PO Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228 ISSN1083-9593 March 20, 2000
The landscape of American pro wrestling may undergo major changes within the next month.
Starting off, WWF officially gave notice to the USA Network on 3/1 that it is cancelling its contract with them effective in September when the new TV season starts. This isn't necessarily as big as it sounds, but most feel it is bigger. The WWF's deal for Raw, Livewire and Superstars expired in September 2001, but WWF has the right to get out of the deal in September 2000 by giving the network six months notice and USA Network has the right to match any offer. The Heat contract expires in September 2000 so they don't have to give notice on the show. This enables them to officially begin shopping the cable package around to other buyers, but doesn't necessarily mean they'll be leaving the USA network.
Based on posturing and media reports, it appears CBS/Viacom is willing to make a huge move, backed up by buying a $100 million equity interest in the company. This also should result in propping up the disappointing stock performance with the added money put in and added exposure being part of the huge Viacom family will bring when it comes to cross-promotional opportunities. At this point, a potential merger of CBS and UPN is on the drawing board but has yet to be approved by the FCC and there is a monkey wrench in the works as it regards Chris-Craft Industries.
At press time, UPN is owned 50% by Viacom and 50% by Chris Craft. Viacom, which is in the process of merging with CBS, now wants complete ownership of the network, or they don't want to be involved in it at all. According to a story in the 3/13 New York Times, they gave Chris Craft an ultimatum to either sell them the other half of the company, or buy out their shares, a decision which they wanted made by 3/20. Viacom has proposed having its shares, should Craft not want to sell, bought out for only $5 million. While that sounds like a ridiculously low price for half of a network, Craft wanted to maintain the current agreement because it doesn't want to have to absorb the heavy losses the network is still incurring even with its improvement over the past season in ratings. Up to this point in its existence, the UPN network has lost $800 million. Craft is also going to court to stop the Viacom-CBS merger under the claim that Viacom owning CBS would make them less interested in improving UPN. Craft's main point in the lawsuit is a clause in its contract with Viacom for joint ownership of UPN that clearly states Viacom is forbidden from making a deal with any competing network. Viacom's defense is that the merger with CBS is only on the table, and not in effect, thus at this point it has yet to have broken the non-compete clause in the contract. The company has requested in injunction from the New York Supreme Court to block the CBS/Viacom merger, which, if successful, could blow up the CBS/WWF deal.
If CBS and UPN become under the same umbrella owned by Viacom, the rumored deal goes through, it would give CBS total rights to WWF programming in the United States as well as the XFL, which it is believed would air on Sunday afternoons on UPN. If not, it's doubtful CBS on its own would be willing to pay that kind of money simply for a cable package, when it wouldn't even have exclusivity of the product. The money CBS would pay WWFE for the equity stock interest would cover the estimated league start-up costs. CBS, which skews dangerously old, is apparently interested in getting involved with programming that is some of the youngest skewing programming available. The belief is the USA cable package would move to TNN, which would undergo a name change and facelift so it would have less of a Southern country music aura and start appealing to a younger demographic. This would also leave TSN in Canada without the WWF, which may result in that network giving stronger promotion to WCW, which also airs on the station, or taking ECW, which would really boost ECW's visibility in what is traditionally a very strong wrestling country. ECW has evidently believed for some time that the deal is happening, as they've positioned TNN from their biggest ally a few months ago, to their storyline hated enemy, positioning its audience if the WWF deal goes through and they lose their time slot. There are industry sources who believe the CBS deal is as good as done, and statements made by USA Network officials that they don't need WWF indicate the decision has already been made not to match the CBS offer. Some industry sources claim such a decision that has already been made. Losing WWF programming would put USA in jeopardy of losing its status as the highest rated prime time cable network. Other industry sources recall back in 1987, during another period when the WWF was considered a hot television property, although not on the current level, when ESPN believed it had signed the WWF deal away from the USA Network, only to be left holding the bag when WWF, having given ESPN the impression they were with them, signed a ten year deal with USA. ESPN, having already cleared a time slot, went with a past its prime AWA as a Tuesday night prime time vehicle and drew decent ratings at the start, but ultimately it failed as the AWA weakened.
As in 1985, when the landscape changed the course of wrestling history, such as TBS and Ted Turner originally coming close to making a deal with Bill Watts, but when it collapsed and Jim Crockett bought the time slot from Vince McMahon, who was getting kicked off the station, the ultimate result was Watts' company collapsing and Crockett having a successful few years before the costs of expansion did him in, and he was forced to sell the company to Turner, who during a weak period in the early 90s nixed a proposal by the heads of TBS to fold the wrestling operation, since Turner's stations carried wrestling from the 70s, and when cable first exploded, his Georgia Championship Wrestling shows drew ratings on Saturday nights at 6 p.m. actually higher than Raw does today without any media hype. If WCW in its current money losing and ratings dwindling form survives this current free-fall, it may be because Turner sees wrestling as it is, a cyclical business that inevitably comes back strong. Of course, WCW is free-falling during what is generally considered a boom period for the industry. But that's not unlike Crockett's company in 1987. By the creation of Nitro, it was WCW that ushered in this current boom period before WWF took better advantage of it by pushing young talent while WCW never prepared for life after the next Monday.
If WWF does stay with USA, we are likely not to see much of a change. ECW will likely remain with TNN and have to work an angle making the network babyfaces, similar to Mr. McMahon becoming Vince again, and it'll work in the snap of a finger.
If it doesn't, all hell is going to break loose. What will USA Network's move be? There is said to be interest in the network at maintaining a Monday night wrestling show. WWF is not going to move from its traditional big Monday if it finds a new cable home, and the product is strong enough that its ratings are going to remain sky high. WWF has become something of a major network hit, despite being on what was a network that was one step away from the scrap heap a few months ago.
What Time Warner with the AOL merger is going to do about WCW is a major question. With the various mergers, Ted Turner no longer has the autonomous power he once had. And for someone who has publicly tried to champion good causes, the changes in the wrestling industry as far as what sells and what needs to be done to attract the male teenage and early 20s demographic that controls the industry today is not consistent with his public messages. The big company, with the merger, will be worth so much money that even the major losses WCW is currently suffering is like pennies when it comes to a $180 billion company. And even while down, wrestling has always been at the forefront of many technological revolutions, a period we are currently in, such as television, later UHF television, later cable television, later PPV, video games merchandising and internet. With its generally strong, when it's cooking, young male demos, that is likely to be the case for the next several years barring a situation similar to the early 90s when the industry itself walked headlong into a disaster caused by arrogance.
Nitro still does what would be considered competitive ratings for prime time on TNT every Monday, which is still considered in the TV industry as wrestling night. Its no longer the ratings monster it was even one year ago, but it still beats the NBA, which is a higher profile franchise. Thunder no longer can say the same for TBS, as its Ripley's Believe it or Not lead-in substantially out rates the declining Thunder. And WCW Saturday Night, on bad weeks, is the lowest rated show on TBS on the day from Noon to midnight. On better weeks, it delivers what would be considered a competitive, but by no means good, rating for the time slot and the station, that a good movie probably could beat.
There are plenty of other wild cards out there. It would be difficult without incurring huge losses at the start to open up a company from scratch, being that there is virtually no marketable top talent not under contract, unless you consider someone like Randy Savage or Jake Roberts, who a company built around would fail, or even at some point in the future, a new product featuring Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff once their WCW contracts end along with other WCW performers whose contracts expire two years down the road, which includes most of the biggest names in the company. But this company can't be ready for September, and two years from now, those big names will be two years older and they are dying as draws today.
