Craig H

Strong Patriots vibes from the Chiefs. Guess they really are going to be that team now.

The only time I saw Joe live was at the Chicago Reborn where he defended the world title against…Striker? I think that was his name? It was a shit dude in ROH with bad hair. My favorite memory of that match is Joe turning to our section because we, as well as everyone, were yelling out shit from Chappelle’s Show, and Joe goes, “Is Samoa Joe gonna have to choke a bitch?” I don’t recall Joe being on the Thanksgiving Eve Dynamite I went to in 2022… And the first match of his I saw period was an early early early ROH match. It was Samoa Joe vs Low Ki. At the time, it basically blew my mind. They had a ridiculous opening sequence that was likely choreographed but who cares because it fucking ruled and it looked great. It looked like something out of the Matrix. That turned me into an instant fan. It’s unfortunate he spent so much time in TNA, but what are you going to do when your other options were WWE where they wanted him to be Umaga and not cut promos, ROH which was in worse shape than TNA, NJPW which was in really rough shape but starting to to get better, or NOAH which was worse off than NJPW. He’d also be in total obscurity over in Japan so at least he got to build his legend in TNA. And now he’s at his rightful place at the top of a major company.

Is it that much of a stretch to think that musician Sting will be front row for wrestler Sting’s final match?

Hey! Another Jericho Cruise right at the same time as another Covid surge! Hopefully all of the dudes going to that sausage fest mask up. Narrator: They didn’t mask up.

Triple post, but it does suck that Revolution should basically be the ultimate tribute show for Sting and WWE owns the bulk of classic Sting footage that could be used in video packages. There’s the TNA footage, but I want clips of Sting vs Flair, or Vader, or Sid, or Hogan, or Bret, or his entrance from WM, or the War Games matches, and so on. Maybe there’s a chance, albeit very slim, that WWE rents the footage out to AEW for a hefty sum. I mean, it couldn’t be more than the cost to use The Final Countdown. It’s HHH kind of in charge so maybe he sees the importance of letting it happen. I just have this image in my head of Sting’s final entrance where it starts out with a look alike without the jacket with pauldrons coming out to: That being his best music…To me anyway…Then we get the look alike with jacket and pauldrons coming out to The Man They Call Sting. Then another look alike in the sad makeup and trenchcoat comes out to: Do a red and black look alike coming out to Metallica’s Seek and Destroy even if he came out to that at Wembley. And then finally have him come out to his AEW entrance. And yeah, Jericho did something similar, but this entrance for Sting’s final match would be so fucking epic. I just know one thing, I’m going to be in tears. I’m not ready for it to be over. I was a WWF kid, but man, if my favorite as a kid wasn’t Ricky Steamboat then it was definitely Sting. He’s the reason I got into WCW/NWA. His matches with Muta are likely the reason I got into Japanese wrestling. The entire storyline of him going into silence and waiting forever to challenge Hogan is still one of the best ever even if they didn’t stick the landing (because what is wrestling without a great story and not sticking the landing). Dude is one of my all time favorites, didn’t need to do any of this stuff, and yet he did anyway. To kinda quote Moneyball, how can you not be romantic about pro wrestling?

The only other team I could see maybe being a better fit is some kind of combination from the HoB, but the prospect of that is legitimately terrifying.

This board is weird, I swear. Look, I get the Bucks aren’t all of y’all’s cup of tea, but Sting can’t do a singles match. Hell, he even has to do cinematic matches as a tag match. So who else would be better to put Sting and Darby up against than the Bucks. As characters, the Bucks are dickheads, they want to send Sting out with a loss, but in reality, there’s fewer teams more appropriate than the Bucks that can ALSO protect Sting and bump around like pinballs for him. This is the logical and best conclusion given Sting’s capabilities. Now, if maybe Sting wasn’t going full Cactus Jack in most of his tag matches then he’d be able to physically do the singles match against Darby, but he looked seriously fucked up at the end of that match last night. I don’t want to see Sting all broken down looking sad as fuck in his final match like Flair did. Give him the tag match against the Bucks and let Nick and Matt bump around the ring for Sting like crazy. I am almost sure that if it were physically possible that Sting would want to do the honors for Darby, but I just don’t think he’s capable of doing it.

Also, there is a dire lack of using the term “shit-ass” on Echo. Anyway, that first episode is 10/10. Just fucking outstanding.

Holy shit. That opening to episode 1 of Echo is so unbelievable sad and also heartwarming. I was in tears until Fisk showed up. Probably the dad in me. My oldest’s name is also Maya, so that was getting to me too. And I guess coincidentally enough she’s talking ASL when she starts high school in August. So just a lot got to me in a way not much else from the MCU has.

It was a Violent Gentlemen shirt being sold right after Brodie passed with proceeds going to Brodie’s family. I remember trying to buy one and they were all sold out online and I went back some months later and they were no longer being sold. It would be cool if they would sell them again.

Heh, I just finished my rewatch of Justified with my wife and she remarked that Kaitlyn Dever should be in more stuff.

Paul doesn’t like cosmic Marvel stuff.

We can’t use Lone Wolf and Cub, even though this is basically influenced by it, so let’s just call it the Mandalorian and Grogu. Basic name aside, I’m down for this. GIVE ME MORE COBB VANTH YOU FUCKS. I need more space Raylan Givens in my life.

To quote Dave Wasserman (it is an election year after all sadly enough), I’ve seen enough.

Yeah I remember you mentioning that before so whenever I go back to watch it that’s actually one of the first things I think about it. Small world and all that.

People also forget Dynamite used to be the same mix of squashes/enhancement matches and bigger matches. Collision is basically closer to what Dynamite was in its first couple years.

