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Nope. I posted it multiple pages ago. Firing Vince lets them say “the bad man is gone, nothing to see here.” I mean shit, the Netflix CEO said as much a day or so afterward. I hope I’m wrong and maybe more will come out in discovery and trial (if it gets that far) or in the criminal investigation, but I’m cynical about it all. The rich and powerful always seem to evade justice.

HHH learned from watching Succession. Deny everything, attain power, sell out your spouse, take all the power.

Adding to this point: this aspect of the story being written about so long after the original story breaking kind of leaves "the bad man is gone" as kind of the lasting taste in the general public's mouth - I don't necessarily know if this addendum to the story is "sensational" enough to garner the same kind of coverage. I'd be willing to bet the Netflix position is what most average folks (who don't have a 44 page thread on it going) walk away with - whether that's by design, who knows?

Oompa Loompa Streudleedoo

I was there with my dad and brother. My friends, Handsome Frank Stalletto and Beef Stew Lou Marconi were two of the Undertaker's druids. I hope I can be there this year.

But no one is wrecking fools left and right! I need to see some fools get wrecked!

I was recently thinking how most tag teams nowadays are shooting for Midnight Express or RnR Express, but where are the Road Warriors or Skyscrapers of today? We need to have more teams of big dudes/gals just wrecking fools.

For those who haven’t seen this before

SummerSlam 2024 will emanate from Cleveland Browns Stadium on Saturday, 3rd August 2024. Last SummerSlam in Cleveland was SummerSlam 1996.

It’s all about the game and how you play it

one thing about when Tenta was released by the WWF that i've suspected but I haven't read confirmation of is that the WWF cut several large-ish guys right around the time that they brought in Paul Wight Wight debuts on February 14th, 1999 Giant Silva didn't work a WWE match after February 16th Tenta's last Golga match was February 21st Kurrgan was gone on February 28th 1999 WWF wasn't exactly known for deep precise planning, but I think there might be a reason why they decided to just drop the stable of giant dudes not doing much in order to not overshadow Big Show

Speaking of Shane Taylor, he needs to go back to the boxing trunks ASAP. The tights are bad look for him.

You're money and you don't even know it.

You know what you are? You're like a big bear with claws and with fangs...

To be fair, the match I saw was from February 1980 so he would have been 29. Granted, I am judging off based on wrestling standards from the mid to late 80s and on where workrate only went up while smoke and mirrors and good ole Southern rasslin went down. That said, he's not worse than Sid as Lord Humongous just starting in the business.

6/9/87: Kevin Von Erich vs Kido: Past Kevin being super aggressive to start like he always is and one crazy missed charged into the corner, this was pretty technical and sportsmanlike. Oh and maybe one claw attempt towards the end but that's just to be expected with these guys. Kevin hung a little, though some of that felt like Kido making him look good to be honest. He had that cross armbreaker takedown where you hook the leg under the arm and flip the guy but he couldn't get a cross armbreaker out of it, just an armbar. The ending was pretty ugly as they stumbled around the ring for thirty seconds until Kevin could get a small package. Needed either more of Kevin being a jock jerk or Kido having someone stronger to roll around with. 6/9/87: Barbarian vs Ueda: Just 3 minutes here but they said we were 4 minutes JIP. Ueda was already bleeding which was dumb considering what was coming later in the card. Barbarian beat the crap out of him and then brought his second, Killer Brooks in and slammed Brooks onto Ueda which drew a DQ. Post match they destroyed him with the chain until he started firing back with a chair. I vaguely got the sense this was setting up a tag with Sakaguchi but if that was the case Sakaguchi should have made the save, so maybe not? 6/9/87: Fujiwara vs Choshu: Choshu's back! Finally! Let me double check. He's been wrestling since the start of June. We just don't have footage. A singles match vs Kimura in there too. Anyway, this was #5 in the 80s set and it's pretty awesome. It's in Way of the Blade too. They start brawling on the way down and Fujiwara takes an immediate advantage with headbutt after headbutt after headbutt, opening Choshu up. Choshu finally fires back in the ring and it's great because Fujiwara takes it and there's a sense of fighting spirit and a hard head but then Fujiwara just walks forward and goozles him! Like fine, do the fighting spirit stuff, sure, but then immediately there after, try to kill your opponent! That's so much better than chop fests. Choshu gets a belly to back out of nowhere shortly thereafter though and locks in the Scorpion. He presses the advantage even after Fujiwara makes it to the ropes but Fujiwara gets the armbar! Then Fujiwara tries to take off the corner buckle, but Choshu reverses a whip. Then he hits a lariat, but Fujiwara gets the armbar again on an attempt of a second one! Choshu rolls out and busts Fujiwara open huge on the outside. He comes in and hits lariats until Fujiwara gets knocked out. Just a great, measured, passionate, bloody, headbutt-laden war. Here it is on dailymotion if you haven't seen it for a bit: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3m34p8 EDIT: Oh yeah, I watched Harley Race/Marty Jannetty vs Choshu/Hamaguchi since I had a few minutes to kill. Race actually imposes on Choshu here because Jannetty wasn't going to be able to do it. It's the Race you want in Japan that you so rarely get.