If Nitro remains on the fall schedule, and USA Network wants to keep wrestling in its traditional time slot, and there are indications it is at least considering that if WWF leaves, it leaves ECW, which would be a free agent at that point. Clearly, to be on USA, ECW would have to greatly up its production and if USA wants them to fill two or three hours per week, they would have to move up from their mom-and-pop operation because Paul Heyman is already collapsing and aging rapidly under the current workload, and Heyman is ECW. It wouldn't die in ECW's best interest to run live, but USA may insist on a live Monday vehicle since Raw and Nitro are live even though evidence from when the promotional war was heated and Raw ran taped shows, that the difference in ratings from a live show to a taped show was non-existent. But that would put ECW is its most interesting position to date. ECW, even with its Friday night show, has never been tested on the big stage. Its PPVs do better than sustainable business, but the numbers are no better than what some pro wrestling PPVs without national television exposure have done. Its PPV show this past weekend is expected to beat out what WCW's did last month and will do this week. Its PPVs are roughly at the same level of buy rate they were before TNN entered into the picture, and TNN has only really opened up Canada. Its house show business is roughly at the same level it was one year ago before TNN entered into the picture. And its ratings, nowhere near the 2.0 level that TNN predicted for the show before it started, have yet to even beat out the lowest rated of the plethora of WWF and WCW programming. But it is still higher than everything but NASCAR and a rare major rodeo event on the station. But, like the booking of a 1,500 seat arena in Philadelphia and even smaller similar sized venues in markets the size of New York and Boston, ECW has been masters of the illusion of running packed houses during periods when the company was deep in red ink. Even today, it can point to the fact TNN is a far weaker station than USA, TBS and TNT when it comes to drawing ratings across the board (all four networks are actually available in an almost identical number of homes), and Friday night is a tougher night to draw an audience then Monday.
On Monday and on USA, if this were to happen, ECW is in the big game. Not only battling WCW for the second spot, which if things continue along the current trends, by September they may be very competitive with and even beating overall, but battling WWF. Going head-to-head will change ECW from being a company WWF helps to a company that is the WWF's enemy, a position ECW hasn't been in for years. The more successful ECW becomes, the bigger the enemy the WWF becomes. If ECW on USA results in WWF ratings being lowered, it'll create a war, which will be the best thing for the industry and the wrestlers, but will greatly escalate costs for ECW, which has had its history of financial problems. If it can beat out WCW, and there is no indication today that would happen although a lot can change in six months and if WCW doesn't get its act together, it's conceivable as a possibility, they are going to be at war with a company with stronger financial backing unless USA buys ownership interest in ECW and it results in much of the work no longer being handled by Heyman, who has the big vision, alone. USA may very well decide that three wrestling shows dividing what has been a dwindling total Monday night audience since August isn't its best recipe for prime time ratings. But if it doesn't, ECW is in the big game for the first time without a crutch. It would be on the strongest station, inheriting a huge audience, on the best night for wrestling. Of course, even if it finishes third every week on a three-team race for ratings, it'll have its greatest exposure to date and should be far stronger than it has ever been in real money terms, but in the weekly game for ratings points, it can't be a distant third and be considered a hot rising company.
But the decisions have to be made very quickly, and the short-term future of the industry will largely be determined by these decisions.
The ECW Living Dangerously PPV on 3/12 from the O'Neill Center in Danbury, CT will be remembered for one brief glimpse.
New Jack and Vic Grimes had climbed up a ladder to the top level of a scaffold, approximately 13 feet from the ground (although on the broadcast Joey Styles labeled it 40 feet). It was very high, but people have taken bumps from several feet higher heights in the business regularly, and gotten up to continue the match, but not off a platform with such poor footing. The idea apparently was for Jack to suplex Grimes off the scaffold, through a table. The 400 or so pound Grimes had just moments earlier done one of the craziest bumps anyone would ever see, stepping from the top rope, putting his foot on the ring post, and flying off with a senton onto Balls Mahoney. In doing so, Grimes had already done a spot that his hero, Mick Foley, the one who changed wrestling more than he or nearly everyone caught up in this whirlwind of a rapidly change audience for pro wrestling, had never done in his career. The reality of which that career having possibly ended just weeks earlier, hadn't sunk in, or maybe the fact he retired as a hero was far more powerful than the fact he retired.
The scaffold didn't have a large stable floor base. It had a plank like bottom that one could walk on, but hardly do anything athletic on. The side of the plank was several feet from the edge, which had a metal base on nothing else, where Grimes would take the bump from. The idea of attempting to do pro wrestling up there was ludicrous but according to other wrestlers, the two never scouted it out ahead of time and just saw it and made plans without seeing the lack of footing. But it was a live PPV and it was a chance for a pop. And like Foley, Jerome Young and Vic Grimes have already given their bodies up for the euphoric momentarily feeling one gets from a huge pop. They've just done it for a lot less money. But the truth is, Foley was doing it for less money before he got on the big TV show with the major league production, and etched in our brains memories we will live with for the rest of our lives, and changed not just a niche of the business, but the entire business.
Once Young and Grimes were on top of the scaffold, time sort of stood still. They "had" to go off. The world was watching and waiting. They couldn't do a suplex. You could see them on the top talking. New Jack gave Grimes a low blow which was kind of a stupid panic move since Grimes couldn't sell it. There was no place up there to go down. So apparently, Young was going to throw Grimes off and he'd take a bump similar to the one Foley took, and lived through twice, in his two Hell in a Cell matches, through the tables. Only Young went with him. What happened from there was instantaneous. Jack, bad foot, apparently just out of surgery, and bad hip, which rendered him far less mobile than usual in the brawling that had taken place before they got here, seemed to land almost feet first through the table, with the 400-pound man holding on. The crowd went crazy. The music was still playing. The director quickly cut away from the scene and went to a wide crowd shot. They weren't stunned, or horrified, like the similar feeling that night in Kansas City when the cameras pulled away, afraid of what might unfold at the scene of an accident, less than one year ago. They were euphoric. The guys got their pop. And then some. For several minutes. Maybe if they're physically able, they'd do it again some day. And if, in that fleeting second, or in retrospect, either had a change of heart, it doesn't matter in the big picture, because several more people, caught up in the moment, are going to do it, since, after all, they both lived. Some will be luckier. And hopefully, none will be less lucky. But the truth is someone will be. One thing was clear. Sickeningly so. There is a scene coming sooner than later where someone will copy a stunt like this. And they won't get up. Ever. And unlike in Kansas City where fans were in horror, the fans will be euphoric. A wrestler will be dead. And whatever strides had been made about the perceptions of the audience that watches wrestling, will be destroyed for a generation.
What the fans could see at home at this point was a replay showing Grimes landing with all the momentum from 13 feet times 400 pounds, right on the face of New Jack. Officials were on the screen, clearly panicking. When the camera pulled away, no doubt some people remembered another scene they'll never forget on a live PPV, that night in Kansas City, where nobody really saw it happen, but everyone watching will remember what it felt like to be watching when it happened.
Eventually, a groggy Grimes was helped while New Jack's music continued to play. They cut away from the scene with New Jack laying on the ground, twitching. There was a large pool of blood coming from his head. In the dressing room, there was a legitimate brief scare that he was dead, enough to send the show into a panic and rush everything to end it as soon as possible without doing two minute matches and making it too obvious. The fact we at home were seeing everything but what was actually happening was a testament to the fact people calling the shots were scared out of their minds. To their credit, announcers Styles and Cyrus kept it together, although it almost seemed too typical pro wrestling when they told us once the panic period regarding mortality was over that they'd try to have an update on New Jack's condition later in the show, but nothing was ever said. Whatever the emotional decision was, and it was probably the right one, when the show, which was clearly being rushed from that point on to just get it over with, ended, and they showed a highlight package, the incident was never shown nor mentioned.
New Jack laid on the ground for several minutes. His music was still playing and he was still on the ground when they sent the wrestlers to rush through what had been the advertised main event three way dance tag title match. He was finally taken to the back and immediately rushed from an ambulance into the hospital. He was out of the hospital by the next day. He "only" suffered a mild concussion, an external bruise of the chest and shoulders, a bruised sternum, a cracked elbow (somewhat re-aggravating a previous injury) that won't require surgery and was able to fly home to Atlanta the next evening. He was actually able to walk around, although very sore, and talked of performing as early as this coming weekend. Paul Heyman said he wouldn't be on the shows this weekend.
