The Elite and the dirtsheets are becoming more and more true. Meanwhile, hardly anything on Punk himself, but a lot more regarding Elite plans and the like: Omega positioning himself as “locker room leader” with what sounds like a hilariously ludicrous speech, Bucks inflating their worth with WWE rumors, etc. I made mention earlier about how the Bucks and Omega really used the sheets to their advantage over the years, mainly by flooding them with so much information the counter arguments were minuscule in comparison, and they’re trying to do the same here. Problem is their exposure is such that reading between the lines is becoming easier and easier. So if they DO jump elsewhere, and don’t have the usual safety nets that have actually buffered their standing over the years, they get branded as malcontents. So they’re using that playbook to make Punk, a noted curmudgeon, out to be that. Page is the metronome here and has also overplayed his hand; playing into Punk’s criticisms of him while also saying “The Elite think I’m good and that’s all I need.” Meanwhile, you put The Elite in a more controlled environment and their strengths deteriorate, which would happen to Page faster than he realizes The fascinating part of all of this is this mad rush to get to all the Hot Newz first, and people fumbling over sourcing this and that because you have to get SOMETHING out there to keep folks interested. It’s just the last 25 years sped up in a way that makes me shake my head; if there was EVER a time to actually try and get this right, now is the time, but the sheets can’t help themselves.

Watching Shoot The Piano Player for the first time. I heard somebody mention it on their podcast. @OdessaSteps thanks!

Apologies if I'm late to the game, but I just found out that Darren Wilson Johnson (Beta Ray Bill, Wonder Woman: Dead Earth) has a new wrestling comic with Image, Do A Powerbomb!. It's basically puroresu mixed with DBZ, and it is magnificent.

TUA AND 0!!!!!!!!!!!!

The sting of the Steelers loss isn’t that bad since Baltimore just blew a huge lead and let Tua throw 6 TD’s!

God sometimes Rivera just wants to make it seem like he's smarter than everyone and it always blows up in his face

MAAAN! That is the most 70s picture ever taken. We are oldies but we are goodies.

It's funny how the AEW version of Sting is...Sting

15:40, that top right section was full of ones that stumped me for a while! re: masks, noticed Penta is in a mask v mask per the post above, Penta must hold the record for number of times his mask has been ripped without being unmasked at this point.

Typhoon Nanmadol, featuring winds of 180 km/h and gusts over 250 is expected to tear through our area some time between tonight and the day after tomorrow, dumping 40+cm of rain on its way through. Best of luck to lostinube and all our fellow gaijin, wrestling nerds and otherwise, and native Japanese and anyone else in the path of this monster. It looks like it's gonna be a bad one!

Along with "Don't over stay a welcome."

Those were my big positive takeaways. Really felt a lot of No Mercy throughout with the pacing of Hctp. It's pretty much what we asked for. I would like to see matches run a little longer and for it to be tougher to land big grapples early but the core gameplay looks great. To this day I don't think there's a wrestling game that does high flying better than VPW2. We saw some nice springboards in the Punk/Omega match.

Oh I meant more like, holy fuck they have gone there so many times for so many nights in a row, why not go literally anywhere else in the country? Killing the territory and all that...

For the record, I really like AEW and it's basically the only wrestling I watch, but... what the fuck? Go somewhere else, yo.

Didn’t realize there was a thread for this outside of the AEW board so I never really posted my thoughts. Don’t really feel like going through 25 pages and I’m sure it’s been touched on but the ultimate irony of this situation to me is that Punk was mad Page made him look bad, but instead of handling it privately he drew way more attention to it, now everyone has gone back and watched that Page promo, knows the words behind it hold real weight, and won’t forget it any time soon. This could have all been brushed under the rug. The funny thing is, watching that promo at the time, I thought the lines were good, but the whole “I’m defending AEW from you” bit was just a variation of Kingston’s promo months earlier. I feel like the “worker’s rights” line must have really gotten to him, since he didn’t get a comeback, whereas with Kingston he could always use the “you’re fat and wasted your potential” bit to get a bit of a receipt. And yes, the whole “these guys have done nothing in this business” line is the most egregious to me, since the Bucks and Omega have done more for Indy wrestling and getting journeymen paid than Punk could ever dream. The weird cringey Christian dorks are ironically way more punk than Punk. They did things their way, never “sold out”, and brought their friends along with them. In ring wise Punk’s best matches have always been against the real best in the world types, like Samoa Joe and John Cena. I really haven’t loved any Punk match since he’s got back besides the Eddie Kingston one. So I would just dump him. Ratings don’t seem to have changed much in the long run, houses seem down, l think AEW has much bigger problems to address than losing one very volatile talent.

Some sims from TGS here. Some targeting and AI jank to hopefully tweak, but it's looking good imo, liking Rosa's moveset Cole vs Wight was actually a p good big man vs little man match before descending into a somewhat implausible finish, shows off some weight detection and some damage selling by Cole after hitting a move himself Also some evidence of catching springboard counters and flash roll ups as ground counters

With a roster as large and talented as AEW's there shouldn't be time for a guy like Kip. ? If you lose Penelope as a result of that, oh well I guess.

I dunno if they're real or not Unified tags and Raws Women belt below?

New wrestling crossword:

Stan Hansen throwing the first pitch at an Orix Buffaloes game