Good goddamn do I wanna live in a world where wrestlers have names like that again...

My fantasy booking is that The Acclaimed defend their trios titles against The Elite (Billy Gunn vs Okada!), lose and do a soft split. Caster can feud with Keith Lee or some other big guys, and work a loudmouth antagonist gimmick. Bowens can win a ton of matches and get a World title shot on PPV (against World Champ Swerve Strickland, because it would mean a lot to a lot of people to have a black World champion defend against a black challenger, and to have a gay man vying to be top dog in the company). And Billy Gunn can have a quiet few months or go back to his semi-retired manager gig that he had before the trios thing took off.

The Scorpion King shoots an arrow with a fist on it that hits this guy and sends him flying through the ceiling. That's high cinema

I swear I can’t win. Was out doing some errands and my right rear tire popped! Luckily I made it to the tire shop but the left rear is bad too. So I’m sitting here and waiting as they put two new tires on. Ugh I asked them not to charge me an arm and a leg though. I don’t have a leg to spare!

I think the backlash from this new information will really depend if mainstream media sees this a story to aggressively pursue.

No, that just makes it funnier. And to be fair, watching it now, pre ECW New Jack wasn't that bad. If he actually had focused on wrestling and didn't become weapon obsessed as ECW mandated, he probably would have been solid. Mustapha? Yeah, he was always no good but then again they were basically the black Sheepherders or Moondogs. Actual wrestling wasn't suppose to be their forte.

ROH in general as a glorified Dark with ROH vibes works quite fine for me. From what I remember before tuning out of Sinclair ROH they had a kind of similar style to the shows so it doesn't feel like that much of a leap to me. I think what they're still recovering from is Jay Briscoe passing away as he was ROH through and through. In an alternate timeline him and Mark would be champs and we wouldn't have Mark trying to find his groove in AEW. As for things that AEW could control while I love Kingston as Continental champ the ROH champ is barely if ever on TV and TK had to assure the press that he Eddie would be defending at the PPV. It's not the best look and they really could use a champ that's on ROH TV often to drive the show along. And now that I think about it same goes for the tag and 6-man champs which are being used as props for stuff on AEW TV. Unless they have those champs pulling double duty (hopefully with more pay as a result) something will need to be considered for the long term.

Saggs looks no more than maybe five years older than he did in his early 90s heyday. He did a recent shoot interview in which he seemed really decent and grounded too. Even back in the day I always got the impression that his partner was probably a bit of a millstone around his neck, like (to make a wholly inappropriate literary reference) Knobbs was Lennie to Saggs' good-natured and tolerant George.

The Acclaimed have a nice role as the NAO of AEW, but I can never see them being more than that. Entrance always pops the crowd, competent enough, but never gonna out-shine the top guys in the ring.

i was really hoping that i could track down Enos getting a TV title shot sometime in the near future after this match, but alas.... to make up for it, they do run back the Enos/Flynn match on a February Nitro, so you have that to look forward to! Enos DOES eventually get a shot at the US Title, but it's on WCW Saturday Night about a year from this point. Based on the champ at that point, it's probably a pretty good match, but unfortunately, it's also Enos' last for WCW. oh, sorry. Spoiler alert! but then again, with the state of 1999 WCW, maybe that doesn't signify anything....

Insisting on flying in and out of Bulgaria to make AEW TV spots where he never jobs would be one way Miro could milk that contract a little

Oh yeah, if Steph knew, Trips knew. It feels like Nick Khan's involvement might mean that there isn't the "house cleaning" I was anticipating...

There's a time honoured tradition in Wrestling, of using promo photos of veterans that are as old as possible. Joey Janela managed by Missy Hyatt from 1986 apparently.

I do think they corrected pretty well, but I don’t buy that this is a “this was the plan all along” from anyone involved. I think it started with Cody as the plan (which was obvious at the Rumble) but then when the Vince stuff blew up, it was a “Hey! Stop talking about that! It’s The Rock! Look!” And they just inserted him in the laziest possible way and it backfired.

Man, I'm not really feeling Mania this year. I mean, I'm more off than on, but I've generally been pleased with their big shows (and even the NXT big shows). But this card ain't doing nothing for me, even with the Rock around. I think my main problem is that I'm just done with Roman, Seth and Cody and more importantly the WWE style. All the matches feel pretty same-ish (maybe not Gunther matches, but the result is almost never in question), the promos are next level cringe usually. I don't know. WWE doesn't feel fresh. Maybe when Tiffy Time, Ilja, Trick, Melo et al take over it'll be cool again, but I'm kinda done with it.

Get well soon Mark. Also don’t if anyone watches Napoleon Blownaparts videos on YouTube but he just posted part 1 on the history of the MMA linear heavyweight championship on Saturday that features Coleman prominently.

In some cases it's thought that the fentanyl got mixed in with cocaine due to cross contamination, basically being processed/packaged in the same facility with no type of cleaning happening.