Whatever else happened on the show before an estimated sellout crowd of 3,390 (about 4,000 total) paying $96,400, didn't seem important. It was a well booked entertaining show featuring matches that would mainly be forgotten by the next day when four new hours of television were there to be digested. The production was heavily criticized as being poor, even by ECW standards, as the arena looked dark, thus giving the impression of a small crowd, and the sound mixing wasn't good either. The preliminary indications according to Paul Heyman are that the buy rate will be the company's strongest in history based on Monday morning returns, easily beating WCW numbers for SuperBrawl.
There was definitely heat among some wrestlers feeling New Jack and Grimes had raised the bar of expectations for the rest of the crew in a business that is already dangerous enough and made it very difficult on the people following them on the show. The feeling was that the two came up with the spot without even scouting out the scaffold to realize what they planned would be impossible to pull off.
A. In a dark match, Mikey Whipwreck (John Watson) pinned Pit Bull #1 (Gary Wolfe).
The show opened with Joey Styles and Joel Gertner, when Cyrus came out. Gertner and Cyrus teased a fight, with Gertner not backing down. To show fans will buy anything, they actually bought Gertner, who had played the role of the ultimate fat sissy for more than a year, now as a tough guy babyface against a pro wrestler with years of experience. Cyrus, playing heel, backed down. Gertner turned his back like one of those idiot babyfaces on Nitro, and Cyrus laid him out with a kick. Styles tackled Cyrus to pull him off, but it did give a storyline reason for Cyrus to do the announcing the rest of the show, and in many ways he was the star of the show in that role.
Next up was Steve Corino, who started insulting Lori Fullington, the Sandman's wife, and his son, both of whom were involved in one of the heaviest ECW angles where she, in the role of a strung out junkie, left Sandman for Raven taking her son with him, which nearly resulted in ECW never getting on PPV in the first place. But now everything is apparently Peaches. Corino did the expected insults, saying she did everyone in the dressing room, said the Raven thing wasn't an angle and called her a whore. She slapped him. He threw her in the ring while Rhino and Jack Victory held her. He teased like he was going to pull down his pants when, after actually way too long given how strong the angle was going, Sandman arrived. Just before he could save her, Rhino speared her through a table. Sandman covered her while the heels put the boots to her. Finally he carried her to the back, basically to give a storyline reason why they didn't even bother having the advertised Rhino vs. Sandman match, perhaps because their previous TV match was so bad and not putting Sandman in the ring except to drink beer and make a big save is probably the best use of him these days on a PPV.
1. Dusty Rhodes (Virgil Runnels) pinned Steve Corino in 10:13 with an elbow drop in a bullrope match. Who would have ever thought that Rhodes, now 55, would be in the longest match of the show? Rhodes didn't get nearly the pop you'd expect. The match was terrible, and Rhodes surprisingly showed no charisma to match his complete lack of mobility. But the crowd didn't mind because they got a lot of blood. Rhodes and Corino both juiced from the head after doing the cowbell shots. Rhodes also scraped the cowbell on Corino's arm, so he bladed his arm. They mainly brawled in the crowd until the finish. Rhodes appeared winded from doing nothing. It was way too long for these two. Rhodes in the ring finally hit Corino and Victory with an elbow. H.C. Loc, who had done an angle on TV where Corino had bloodied him, taped a cowbell to Corino's head (this was real clumsy looking) and Rhodes hit the bell with a chair, then dropped an elbow on him for the pin. 1/2*
2. C.W. Anderson (Chris Wright) & Bill Whiles beat Danny Doring (Dan Morrison) & Roadkill (Mike DiPaolo) in 7:23. A plant tried to kiss Doring before the match causing Electra to go berserk. Doring jumped off Roadkill's back to do a dive over the top on both foes. They went to near falls with Doring & Roadkill doing a lot of big moves. Doring hit a legdrop off the top on Anderson. Roadkill was on the top when Electra turned on him and grabbed his leg, causing him to crotch himself. Lou E. Dangerously, who had bragged how the PPV show was named after him, hit Doring with his cell phone and Anderson pinned him after a spinebuster. *1/2
3. Mike Awesome (Mike Alfonso) pinned Kid Kash (David Cash) in 4:44. This started as Kash vs. Simon Diamond (who is actually out with an injury). Jeff Jones came out for no apparent reason, leading to Awesome coming out. Hey, at least it wasn't Sid. Awesome told everyone to leave the ring or he'd beat them up. Diamond and entourage Prodigy (Tom Marquez) and Mitch got out of town but Kash stayed there and the match started. Kash did a springboard plancha clearing the guard rail which was a hell of a move. He delivered a double arm piledriver on Jones and jumped off the top rope with a huracanrana on Awesome. Awesome came back with one Awesome bomb through a table, followed by the same finisher he used on Spike Dudley at the last PPV, where he stood on the middle rope holding Kash in power bomb position, then climbed to the top and did the power bomb off the top through a table for the pin. This was a shorter version of an Awesome vs. Spike match. ***
4. Nova (Mike Bucci) & Chris Chetti beat Gedo (Keiti Takayama) & Jado (Shoji Akiyoshi) in 7:33. This actually started at the end of the last match when Jazz was checking on Kash. For whatever reason, they are trying to say Jazz and Kash have a platonic friendship. Gedo & Jado then came out to attack Jazz, leading to Nova & Chetti making the save and getting this bout underway. Chetti has really gotten out of shape, made more obvious by his ring outfit. Gedo, who is a hell of a worker, did a moonsault off the middle rope to the floor on both men. Jado did a super bomb off the ropes on Chetti but Nova saved. They worked real hard but missed a lot of spots, ending with Nova & Chetti doing the Tidal wive (both jumping off the same top turnbuckle) onto Gedo for the pin. 3/4*
5. In a TV title semifinal, Super Crazy (Francisco Pantoja Islas) pinned Little Guido (James Maritato) in 7:47. Crazy opened doing a top rope Asai moonsault on both Guido and Sal E. Graziano. They were trying to push hard the idea that Guido isn't a comedy character any longer. On the spot, Crazy wanted to move the guard rails in, and he barely got them to move in, so instead of doing the move off the middle ropes, did it off the top so he could clear the rails. Guido juiced after two chair shots. Crazy came off the top off Sal's shoulders but was met by Guido getting his feet up. Guido started whipping Crazy with Graziano's belt. Finish was Guido coming off Graziano's shoulders for an elbow onto Crazy on a table but Crazy moved and Guido went through the table. Crazy then hit a quebrada and used a brainbuster onto the broken part of the table for the pin. The original plan was for this to be a three-way with Yoshihiro Tajiri, but they decided to get Tajiri involved in the main event instead. ***
6. Balls Mahoney (John Rechner) pinned Kintaro Kanemura (Yukihiro Kanemura) in 1:58. Kanemura hit Mahoney with two chair shots that he didn't sell. Mahoney avenged his loss at the Yokohama Arena show in November by quickly winning with a nutcracker suite. Apparently Kanemura was pretty banged up. DUD
The previous match was really just to set the stage for the run-in. The Baldies all attacked Mahoney leading to Grimes doing his dive off the post onto him. Fans all knew New Jack was coming. He got rid of Tony DeVito and Angel with weapons including a guitar shot on Angel. Grimes, who was still selling the previous bump, got up and he and Jack brawled to the part of the building where the scaffold was.