His response was, and I quote, “yeah.” Probably annoyed some 18 year old kid was talking to him. And I haven’t met anyone from AEW, but I’ve also missed out what feels like 6 or 7 different Chicago shows and only made it to the one pre Thanksgiving one last year. OH! We saw HOOK walking out with us. He was headed in the same direction to the parking garage from the Wintrust Arena. He had a security dude with him. That’s what really gave him away, but honestly, the hoody with his anime hair sticking out would have still given himself away. He looks like he’s in character 100% of the time. I think I said and a couple others were like, “what’s up Hook?!” and he threw a hand up for us. Regarding fans showing up at hotels and airports, I wonder how much wrestlers like the Bucks deserve some blame. It’s not their fault that these weirdos go to the airport, but the Bucks and some others always seem to stop for them, sign a bunch of their shit, etc. In a way that seems to encourage that behavior.

Not that I’m like actively looking or anything, but I swear Skye Blue is begging for a wardrobe malfunction. Beautiful woman, but I don’t want to see her wind up being a meme or screengrab for weirdos. I think it’s the dad in me? It’s always this feeling of, look, I don’t care what you wear as long as it makes you feel good, just watch out for others who might take advantage of you.

Oh, and I interacted with more than a few ROH folks at the Reborn show in Chicago. I remember watching the DVD of it and basically being embarrassed/ashamed of how much I could see myself during that show, not because I was acting like a dork, just because I don’t like seeing myself in pictures or on video.

I’ve bumped into a few wrestlers. The most I ran into was the hotel I stayed at when I went to Summerslam 99 in Minneapolis. We stayed at a Marriott in Bloomington, basically right across the street from the Mall of America. Never expected any wrestlers to be there and then after getting back from the mall on Friday night I see Big Show in the lobby crossed paths with Bradshaw coming out of the elevator, and rode the elevator up with Ron Simmons. I was basically too scared to say anything except to Bradshaw, “are you Bradshaw?” Really good job there, Craig. I think 2000 or 2001 I almost literally bumped into Matt Hardy. I had started getting into shape at that time and thought my arms were starting to get big, but seeing Matt up close, Jesus, he was huge. On tv you know he looked skinny, but his arms were gigantic. At that same show, which I think was either Backlash or Judgment Day at the AllState Arena, the one with 2 Man Power Trip vs Brothers of Destruction as the main event, we ate at the Steak n Shake right near the arena and there were a bunch of ECW folks there. Saw CM Punk on the blue line/El in Chicago. Just nodded at him and he nodded back. Of fuck. The weirdest one. I just now remembered this. This was like, shit, forever ago. So I go to a friend of a friend’s house to watch the WM where Cena vs Rock was the main event. I think this was the one where Danielson lost in 14 seconds to Sheamus. And fucking Snitsky shows up. I want to say this is maybe around the time he was doing an infomercial for a seafood boil machine. But yeah, that was really random and there’s not much more to say about it than that.

Man, I also like this Copeland run in AEW. That was my thought as well, that he finally has the freedom to work instead of just playing the hits that road agents lay out for every match. The tag match main event ruled and I’m loving this run for DG. HoB are so good they had FTR’s hometown crowd chanting for them after the match. I would say that TK needs to get HoB time on Dynamite, but I have a feeling that Black and Vega probably spend Tuesdays and Wednesdays or Wednesdays and Thursdays together and Black is content to only work Collision since Vega is doing house shows on that day. Again, just guessing, but given how much importance Black puts on work/life balance, it feels like this is the case. And that sucks. I think without Dynamite, he’s never going to get to that next level, but maybe he’s also content to let Brody be that guy.

Depending on the condition of your Snake Mountain, it could be worth a ton. I remember a few years back seeing how much Snake Mountain and the Ghostbusters firehouse were going for with even a decent amount of play and was pissed I didn’t have them anymore. Those were my two all time favorite bases I had for action figures. The TMNT Sewer and Technodrome were cool, but they constantly fell apart. And for as many GI Joes as I had, I never had any of the bases for them, but I did have a friend who had the aircraft carrier. That kid had parents who were just pieces of crap, but it was the nicest thing they probably ever did for him. Of course, it could only be played with in the basement since it was the only space to fit it and his dickhead dad rarely let us go into the basement.

For real though, I didn’t get much but I didn’t want much. I got the Marvel Multiverse RPG guide and Kang expansion so I’ll be hitting up @SirFozzie for some advice or help on that. I got the complete MCU timeline coffee table book which is cool as fuck since I love the MCU. Some MCU Funkos, a Doctor Who shirt that has EVERY Doctor on it including the Tennant bigeneration Doctor and Gatwa, Adventure Time pajamas, and a Rocketbook which if you don’t know what it is, look it up because it’s cool as hell. Most of my fun and my wife’s fun comes from watching the kids open up their stuff. My youngest turned 2 in August and she seemed to really get Christmas this year and had a blast. My oldest is 13 and she got a bunch of cool nerdy shit. I did say this would be the last year we went overboard on everyone just because I think we get them so much stuff and maybe 1/4 of it they remember and the rest is just extra stuff, but my wife and I can’t help but spoil them. Just today I’m starting to try and pick up the mess from Christmas to try to reclaim my living room and family room, but when there’s so much stuff for the kids, it’s hard to find a home for it all in the house. For both kids i think we’re going to have to go through and just be like, ok, a ton of this stuff you have that you don’t use needs to be donated or put in storage.

And I can’t see Hanger losing a 3rd time. That does nothing to help either guy.

It’ll either be a cage match or a parking lot brawl if they don’t go the enemies as tag partners route.