You know you are in a fucked up situation when your most reliable QB on AND off the field is Jameis Winston

Here you go, my friend: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qUn23R_Bi98&pp=ygUDV3dl

I'd say Wednesday, when Cole's MRI is scheduled for.

Happy 30th anniversary

A lot of dudes who are meant to be Mr. Perfect think they should actually be Shawn Michaels. I get it, we all are our best advocates and want what we think we deserve, but there's no shame in occupying a lower position and excelling at it.

Obligatory “who are you to doubt chiropractic medicine” joke

Wasn't he supposed to be apart of Team Piper around Starcade 96 after Piper came in? I vaguely remember him being aligned with Piper during a segment after he came in. I remember they used his real name. I was new to WCW in 96 so I hadn't seen his run as the Shark in real time.

LOL

Being there to witness this live with my daughter, which it was her very first live wrestling experience was surreal. I honestly didn't think anything would top seeing Kingston/Akiyama live on Zero Hour before Full Gear 2022, but I can confidently say that seeing Sting's send-off live with my kiddo and two of my best friends in the world is hands down the best live wrestling experience I've ever had in my life.

https://twitter.com/elusiveraf/status/1766264114156879907

According to Cagematch John Tenta had one match between his WCW run and his return to WWF and it was against Koji Kitao of all people.

PWTorch reports that Kevin Kelly has been let go by AEW. His recent social media comments against Ian Riccaboni over the weekend led to his termination. Additionally, Kelly's on-air performances were deemed below par within AEW, with Tony Schiavone stepping in to assume the lead play-by-play role a few months into Collision's run, a move reportedly supported by Tony Khan.

Imagine being giftwrapped a talented wrestler who actually draws attention to your stale, star-bereft shows and thinking, “I’m going to attach this guy to the shittiest thing we’ve got so when people check in to see him, they’ll see just how truly shitty we can be.”

I love the reaffirmation in the tweet just in case you didn't get the point. It's crazy that had Kamala not just been this randomly created character and a terrible inaccurate one since I don't think you would associate much of Uganda with The Gods Must Be Crazy type of tribalism, sub Saharan Africa would probably be a more realistic portrayal in line with what boxing had which is the truth is somewhere in the middle. Mickey Duff as trainer/co-promoter/manager for a lot of African fighters that he imported into the UK would have guys like Cornelius Boza-Edwards and John Mugabi (both Ugandan) along with guys from the neighboring countries to the opposite side of the continent. Sometimes their upbringings would line up with poverty and other things would you associate with third world/developing countries. Sometimes you get guys who seemed to be way, way more privileged than others and would be first class citizens here in the United States. People have to remember that the term "black" doesn't exist in sub-Saharan African countries cause everyone outside of South Africa is technically black in terms of pigmentation and melanin. Everything is defined by class much like it is Western society. So you have those guys and then later on you get wild shit like Kassim Ouma being a child soldier in Uganda and the story being so amazing that made a critically acclaimed documentary. With those stories, you can juxtapose them with other stories. For example, one of my favorites being Larry Merchant bringing up Ike Quartey (from Ghana) having a 77 year old (hell maybe she was 80) sister when Ike himself had to be like 33-35 years old at the time and one of the youngest of 20+ kids. That and having the tribal markings on his face. At no point did they try to make his story the same as everyone else. Now I get that pro wrestling itself largely was defined by painting with a broad brush especially during the Cold War. However, part of the reason most people love pro wrestling is you can differentiate the characters. The more you're able to do that, the more they can stand out.

...buckle up, I'm an American who has just watched a Significant American Football Game and am under the influence of whiskey/whisky (yes, I had both). I will probably ramble on but will at least try to spell correctly. First, add me to those who think ZSJ/Danielson 2 was amazing. Run, don't walk, to find a way to watch that match. If Danielson is getting ready to hang it up as a full-timer, he's doing his level-best to put on the all of the dream matches he possibly can before he reduces his schedule. I didn't post in the Wrestle Kingdom thread, but I kept trying to find a creative way to describe Okada/Danielson 2, and the phrase I kept coming up with was "museum-quality." As in: if I wanted someone to see how pro wrestling should be defined, that's the match I'd want them to watch, next to stuff like Guerrero/Mysterio from Halloween Havoc '97. But with these ZSJ/Danielson matches...I don't know that we have seen in-ring chemistry and overall match quality like this since the Okada/Omega series. It is mind-boggling how good the WrestleDream and now the New Beginning matches have been. We don't get to see perfectly paired wrestlers put on matches like this every day, and as alluded to above, when ZSJ is done, this style may largely go with him. Also: I don't think this will require spoilers, but man...that Osaka crowd knew they were in for some special stuff at this event and acted accordingly. Part of me wonders if some folks made the trip from the UK to see ZSJ/Danielson, and Ospreay's final match, hence some of the chants in English that we don't usually hear from Japanese audiences. I could feel the atmosphere through the screen, which doesn't happen for me too much any longer. More on that below.