7. Lance Storm (Lance Evers) & Justin Credible (Peter Polaco) regained the ECW tag titles beating Raven (Scott Levy) & Awesome and Masato Tanaka & Tommy Dreamer (Tom Laughlin) in a three-way dance in 9:06. Raven came out and did his snot rag and drop toe hold of Dreamer's face through a table right away. Tanaka back suplexed Awesome through a table and pinned him with the roaring elbow in 4:32. It happened so suddenly, the announcers really never got over how the world champion was pinned cleanly by a single move, and it didn't have nearly the impact with the fans that doing something like that to elevate Tanaka should have. The crowd was still down because of the New Jack bump. Credible gave Tanaka a hard cane shot and they doubled on Dreamer, bloodying him up. Finally Storm piledrove Tanaka, and both guys gave Dreamer a stuff piledriver and Storm pinned him to regain the titles. Cyrus hit the ring to congratulate the new champs. There was nothing wrong with anything they did but it was rushed and didn't have much heat. **
8. Crazy pinned Rhino (Terry Gerin) in 7:56 to win the TV title tournament. Before the match started, Cyrus and Paul Heyman argued, with Heyman making the point of how much ECW should hate TNN, setting the stage because of the belief they have that they're being booted when the WWF deal comes in. Gertner came back and had a confrontation verbally with Cyrus. Crazy opened the match doing a dive off ref Jim Molineaux's back. Rhino pressed Crazy over the top rope through a table. He also speared a table when Crazy moved. Crazy did his three moonsault spot when Tajiri showed up and blew green mist in Crazy's eyes and started throwing the stiff kicks at him. Molineaux was bumped on the third moonsault, which actually appeared to miss Molineaux but he had to sell it anyway. Tajiri & Rhino were destroying Crazy until Rob Van Dam, with his leg in a big cast, showed up with Scott Antol (WCW's former Scotty Riggs, and they very clearly made it a point never to call him anything but Scotty since Riggs is a gimmick name he used first in WCW and ECW and WCW are at legal odds these days). Van Dam put Rhino through a table, selling his own leg in the process and Crazy pinned him after a moonsault. After the match, Rhino speared Van Dam and Scotty, and Corino and Victory came out to lay everyone out until Sandman made the big comeback cleaning the ring with the cane, and offered cans of beer to Crazy, Van Dam and "Scotty" as the show went off the air about 25-30 minutes early. *3/4
World Championship Wrestling had what was on paper its most successful weekend in at least a year, drawing three consecutive sellouts, largely very enthusiastic fans, and selling out of all merchandise in the United Kingdom.
While the gates were huge, the reaction to the shows by the time they were over was typical of the WCW shoot yourself in the foot tour 2000. Birmingham drew 11,812 paying $383,976. London drew 10,450 paying $375,411 and Manchester drew 16,318 (which had a few thousand empty seats which were technical holds so the building itself was sold out of available seats) paying $447,436. WCW didn't seem fit to even announce this level of success on television when they came home. On the surface, that would seem like great news, and WCW has planned a return for November. But reports indicate the crowds were hot to see a big show, and WCW brought out all the trappings such as the pyro, the Nitro Girls along with injured stars like Bret Hart, Buff Bagwell and Kevin Nash, but reports from the shows were strongly negative across the board at the wrestling itself, and the fact that the perceived top guys like Sting, Bill Goldberg (who were both on the tickets themselves) and Sid Vicious weren't there. Goldberg, Page, Sting, Scott Hall and Billy Kidman were all either advertised ahead of time as being on the tour or listed as being there in the program.
Hart was clearly the biggest star on the tour, getting huge reactions for interviews in all three cities, with loud chants for both himself and Owen Hart. Hart received a standing ovation in London, talking about his 1992 match in Wembley Stadium with Davey Boy Smith which he said was his best match of his career, and strongly hinted on the final night that this would be his last appearance ever in the U.K. and was visibly choked up about it. Hart in Birmingham talked about his 1997 match in the same building against Undertaker. In Birmingham he said that he was advised not to fly, but had waited three years to come back to England and said he would wrestle if there was any way he wouldn't be putting himself at serious risk by doing so. He then said he didn't want to wind up like Muhammad Ali or not be able to remember all the good times he's had throughout his career. He actually brought up his memory losses from his latest concussion and how it scared him into reality and ended by saying this may be goodbye forever, getting a hue standing ovation.
Most reports indicated that Vampiro got the loudest response of WCW in-ring wrestlers every night, something of a surprise since he's only started getting pushed on television. The main event all three nights were a disappointment. On the first night, they used Ric Flair vs. Curt Hennig on top, and from all indications, they had a good technical match that the crowd wasn't into, with lots of "Goldberg" chants and even chants for Sid Vicious and overall the two not getting heat. After the match, Lex Luger and Elizabeth did a run-in, leaving Bagwell to make the save and the show actually ended with Bagwell in the ring with his music playing, saying "You didn't get Goldberg and you didn't get Sting, but you got Buff and he's the stuff." Needless to say, that interview wasn't exactly well received by the audience. The second night in London, the main event started as Lex Luger vs. Booker, which ended when Flair and Hennig both interfered and commissioner Kevin Nash turned it into a tag match. There were no chants for Goldberg because the fans were told when the card started it would be an eight match show, and if the Luger vs. Booker match which turned into a tag was counted as two matches, it was, but most of the audience assumed there was still a main event to follow, and when there wasn't, they left disappointed. Nash, who has dropped the amnesia Commissioner Gordon gimmick, was on crutches despite being on two major television shows promoting the tour walking around and acting fine. They put Flair & Luger vs. Vampiro & Hennig in the middle of the card in Manchester (even then, Vampiro was the only wrestler really over with the crowd except for Bagwell doing the run-in at the finish) on the final night, with Bagwell interfering leading to Hennig pinning Flair while at the same time Luger pinned Vampiro. This led to a hugely disappointing main event, headlined by local boxer Steve "The Viking" Foster working as outside the ring second ref for the Mamalukes tag title defense against the Harris Twins. The match had no heat and lots of missed spots with fans filing out as it was going on. Ron Harris actually grabbed the house mic and ripped on the fans for not caring about the match. Reports were the match was terrible. Foster, who weights about 168 pounds today, a local level boxer who in 1997 once challenged for the WBO light middleweight title, using a right hook to floor Ron Harris and fast counted the pin after the first ref was bumped. Foster, we're told, wasn't a big enough name to actually help sell tickets and most of the fans in attendance didn't even know who he was.
The first night in Birmingham, Nash came out in a wheelchair and ordered Elizabeth to the back before a Luger vs. Vampiro match with Luger won with the rack, when Elizabeth showed back up and hit Vampiro with the bat. Nash was said to be embarrassing, badly slurring his words. Nash also ordered Elizabeth away from the ring on the third night, again on crutches.
The tour also featured several Nitro girls, including Miss Hancock performing in that guise doing her distracting the wrestlers routine, in addition to being Skye dancing as a Nitro girl in a totally different outfit. Jeff Jarrett missed the first night of the tour, apparently because he had lost his passport and before the problems could be cleared up he had to take a later flight. Vicious wasn't there. According to WCW sources it was because he's not allowed in the country due to the Arn Anderson incident in 1993 when they got into a very serious fight while on tour, however in 1996 while working for the WWF, he did appear in England. Vicious was doing autograph shows in the U.S. over the weekend.
In a funny segment in London, Jim Duggan got the crowd chanting "USA" in his match against U.K. wrestler David Finlay but it didn't go over as well in Birmingham which had a younger audience that didn't remember Duggan from the WWF days as well. In Birmingham for the main event, Michael Buffer announced Hennig as a "six-time world champion."
All Japan received a major dose of bad news on 3/13 when Nippon TV announced it was lowering its rights fees to broadcast the promotion and moving the shows from Sunday at 12:45 a.m. to Wednesday nights from 1:45 to 2:15 a.m., considered an even more death of a time slot.
Even though the group saw its television ratings increase in 1999, that was largely due to huge ratings in the first quarter in the aftermath of the death of Giant Baba and the retirement of Jumbo Tsuruta. Still, the shows were very competitive through the end of the year drawing what has to be considered strong numbers and even stronger market shares, usually winning its time slot, but wrestling has become lower priority within the NTV family.
The news came at about the same time the promotion announced a new format this year for the Champion Carnival tournament. Instead of the more physically taxing format, which created so many unique match-ups, they are doing a more traditional single-elimination tournament, a 16 man tournament which means the eventual champion only has to wrestle four singles matches as opposed to the usual 12 hard singles bouts in previous years.
