WWE Network Conversation

[The Natural]

 

[hammerva]

Looks like the newest Classic dump is the 1989 WWE Prime Time shows.

[paintedbynumbers]

1 hour ago, hammerva said:

Looks like the newest Classic dump is the 1989 WWE Prime Time shows.

they only added 10 though   was hoping we would finish the year.  It ends before the awesome Demolition tag title switch too

[RIPPA]

New season of Ride Along starts on Friday (7:30 PM EST)

First episode is Alexa Bliss/Nikki Cross in one car, Carmella/Corey Graves in the other

[Gorman]

Thoughts on Judgment Day 2000

Too Cool won a lot in 2000, teaming with Rikishi here to beat Edge, Christian and Kurt Angle. The fans loved to watch them dance, and you can't really do that after you lose.

Eddy Guerrero and Chyna looked like they were having a great time together. Eddy beat Malenko and Saturn in a three-way to keep the European title. Malenko was knocked out with a lead pipe that was hidden in Chyna's bouquet of roses. So while Eddy didn't start saying "lie-cheat-steal" until much later, he really did it from Day One in the WWF.

Shane McMahon predictably needed outside help (T&A, Bossman and Buchanan) to beat Big Show in the Falls Count Anywhere match. Finally, Shane broke a cinder block over Show's head to knock him out.

Chris Benoit moved slightly ahead of Chris Jericho by retaining the IC title in a submission match, but Jericho was getting huge babyface reactions, so his future was secure.

"Losing your specialty match" was popularized by the Dudley Boyz, who lost a tables match to Road Dogg & X-Pac. Tori managed to escape getting put through a table by Buh-Buh Ray.

The 60-Minute Ironman match was the opposite of the Bret-Shawn match at WM 12, as HHH won 6-5 to recapture the WWF title. This was the rare case of a title changing hands on a disqualification.  The creepy little girls on the video said "He's back from the dead," and BikerTaker made his debut. He immediately destroyed the McMahon family and caused the poor Rock to get DQ'd when he wasn't involved in the carnage. Shawn Michaels didn't really need to be the special referee, as he didn't do anything a normal ref wouldn't do. 

I was trying to remember why Undertaker would be angry at the McMahons in the first place. He was injured the previous summer and allowed Mideon and Viscera to take his place and lose the WWF tag team title he shared with the Big Show, so it's not like he needed any revenge on HHH or the McMahons. Instead, he unwittingly gift-wrapped the title for HHH, who gets the MVP for living up to his Cerebral Assassin nickname. He deliberately lost a fall by a chairshot DQ, only to pin Rock and get the fall back. It was like a legal chairshot!

Edited February 1, 2020 by Gorman

[Brian Fowler]

I've always thought he should've gotten two pins off that chair shot, so he wound up ahead of where he was before the DQ. Just really rub in how well he manipulated the rules.

But that match was awesome.

[Gorman]

Thoughts on King of the Ring 2000

Chris Benoit blasted Rikishi with a chair to gain revenge for losing the IC title to him a few days earlier. However, he did it in full view of the referee and got disqualified. Backstage, he faced the same question posed to Hardcore Holly four years earlier: Why did you get yourself disqualified from the King of the Ring tournament? "Everyone knows I'm the best technical wrestler in WWF history, so I do what I want, when I want." Okay, then.

Val Venis and Trish Stratus got together in a surprisingly platonic pairing. It worked, because Val beat Eddy Guerrero in the first round before losing to Rikishi in the semifinals.

Crash Holly was doing a "giant killer" gimmick, beating Albert to qualify for the PPV and then defeating Bull Buchanan in the first round. He later won everyone's hearts by putting an end to the evening gown match between Gerald Brisco and Pat Patterson and winning back the WWF Hardcore title.

Kurt Angle won King of the Ring and the MVP award, beating Chris Jericho, Crash and Rikishi. He delivered an amazing belly-to-belly superplex on Rikishi to capture the crown. The show was running late, so his coronation had to wait until the next night on Raw.

Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley curiously came out to help Angle in the opening round. But before anyone could wonder why, Jericho stole the headline by planting a big kiss on Steph.

Too Cool was so hot that they came into the show with the tag team titles. However, they lost the championships in a four-way to Edge & Christian, who used their finisher, the belt shot to the head.

The Dudleys lost another tables (and dumpster) match to DX. They tried to catch Tori  and put her through a table, but she wisely lured them toward the the dumpster so Road Dogg and X-Pac could knock them into it. The Dudleys finally got revenge by driving Tori through a table that literally had her name on it.

The WWF title ping-ponged back to The Rock, who won Triple H's title by pinning Vince in a six-man tag. Vince hilariously went for the People's Elbow but walked right into the Rock Bottom.

[JonnyLaw]

16 hours ago, Brian Fowler said:

I've always thought he should've gotten two pins off that chair shot, so he wound up ahead of where he was before the DQ. Just really rub in how well he manipulated the rules.

But that match was awesome.

IIRC, they basically did that with the Brock/Angle Smackdown Iron Man a couple of years later, and I haaaaaaaated it. Brock built up a big early lead off DQs, and then we had to watch Angle try to sell as he slowly came back, which was excruciating. I was there live, and I’ve never been so let down by a match relative to my expectations for it.

Edited January 30, 2020 by JonnyLaw

[Brian Fowler]

It's really amazing that Rock and Triple H had the best 60 minute Iron Man match WWF/WWE ever put on television/ppv. Especially given who all were in the other matches.

[Peck]

Just want to give some love to Tuesday Night Titans. Basically watched the entire 1984 season over the past couple of weeks and there's some vastly underrated comedy on that show. Couple of things off the top of my head worth watching are Butcher Vachon's wedding and reception towards end of '84, a Mean Gene segment where he's in New York City looking for Adrian Adonis(featuring Dick Murdoch) and a letters-from-fans love advice segment with Bobby Heenan and Vince McMahon where Heenan has Vince laughing uncontrollably on camera. It's so good.

[Gorman]

Thoughts on Fully Loaded 2000

Lita won the MVP award right off the bat, flying all over the ring onto Test, Albert and Trish Stratus. She (and later Trish) raised the women's division to new levels of athleticism and prestige.

Tazz beat Al Snow in a match that looked like it dropped in from ECW. This was a second chance to make Tazz as big as he could have been after his win over Kurt Angle at Royal Rumble.

Perry Saturn upset Eddy Guerrero for the European title. Saturn was most interesting when he was paired with Terri (and later Moppy), as opposed to getting by on his wrestling alone like Benoit and Malenko.

Edge & Christian tried their best to get out of a title defense against the Acolytes, but Commissioner Mick Foley discovered that Christian wasn't really sick. Edge got his team DQ'd for using their "belt shot to the head" finisher in front of the referee.

Rikishi lost to IC champ Val Venis in a cage match after Tazz hit him with a TV camera. That's exactly how he had lost the title to Venis. Why did Tazz keep hitting Rikishi with TV cameras to help Val Venis?

The focus of this show was Angle, Jericho and Benoit getting moved into a triple main event to see if they could hang with Undertaker, HHH and The Rock, respectively. Undertaker beat Angle convincingly. HHH was mopping the floor with Y2J until he made a strong comeback, only to lose the Last Man Standing Match by one second.

Then there's Chris Benoit's very strange title shot against the Rock. The WWF higher-ups didn't trust Benoit to handle things on his own, so they awkwardly placed Shane McMahon in his corner. They also made a big deal out of the fact that Rock could lose the title if he got disqualified, which was usually a stipulation for heel champs like The Honky Tonk Man who often saved their titles by DQ. So the Rock was DQ'd for merely holding a chair, and Benoit was announced as the new champion. Fortunately , Foley reversed the decision, and Rocky won with the Rock Bottom. 

While Angle, Benoit and Jericho all lost, they had all proven by this time that they were World championship material.