The bracketing for the tournament, in order, consists of first round matches of Steve Williams vs. Akira Taue (3/26 in Nagoya), Wolf Hawkfield vs. Jun Izumida (3/29 in Fukui), Takao Omori vs. Jun Akiyama (3/26 in Nagoya), Mike Barton vs. Masao Inoue (3/25 in Tokyo), Toshiaki Kawada vs. Mitsuharu Misawa (3/31 in Hiroshima), Vader vs. Yoshihiro Takayama (3/30 in Osaka), Johnny Ace vs. Kenta Kobashi (4/1 in Okayama) and Johnny Smith vs. Tamon Honda (3/24 in Tokyo). The second round matches will take place between 4/2 and 4/8, with semifinals on 4/9 in Sendai and 4/11 in Kanazawa and the championship match on 4/15 at Budokan Hall.
The bracketing seems pretty clear that Akiyama will make the final four against either Williams or Taue, and probably go to the finals from his side. Current Triple Crown champ Kobashi is in the final four against either Kawada, Misawa or Vader, any of which could go to the finals. It's interesting that Misawa vs. Kawada is a lock with the winner facing Vader and the winner of that going to Kobashi making the bottom half of the bracket far stronger than the top half. All tournament matches are pretty well guaranteed clean finishes since the matches have no time limit.
The only reaction one would have to the main event storyline at the Rikidozan Memorial show on 3/11 at the Yokohama Arena is that WCW level booking stupidity occurs on major Japanese shows as well.
From the start, the idea of a Shinya Hashimoto & Naoya Ogawa tag team, while good for gaining press, seemed like the worst idea because of the nature of their heated angle. And after an angle-filled strange show, with an attempt to duplicate one of Japanese wrestling's legendary scenes, the late 1987 introduction of Big Van Vader (who destroyed Antonio Inoki in two minutes in his Japanese debut, which actually caused a riot, which was bad, not good, that night, but ended up through improving greatly over the next several months actually became a superstar in Japan anyway), this time with 7-2 former college basketball star Ron Reis. What's curious about Reis is that he's a legit 7-2, and is several inches taller than Paul Wight, but because he was never put in a position to be pushed, his height in wrestling was always decreased as opposed to exaggerated by the few to many inches than pro wrestling traditionally does with tall performers. Reis has flopped across the board with both the Americans and Japanese trying to teach him to be a wrestler, playing the monster foreigner role as B.B. Jones. In the end, what looked great on paper, Jones, under a mask as the gigantic foreigner, a throwback to the Sharpe Brothers in the Rikidozan era as well, pinning Hashimoto, and in one night making himself a superstar, wasn't great in practice. As it turned out, the disappointing crowd of 9,000 fans (announced as 13,500), showing that while fans will pay to see Hashimoto "fight" Ogawa, they aren't interested in seeing them work pro wrestling angles (this is almost a WCW level lack of understanding of what made the angle work and not understanding how it can't be done as a typical "pro wrestling angle"), laughed at the main event and groaned at the finish. A new Big Van Vader wasn't created as much as a new Gasper Brother (one of New Japan's flop angles during a down period in the 80s).
And when it was over, in order to build heat for the next Hashimoto vs. Ogawa match on 4/7 at the Tokyo Dome, Hashimoto, after being pinned dramatically in this tag match, at least on paper, was to announce that if he didn't win the Dome match, he'd retire. Unfortunately, this angle that should have been a dramatic comeback to a bloodied defeat, came off as bad comedy, and adding a retirement stipulation, that due to context, didn't get taken seriously.
Overall, the show, which looked bad on paper, was even worse live, said to be one of the worst major shows in Japan in a long time. Aside from the opener, which even then was below par considering the talent involved, there wasn't one pro wrestling match that could be considered good. The most exciting matches after the opener were actually a shoot match involving Yuki Kondo of Pancrase, and there was a big pop for current teenage rock sensation Hideaki Takizawa, 18, who sang the national anthem and then pinned Antonio Inoki in a comedy match.
Complete results saw: 1. Magnum Tokyo & Gran Hamada beat Cima & Sumo Dandy Fuji in 18:25 when Tokyo pinned Fuji after a Michinoku driver. This, combining three wrestlers from Toryumon with Hamada from Michinoku Pro, who all do the same Japanese lucha libre style, was said to be the only good match on the show; 2. Naoki Sano of Takada Dojo pinned Yuki Ishikawa, the boss of Battlarts, in 11:30 in what was said to have been so-so; 3. Yuki Kondo of Pancrase in a shoot match choked out Kan Tenjun of Korea in :40. This was an explosive exciting match since Kondo was given an easy opponent. After the win, Kondo announced his next match would be 5/26 at the Tokyo Dome (he didn't announce his opponent who is expected to be Saulo Ribiero, the winner at 191 pounds in Abu Dhabi last week); 4. Commando Boilshoi of JWP & Yumiko Hotta of AJW, beat Kayoko Haruyama & Ran Yuyu of JWP in 10:10 when Boilshoi pinned Haruyama with a reverse uranage. Also said to be so-so; 5. In another womens match, Yoshiko Tamura & Yuka Nakamura & Kyoko Inoue of Neo Ladies beat the JWP trio of Dynamite Kansai & Tsubasa Kuragaki & Azumi Hyuga in 16:36 when Tamura made Kuragaki submit. Said to be kind of boring; 6. Yoshiaki Fujiwara, at age 50, returned to the big stage in a legends match against old rival Satoru Sayama, winning with a leglock in 10:56. Said to have been passable; 7. Junji Hirata of New Japan & Ryuma Go of his own promotion beat the New Japan team of Tadao Yasuda & Osamu Kido when Hirata pinned Yasuda after a schoolboy. It was said to be decent when Hirata was in, which was most of the way. Go was said to be terrible, which was expected, but he wasn't in much; 8. In a total comedy skit billed as an exhibition match, Hideaki Takizawa beat Antonio Inoki in 3:57. This match got a huge reaction because Takizawa is such a big deal right now that a lot of teenage girls, who didn't react or care about any of the other matches on the show, bought tickets to see him. Inoki clowned around and sold because Fujiwara would interfere. Finally, Takizawa got the pin after a people's elbow. Not all that long ago, Takizawa sang at a baseball game and drew 20,000 extra female fans, so the belief was his appearance would lead to this show drawing tons of women, but that wasn't the case; 9. In the Big Japan vs. FMW feud, Big Japan stars Ryuji Yamakawa & Tomoaki Honma beat FMW headliner H along with prelim boy Naohiko Yamazaki in 18:58 when Yamakawa pinned Yamazaki with a reverse tiger driver. Said to be so-so; 10. In what was said to be a terrible match that the fans booed, Yoji Anjoh, the former UWFI and Kingdom star who most recently was fighting in K-1, beat indie wrestler Tarzan Goto via DQ in 13:37. Both looked terrible. Both juiced and Goto used objects like a fork, a chain and some chair shots before he finally was DQ'd for hitting the ref. Fans booed the match and the finish; 11. Jones & Genichiro Tenryu beat Hashimoto & Ogawa in 8:51. The storyline for this, totally unbeknownst to the live audience, is that at 5:30 p.m., with no witnesses or cameras, Ogawa's regular tag partner Kazunari Murakami jumped Hashimoto in the parking lot and bloodied him up. At first, Hashimoto didn't even come out for the match. When he finally came out, he was walking real slow to sell the injury. Ogawa worked the first five minutes before their pre-arranged stipulation of Hashimoto going in. Hashimoto worked with Jones, who threw him outside the ring and brawled with him, causing the audience to, laugh. That wasn't the idea, and it got worse because Hashimoto was selling a serious beating and Jones' offense was anything but serious.
The 3/10 UFC PPV show was, on paper, a one match show
and the one match didn't take place.
The long-awaited heavyweight title shot for undefeated Pedro Rizzo wound up with a legitimate backstage accident and very strange handling of that accident causing the show, which had been very exciting up to that point, to end on a somber note.
Heavyweight champ Kevin Randleman, some time after the PPV itself started, was backstage warming up and as he went through a curtain, stepped on a pipe, somehow lost his balance described like someone slipping on a banana peel, and cracked his head on the floor and also hurting his shoulder somewhat. He had to be taken from the Lake Charles, LA Civic Center to the hospital, and according to Dr. Richard Istrico on the broadcast, suffered a concussion, threw up in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, and there was no way they were going to let him fight that evening. After the accident, Randleman at first wanted to fight, and the decision was made to send him to the hospital and if he could pass a CATSCAN, he'd be able to fight, but once he threw up in the ambulance, it was a telltale sign he'd suffered a concussion. It was handled very clumsily on the air and to the fans.
During the show, they had an early interview with Rizzo, but as the show went on, really didn't hype the main event like they had in past shows. The show appeared to be running late, as it was already nearly 11:30 p.m. after the scheduled semifinal match of the live show, a heavyweight match between no-names Tedd Williams and Steve Judson. At that point they went backstage and had interviewer James Worme and Istrico announce that there would be no main event due to the injury to Randleman, a position neither looked comfortable in. Jeff Blatnick then talked about hearing rumors but not wanting to say anything on the air, even saying that's why at certain points in the broadcast he was distracted, and going on a long speech about the fighters' safety being the primary concern and said he had kept it from play-by-play announcer Mike Goldberg throughout the show. Goldberg then said he hadn't even heard about it until five minutes earlier.
This left a show, promoted as a one match show, with the rest of the card filled with fighters with no national name, some of whom looked very impressive in the cage but none displayed that superstar future drawing card charisma either, working for $1,000 each. If there was a saving grace, it was that the matches were very exciting, in particular a war between Bob Cook vs. Tiki (Ghosen), built up on TV as being part of an ongoing storyline drama between Frank Shamrock (Cook's coach) and Tito Ortiz (Tiki's coach), who were acknowledged as being friends now and having even recently been training partners. When Randleman went down, while there were fighters at the show who they probably could have gotten at the last minute to take the fight with Rizzo, being that it was held in a commission state, it would have been impossible to license and check them out on such short notice. There was talk of putting Scott Adams, an unknown heavyweight who looked impressive in a preliminary fight and who came out of the match without a scratch, into the main event, but that didn't materialize either because UFC doesn't want to put fighters in two fights on the same night. The plans are, once everything is worked out, to put the two together in a match either in June or July.
This certainly was another major blow for an organization that has been on the ropes for some time, but this was clearly not the way to end a show probably purchased by largely only its most hardcore fan base, because from a name value standpoint, it was its weakest card to date. In the building, the crowd (said to be not a sellout, but a pretty packed house) booed the lack of a main event pretty hard, but UFC officials were said to be relieved that there was no riot and only small refund chants. There were no indications at press time of any significant call for refunds at the satellite dish level. Virtually no PPV companies carry the show for all the political reasons gone into to death and with the situation of late with pro wrestling PPVs, such as the WWF's premeditated false advertising of Steve Austin at Survivor Series in November and WCW's still advertising Bret Hart on television in January with knowledge the advertised main event wouldn't take place. Of the three situations, clearly the UFC handled it poorly live and WCW at least re-did its pre-game show to give the information so WWF's handling of the situation was by far the most deceptive.
At the show, it was announced that the next PPV would be 4/21. It was never announced it would be a Japanese show or that it would be a tape delay of a card on 4/14 at Tokyo Yoyogi Gym. The previous two Japanese PPVs are generally considered two of the weakest shows in company history and with the nature of how news travels these days and UFC only appealing to a hardcore base, doing a show on a week delay doesn't seem to make sense. The show is scheduled to be headlined by Tito Ortiz vs. Vanderlei Silva for the vacant middleweight title which has little marquee value in the U.S. and even less in Japan, but on paper looks to be a hell of a match. Eugene Jackson would also face a Japanese fighter and it is expected several Japanese, but no major name Japanese, would face Americans on the show. Since Randleman suffered a concussion, it would be in nobody's best interest to put him back in the octagon for at least the 90 days after an in-ring concussion that UFC mandates. It had been rumored that Pat Miletich would also vacate the lightweight title at the show, but in his interview, when talk of retiring came up, he said he was looking at retiring later in the year but talked of fighting again and brought up Cook as a possible opponent.
With no recognition, there were no real crowd pops for any of the fighters. The only people the crowd reacted to as celebrities were Frank Shamrock and Ortiz, who six months earlier in the same building, probably before largely the same fan base, had their now classic match.
1. Shonie Carter won a unanimous decision over Brad Gumm after two 5:00 rounds. Carter threw some nice judo hip tosses. At one point Carter threw the old Akira Maeda captured suplex, but right on landing, Gumm trapped him in a triangle choke for more than one minute before Carter broke free. In the second round, Gumm got a mount but Cater reversed him. It was a close competitive fight.
2. Scott Adams beat Ian Freeman in 3:09. Adams was billed as a master of leglocks, and he went from move to move. Freeman seemed to have experience enough to roll away from the pressure but Adams finally locked the heel hook on and got a tap. Adams seemed a throwback to the old style of pure submission fighters, but his stand-up was never tested since Freeman was never able to stay vertical.
3. Jens Pulver beat David Velasquez via ref stoppage at 2:41 of the second round. This was originally billed as a 150-pound weight class billed as the super lightweights (in a sport where lightweights weigh 170, a super lightweight should weigh more based on boxing vernacular but I guess that's a minor point). Both came in at 157 and they agreed to that weight. Pulver was formerly with Bob Shamrock but switched to training with Miletich. Velasquez was trained by Frank Shamrock. Pulzer was too strong physically and had better stand-up so he dominated an exciting fight. Velasquez stayed up from some very strong punches. Pulzer took him down late in the first round and mounted him, and nearly had an armbar at the bell. In the second round, Pulzer mounted him and threw punch after punch with Velasquez unable to escape and bloodied before ref John McCarthy stopped it.
4. Bob Cook beat Tiki (Ghosen) in 1:26 of the second round. This was one of the most exciting UFC fights in a long time. Tiki was larger and appeared to be physically stronger. Cook is one of those guys who can take a pounding, but never lose confidence of panic. Cook was unable to take him down, and was getting the worst of it early on the stand-up. But Cook nearly got an armbar early before Tiki powered out. Tiki blocked some takedowns and landed on top. However, Cook was in better condition and by the end of the round was connecting on a lot of punches, enough that the first round was even. Tiki was clearly tiring, and Cook was able to take him down and get a mount in the second round, threw punches from the mount causing Tiki to turn, and sunk in a choke for the tap out.
5. Dave Menne beat Fabbiano Iha via decision after three 5:00 rounds. Iha seemed a little better on striking than before, but Menne was still stronger. First round was close but Menne did a little better on the stand up. In the second round, Menne grew stronger, on top and throwing good body and head shot combinations. Menne's right eye was swollen shut by this point, apparently from a thumb which knocked his contact lens out of whack, so he couldn't see from that eye but still dominated. Iha kept taking Menne into his guard to avoid the stand-up, since Menne, even with one eye, was dominating him. Menne was very experienced at working within Iha's guard with more combinations and captured an easy decision.
6. Lance Gibson beat Jermaine Andre via knockout in 3:38 of the third round. Another competitive match. First round was Gibson dominate, taking Andre, who was a muscular muay thai fighter, down. He nearly got an armbar but Andre reversed him, and bloodied his nose with a left hook. The pace slowed in the second round as they had a stalemate near the fence. Fans were booing for the first time in the show. Gibson nearly got a wristlock and Andre broke the hold with almost pure shoulder power. Third round saw Gibson pin Andre against the fence and smother him, and when Andre's head was down, Gibson brought up a knee to the chin and knocked him out.