Edited February 1, 2020 by Gorman

[twiztor]

9 hours ago, Gorman said:

Thoughts on Fully Loaded 2000

The focus of this show was Angle, Jericho and Benoit getting moved into a triple main event to see if they could hang with Undertaker, HHH and The Rock, respectively. Undertaker beat Angle convincingly. HHH was mopping the floor with Y2J until he made a strong comeback, only to lose the Last Man Standing Match by one second.

Then there's Chris Benoit's very strange title shot against the Rock. The WWF higher-ups didn't trust Benoit to handle things on his own, so they awkwardly placed Shane McMahon in his corner.  Rocky won with the Rock Bottom. 

While Angle, Benoit and Jericho all lost, they had all proven by this time that they were World championship material.

to your point, i strongly disagree. Except on Angle, who was pushed strongly since his debut.

Jericho:
by Survivor Series (4 months from now) is in a midcard feud with Kane (and before that, X-Pac)
first wins "the big one" in December of 2001 (18 months from now) and has a lame duck title reign until HHH returns. He won't hold a world title again until 2008. 

Benoit:
hovers near the main event scene for a couple months, but by Survivor Series (4 months from now) is back with the Radicalz and feuding with a reformed DX. 
Benoit first wins the title in 2004 (FOUR YEARS LATER, despite being a former WCW champ).

 

the only people who saw this as Jericho and Benoit finally being recognized as main event talent were long-time fans. They were viewed as perfectly acceptable as filling in for main event matches, or rounding out multi-man matches, but at no point were they upper echelon. 

 

[MORELOCK]

6 hours ago, twiztor said:

Benoit first wins the title in 2004 (FOUR YEARS LATER, despite being a former WCW champ).

A one-day reign that he was given in hopes he wouldn't leave the company, so it doesn't really tie in to your point at all

[Gorman]

Thoughts on SummerSlam 2000

Right to Censor got off to a good start on PPV by beating Too Cool & Rikishi. I loved the finish: W...O...R...Steven Kick!

X-Pac needed help in the "how to be a friend' department. After beating Road Dogg, he said they should be friends again now that everyone knows who the better man is. Road Dogg wasn't having it.

Chyna pinned Trish to win ... Val Venis' Intercontinental title? NOOOOOO! Just when she was in a groove as Eddy Guerrero's "Mamacita," they put the No. 2 men's title back on her.

Tazz wins the MVP for his spectacular job of bullying the announcers. Even during his match with Jerry Lawler, he kept turning to trash-talk Jim Ross. Of course, JR blasted him with a glass candy jar, paying back Tazz for breaking a car window and sending glass into his eye. Tazz sold the glass to the eye well after the match. Since the WWF was not going to give Tazz a serious run, "mid-card bully" was the next best role for him.

Shane McMahon took a ridiculous 50-foot plunge off a scaffold in the Hardcore title match. Steven Blackman then delivered an impressive 20-foot elbow drop off the same scaffold to win the title. Sure, Shane landed back-first on a giant crash pad, but if he had over-rotated and landed on his head, it could have been another disaster.

Chris Benoit's win over Chris Jericho in a three-fall match (with nothing on the line) again kept him slightly ahead of Y2J as a WWF title contender.

The first TLC built on the WrestleMania ladder match and ended before overstaying its welcome. All three teams had established identities, with Edge & Christian being "the comical guys who usually end up with the belts."

Kat and Terri continued their never-ending feud of matches that don't end with pinfalls. Al Snow was in Kat's corner for some reason, and Kat used Head before winning the Thong Stinkface match.

Bikertaker and Kane had a six-minute non-match in which Taker kept trying to rip off Kane's mask. I bet that happened a lot when they were kids on Halloween.

The Rock retained the WWF title in the main event, despite being a total afterthought in the HHH-Angle-Steph soap opera. Fans were probably looking forward more to the Angle-HHH no-DQ match at Unforgiven. 