7. Tedd Williams beat Steve Judson via knockout in 3:21. This was an exciting match as Judson, a 234-ripped physical specimen, seemingly fell victim to the bodybuilders plague in UFC (blowing up suddenly). Williams, a 286-pound wrestler with some strong credentials and unbeaten in MMA, looked like one of those big baby huey types to where if people saw both on the street, they'd think Judson would pummel him in a fight. Judson came out fast throwing punch after punch, most of them missing. Williams early on acted as if he was a one-dimensional wrestler, just tying up and not even taking Judson down. When Judson tired, Williams started punching, and connecting. Judson collapsed after being hit with a left jab, probably as much from exhaustion as the blow itself.
For 3/13, Raw delivered a 6.28 rating (6.09 first hour; 6.45 second hour) and a 10.0 share. Nitro dropped to a new low level of 2.53 (2.92 first hour; 2.19 second hour) and a 3.9 share. Nitro's first hour was beaten by Walker: Texas Ranger which did a 2.98. Raw tripled Nitro over a 30 minute period late in the head-to-head.
The retirement stipulation in the Rock vs. Show match and return of McMahon actually meant nothing to the ratings, since neither the overall number, nor the rating for the main event were up over usual levels. Rock vs. Show started at a 6.39 for the final quarter and grew to 7.25 over-run. The latter is exactly what the show averages for its main events. Nitro's main event of Hogan & Hennig vs. Flair & Luger did a 2.51 rating, one of the lower ones ever. For whatever reason this week, Raw picked up virtually none of the audience once Nitro went off the air, gaining only 3.6% of the nearly three million viewers watching the Hogan match once the show went off the air.
Head-to-head comparisons were: Raw at 5.98 (opening angle with HHH, Stephanie, Shane & Show) to 2.33 (Luger vs. Hennig), Raw at 6.08 (Continuation of opening angle plus Rock appears, Hardys vs. Snow & Blackman) to 2.10 (Dog vs. Smiley, Funk vs. Knobs), Raw at 5.98 (Dudleys vs. Henry, angle with Mae Young) to 1.86 (Harris Twins vs. Sid & Vampiro) and Raw at 6.23 (Angle vs. Tazz vs. Jericho) to 1.93 (Stevie Ray vs. Disco).
WWF Smackdown on 3/9 drew a 4.54 rating and 7.1 share.
WCW Thunder on 3/8 tied its record unopposed regularly scheduled low set the previous week with another 1.93 rating and a 3.1 share. This means both Thunder and Nitro reached record lows on WCW's last two prime time shows. The high point was Artist vs. Psicosis (2.46) and low point was Jarrett vs. Vampiro (1.54). The audience basically declined throughout the show with the exception of a .4 bump upwards during the Flair/Anderson angle, after which the Meng-Finlay-Abbott angle dropped immediately down the .4.
ECW did a 1.14 rating and a 2.0 share on 3/10. RollerJam did an 0.60. The show peaked at 1.26 for Gedo & Jado vs. Credible & Storm while the tag title change with Raven & Awesome beating Tanaka & Dreamer did a 1.21.
Weekend numbers for 3/11-12 saw Livewire at 1.8, Superstars at 1.8, Sunday Night Heat at 3.25 and WCW Saturday Night at 1.5
OBSERVER POLL RESULTS
Results of the Observer survey on phone calls, fax messages and e-mails as of Tuesday, 3/14:
UFC FIRST DEFENSE: Thumbs up 44 (55.7%), Thumbs down 24 (30.4%), In the middle 11 (13.9%). Best match: Bob Cook vs. Tiki 48; Worst match: Dave Menne vs. Fabiano Iha 6; Lance Gibson vs. Jermaine Andre 4
ECW LIVING DANGEROUSLY: Thumbs up 30 (48.4%), Thumbs down 17 (27.4%), In the middle 15 (24.2%). Best match: Mike Awesome vs. Kid Kash 17, Little Guido vs. Super Crazy 10; Worst match: Balls Mahoney vs. Kintaro Kanemura 26, Dusty Rhodes vs. Steve Corino 12
EYADA POLL RESULTS
Results of the poll question on the eyada.com web site. New questions will be up every day at approximately 3 p.m. Eastern time with the results being announced at the start of the Wrestling Observer Live internet audio show the following day along with each week here.
In the situation with Paul Heyman and Sabu do you think Heyman should: a) Give Sabu a clean release to go to WCW 44%; b) Suspend him and put him on ice as long as he can 11%; c) File suit against him for breach of contract 29%; d) Continue to use him as a full-time worker 16%
What was the best TV show of the past (2/29 to 3/6) week? a) Raw 40%; b) Nitro 2%; c) ECW on TNN 33%; d) Smackdown 23%; e) Thunder 2%
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For PPV coverage, I'm on option seven approximately 20 minutes after the completion of the show. We run down the major angles and results right at the start before getting into the details of the show. There are option eight reports up later in the evening to get a different perspective. The reports stay up through the next PPV event.
Upcoming shows covered will be 3/19 WCW Uncensored, 4/2 WWF Wrestlemania, 4/10 New Japan Tokyo Dome (option seven only), 4/16 WCW Spring Stampede, 4/30 WWF Backlash and 5/1 DSE Tokyo Dome (option seven only).
For back issues of the Observer, the "Wrestling Observer Index" lists almost every issue in our history going back more than 17 years with the major headlines by the week. Besides as a guide for ordering back issues, the Index is also a great way to keep a catalog of past issues and use for historical purposes. It is available for $15 from Grant Zwarych, 151 Hart Ave., Peterborough, ON K9J 5C5 Canada. Virtually every back issue from 1982-90 is available from him for $5. Most issues from 1991-present are available from us at $4 per issue. If you are ordering back issues from us, please denote back issues on the envelope to insure the quickest response. All payments to Grant or to us must be made in U.S. funds.
We are also working with Powerbomb Publishing (www.powerbomb.com) to have re-issues of some of the most popular Wrestling Observer publications of the past. We have the 200-page book "Tributes," featuring life stories on Andre the Giant, Bruiser Brody, Junkyard Dog, Brian Pillman, Louie Spicolli, Dick the Bruiser, Buddy Rogers, Kerry Von Erich, Fritz Von Erich, Boris Malenko, Art Barr, Eddie Gilbert, John Studd, Ray Stevens, Dick Murdoch, Jerry Graham and others for $25. We have 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1990 Observer yearbooks for $15. We have 1983, 1984, and 1986 Observer yearbooks for $12. We also have the 1986 Wrestling Observer's Who's Who in Wrestling book for $20. For each order, add $4 for postage and handling within North America, $6 for surface mail worldwide or $14 for airmail overseas. If you are ordering more than one book, you only need to add $1 extra postage per additional book. All payments should be made to "Powerbomb" at P.O. Box 1523, Carrboro, NC 27510.
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Bryan Alvarez and I open the show every day running down the latest news. We either have guests the remainder of the show, taking listener's phone calls and e-mails, or we take calls and e-mails. Even if you don't have access to a computer and just want to talk wrestling, you can reach us between those hours within North America at 1-877-392-3200 (1-877-eyada-00) or from outside North America you can call collect and reverse charges at 1-212-977-1859. You can always e-mail questions for the show 24 hours a day to us at davemeltzer@eyada.com. You can always check the wrestlingobserver.com web-site for the latest guest information.
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We also have late breaking news headlines on wrestlingobserver.com which also includes television reviews and columns written by Bryan Alvarez and Alex Marvez.