 

Edited February 6, 2020 by Gorman

[twiztor]

21 hours ago, Gorman said:

Thoughts on SummerSlam 2000

Bikertaker and Kane had a six-minute non-match in which Taker kept trying to rip off Kane's mask. I bet that happened a lot when they were kids on Halloween.

this "match" always bothered me. there is no winner and no announcement, the segment is just over. JR says something like "there wasn't even a bell to get this started". but there was. we were taping this on vhs live off ppv at a friend's house, and after the event was finished i made him rewind the tape just to confirm. i'm still a bit salty about it.

[Brian Fowler]

There's a Ruthless Aggression docuseries coming to the Network starting this month. They're selling it as a sequel to The Monday Night Wars series. First five eps are an aftermath/rebuild post MNW, John Cena, Evolution, Brock, and The Brand Split.

[RIPPA]

 

[Gorman]

Thoughts on Unforgiven 2000

Val Venis was finally hitting his stride as a singles wrestler until he followed Godfather's lead and repudiated his sleazy past to join Right To Censor. He wasn't even the leader. That was Steven Richards. In fact, the Steven Kick led to the win over the Acolytes and Dudleys as the RTC won their second straight PPV opener. 

Raven surprised everyone by appearing to help Tazz beat Jerry Lawler in the leather strap match. It's funny that this took place in Philly, as if Raven had been waiting for the WWF to come to town to walk off the street and make his debut. 

Steve Blackman survived as WWF Hardcore champion in a 10-minute version of the WrestleMania hardcore scramble. Al Snow entered the match with the European title, wearing Italian clothes and giving the announcers a photo of Tony Danza.

Lita helped the Hardy Boyz win the WWF tag team title from Edge & Christian in a cage match. Jeff Hardy exited the cage early, and the champs did a great job of keeping him out and double-teaming Matt until Lita opened the door to Jeff's return.

Eddy Guerrero retained the IC title over Rikishi in a goofy finish. Chyna stopped the referee from counting Rikishi's pinfall, and Eddy didn't get disqualified. Then Rikishi attacked Chyna and got disqualified? She wasn't supposed to be in the ring!

Triple H emphatically defeated Kurt Angle to culminate the soap opera battle over Stephanie. This was a great story, and it had a lot more mileage on it. Better things were ahead for Angle, though.

Their match overshadowed The Rock's main event title defense again. Chris Benoit earned the MVP award by proving he belonged in the ring with Rock, Undertaker and Kane. In fact, he was announced as WWF champion when he pinned Undertaker, whose foot was on the bottom rope. And....here comes Commissioner Foley to take the title away from Benoit, just like he did at Fully Loaded. The brothers couldn't stop fighting each other, giving the People's Champion the opportunity to beat Benoit with the Rock Bottom.

Jim Ross would preview the next PPV as he would go off the air. At Judgment Day, he said, "Triple H is the King of the Ring," and here he made a reference to No Mercy.

Edited February 8, 2020 by Gorman

[Gorman]

Thoughts on No Mercy 2000

Dudleys won their "Tables Invitational" gauntlet against Lo Down, Too Cool, Raven & Tazz and Bull & Goodfather. They would have looked foolish if they hadn't.

Lita almost had to fight T & A and Trish Stratus by herself after her partners, The Acolytes, had been attacked backstage by T&A. Fortunately, the Hardys came to her rescue.

Chris Jericho won his cage match with X-Pac in an innovative finish. X-Pac was standing on the cage door when Jericho dropkicked the cage and caused X-Pac to crotch himself on the door. Y2J then escaped. He could have been at the top of the card with Benoit and Angle, but there weren't that many main-event spots. Undertaker and Kane weren't even on this show.

Eddy Guerrero went from being engaged to Chyna on the last PPV to hitting her with a loaded bouquet of flowers on this one.

Naked Mideon was forced to wear clothes to get a shot at European champion William Regal. Of course, he just stripped during the match. As great as arrogant snob Regal is, insincere "goodwill ambassador" Regal is a close second.

Matt Hardy made the mistake of unmasking one of the Conquistadores (Edge & Christian), who was wearing another mask. Christian then hit the Unprettier to win back the tag team titles.

Stephanie McMahon worked out a deal where she would manage her "business associate" Kurt Angle. She wasn't in Triple H's corner until the end, when she came out and slapped Chris Benoit, leading to her husband's win. She then came out with Angle and took a Rock Bottom, causing HHH to come out and scrape her off the mat. Angle ended up winning the title after Rikishi came out and accidentally hit The Rock twice. Between this and running over Austin "for the Rock," the People's Champ should have told Rikishi, "Stop helping The Rock!"

Steve Austin is the MVP for exacting revenge on Rikishi in their non-match. Austin beat Rikishi up, busted him open with a chair, loaded him in his truck and took him to the parking lot to run HIM over. Fortunately for Rikishi, Austin ran into an intervening police car and got arrested. Now that's vintage Stone Cold.

[RIPPA]

The Next Broken Skull Session will be with Big Show and will premiere on Sunday Feb 23

Besides the rumored Bret Hart one - Show was probably the next obvious person

 

[Gorman]

Thoughts on Survivor Series 2000

Test, Albert & Trish Stratus came out wearing "T&APA" shirts to mock The Acolytes, but that's not who they were wrestling. Instead, they lost to the makeshift team of Steve Blackman, Crash & Molly Holly. T&A didn't win many important matches.

The Radicals got back together for a Survivor Series match. So did Billy Gunn, Road Dogg and Chyna, but they didn't come out as DX or The New Age Outlaws. Instead, Road Dogg came out rapping with their other partner, K-Kwik. Billy lived up to his new nickname ("The One") by facing a 1-on-3 disadvantage. Benoit and Saturn were the survivors.

Lita took a huge potato shot from Ivory and was bleeding profusely from the head in her unsuccessful attempt to win back the women's title.

Kane won the first round of his feud with Chris Jericho over spilled coffee, but Y2J later came back for more (fighting with Kane, not coffee).

I totally forgot that Right To Censor had earned more gold from Team Extreme, as Bull Buchanan and Goodfather were the champs in the other Survivor Series match. They teamed with Edge & Christian against the Hardys and Dudleys. Jeff was the sole survivor, previewing his future success.

Like Austin, The Rock gained revenge on Rikishi relating to the hit-and-run from a year earlier. Rock objected to being falsely accused of ordering the hit on Austin. Rocky won the match, but Rikishi hit four Banzai drops on The Great One after the match.

Hardcore Holly proved, like at a previous King of the Ring, that he didn't care about winning anything important. He blasted William Regal with the European title right in front of the referee to get disqualified.

Austin's "revenge match" against Triple H ended like the No Mercy match with Rikishi - without a pinfall in the ring and with more vehicle-related shenanigans. Austin used a crane to drop Triple H's car upside down from 25 feet up and they went right off the air. How could fans not wonder if he had been severely injured or worse? He showed up on the next night's Raw with a few bruises.

Kurt Angle is the MVP for devising a brilliant plan to beat The Undertaker and retain the WWF title. Hiding his brother Eric under the ring was right up there with the classic "Double Doink" ruse at WrestleMania IX.

[Eivion]

2 hours ago, RIPPA said:

The Next Broken Skull Session will be with Big Show and will premiere on Sunday Feb 23

Besides the rumored Bret Hart one - Show was probably the next obvious person

 

Its kind of interesting how Austin has started off with the giants of WWE for these things. Show interests me more than Bret so this works for me.

[odessasteps]

I wonder if it is Austin choosing or the Network. 

[RIPPA]

I am sure it won't be a coincidence when Triple H is the guest on the episode that inevitably debuts after Mania

Side note - I would assume the people who would be "approved" by the WWE for this (besides Triple H) would be (and I am just thinking big names that have an easy linkage to Austin)

Kurt Angle

Mick Foley

Booker T

And obviously their dream get would be The Rock

[odessasteps]

I would be nice for them to branch out besides the obvious Attitude Era guests. 

I would add Lawler to that list, since he was just on Austin's podcast. Of course, I doubt they want the Dream Machine or Mongolian Stomper talk on the network.