RESULTS
3/5 Rotterdam, The Netherlands (International Mixfight Association - 4,000): Bob Schreiber b Hugo Duarte, Rene Rooze NC Heath Herring, Gilbert Yvel b Brian Dann, Cacareco b Moti Horenstein, Jose Pele Landy b Martin de Jong, Allister Overeem b Can Sahinbas, Valentijn Overeem b Dennis Reed
3/7 Boston Fleet Center (WWF Smackdown/Heat tapings - 12,951 sellout): Sho Funaki b ?, Inferno Kid b Tim Lowery, Chris jericho b Dean Malenko, Edge b Big Bossman, Too Cool b Head Bangers, Matt Hardy b Viscera, Rock b Chris Benoit & Perry Saturn, WWF lt hwt title: Esse Rios b Christian, IC title: Tazz b Kurt Angle-DQ, Road Dogg & X-Pac b Kane, Steve Blackman b Jeff Hardy, Tables match: Dudleys b Rock, WWF womens title: Jacqueline b Ivory, Hardcore title: Crash Holly NC Prince Albert, Big Show & Hunter Hearst Helmsley b Rikishi Phatu
3/7 Winston-Salem, NC (WCW Thunder - 5,109/1,098 paid): David Finlay b Barbarian, Chavo Guerrero Jr. & La Parka b Silver King & Dandy, WCW cruiserweight title: Psicosis b Artist-DQ, KISS Demon b Idol, Ernest Miller b Maestro, Dustin Rhodes b Lash Leroux, David Finlay NC Meng, Big Vito & Johnny the Bull won four-way for tag titles over Ron & Don Harris, Billy Kidman & Booker and Big T & Stevie Ray, U.S. title: Jeff Jarrett b Vampiro
3/8 Indianapolis (WWF - 16,874): Godfather b Mideon, Bradshaw b Prince Albert, Too Cool b Head Bangers, Steve Blackman b Christian, Rikishi Phatu b Big Bossman, WWF lt hwt title: Esse Rios b Crash Holly, WWF tag titles: Dudleys b Hardys, IC title: Kurt Angle b Edge, Rock & Kane b Hunter Hearst Helmsley & Big Show
3/8 Robinsonville, MS (Memphis Championship Wrestling TV taping): Blue Meanie b K.Krush, Masked Man #1 (Itty Little) b Brickhouse Brown, Todd Morton b Fabulous rocker, Chip Diver NC Reckless Youth, Tomahawk b Bull Pain-DQ, Meanie b Jim Neidhart, Youth b Morton, Curtis Hughes b 1/2 Masked Man (Hollywood Little), Jerry Lawler b K.Krush, Rocker b Danny B, Pain b Youth, Masked Man #1 b Neidhart-COR, Steve Regal b Meanie, Lawler b Hughes
3/8 Tokyo Korakuen Hall (LLPW): Shark Tsuchiya b Miho Watabe & Aya Koyama, Noriyo Tateno b Crusher Maedomari, Mizuki Endo b Carol Midori, Eagle Sawai & Sayuri Okino b Shinobu Kandori & Keiko Aono, LLPW title: Harley Saito b Rumi Kazama
3/8 Glen Burnie, MD (Maryland Championship Wrestling - 700): Chad & Chip b 2 Dope & Sydeswype, Ronnie Zukko b Gregory Martin, Adam Flash b Qenaan Creed, Christian York & Joey Matthews b Rich Myers & Earl the Pearl-DQ, Nova b Steve Corino, Cue Ball Carmichael & Dino Divine b Danny Rose & Gillberg, Tom Brandi b Romeo Valentino, Julio Fantastico b Corporal Punishment, The Bruiser b Jimmy Cicero-DQ
3/9 Odawara (All Japan women): Nanae Takahashi b Kayo Noumi, Zap T b Miyuki Fujii, Yumiko Hotta b Takahashi, Kaoru Ito & Miho Wakizawa b Kumiko Maekawa & Manami Toyota
3/9 Carolina, PR (IWA TV taping - 1,000): Andre Borges b Mikami, Ricky Santana & Sean Hill DDQ Miguel Perez & Huracan Castillo Jr., Andy Anderson b Nuevo Gran Apolo-DQ, Savio Vega & Perez & Castillo b Fidel Sierra & Hill & Santana (somehow Perez & Castillo wind up as IWA tag team champions), Ricky Banderas DDQ Sierra, Santana & Castillo Jr. b Jesus Cristobol (not original) & Steve Bradley, Victor the Bodyguard DDQ Castillo Jr., Cristobol b Rastaman
3/10 Birmingham, England (WCW - 11,812 sellout): Norman Smiley b David Flair, Bam Bam Bigelow b The Wall, Booker b David Finlay, WCW tag titles: Big Vito & Johnny the Bull b Ron & Don Harris, Dustin Rhodes b Terry Funk, Lex Luger b Vampiro, Curt Hennig b Ric Flair
ECW: The ECW Magazine has temporarily suspended operations. Subscribers have been given the option to take WOW Magazine, which comes from the same publishing house, or get a refund. The magazine did poorly when it came to newsstand sales
The 3/10 TNN show was one of the best shows they've ever done. It opened with the long Rob Van Dam/Cyrus angle where Van Dam gave back the TV title. While the premise of Van Dam having to give the title back to keep ECW's TV show or TNN would drop it was pretty far-fetched, it was Van Dam's best mic performance to date and Cyrus is tremendous in the role. Rhino pinned Spike Dudley in 6:15 after a piledriver. Dudley took his usual great bumps. It wasn't even noticeable he had the knee injury, which probably isn't a good thing. They gave Dudley a near fall after his Acid drop but Steve Corino hit the ref. He then gave Jack Victory the Acid drop, but Rhino speared Spike through a table. Storm & Credible beat Gedo & Jado. The final 6:30 aired and this was the most heat and the best match on ECW TV (and on ECW PPV for that matter) in a long time. Based on what aired, this was very close to match of the year level. Storm & Credible came off looking like the team they've been pushed as truly for the first time all the way. Gedo looked great while Jado actually looked good. The finish was a spike piledriver on Jado and Storm pinned him. Even though Gedo & Jado have no reason to be over, they were because they were in a good match, and it worked on television because they created a storyline context of what this match was for, tried to explain why Gedo & Jado were good (Gedo having beaten Chris Benoit, Chris Jericho and Dean Malenko was brought up by Joey Styles, of course not mentioned that was all around 1995). They aired the tag title change with Awesome & Raven beating Tanaka & Dreamer in 12:11. This was better than I was led to believe. It wasn't close to the previous tag match, but the crowd was into it and it was very good as well with some new spots. Dreamer blocked the drop toe hold into the chair by grabbing the chair on the way down and hitting Raven. This built to Raven giving him a drop toe hold onto a table, with Dreamer's face going through the table which looked pretty dangerous. Awesome ended up pinning Dreamer after a power bomb through a vertical table. The show ended with the guy with no name doing a devil-like interview basically recapping the top angles. It's pretty clear they are going to push Awesome for the time being as a double champion as a way to act like he one-upped Van Dam, who held the TV and tag team title at the same time for a while
The 3/25 show originally scheduled for St. Louis has been moved to Wichita, KS, and the 3/24 show in Kansas City will be at the Uptown Theater and not the old Memorial Hall.
WCW: Uncensored line-up for 3/19 in Miami is Artist vs. Psicosis for the cruiserweight title, Vampiro vs. Finlay falls count anywhere, Mamalukes vs. Harris Twins for tag titles, Wall vs. Bigelow, Harlem Heat vs. Kidman & Booker, Knobs vs. Three Count in a gauntlet match for the hardcore title, Smiley & Demon vs. Lane & Rave, Rhodes vs. Funk bullrope match, Sting vs. Luger lumberjack match with the lumberjacks all wearing casts, Hogan vs. Flair in a strap match and Vicious vs. Jarrett for the WCW title. All TV commercials playing for the show only talk about Hogan vs. Flair's strap match with the feeling that Vicious vs. Jarrett is death on top. Not much more than 3,000 tickets had been sold less than a week out
Nitro on 3/13 in Providence, RI drew 2,809 paid and 3,187 comps for a $84,105 house. Aside from lack of interest in the current product, WCW has a track record of doing really poor shows in Providence. It opened with Flair calling out Anderson and asking him to join Team Package. Anderson turned him down and Flair freaked out. Anderson called out Hogan and told Hogan that he wouldn't interfere in the strap match at Uncensored. Hogan hit the ring on Flair. You couldn't help but think how old the two guys looked. Luger hit Hogan with the bat and Flair started whipping him with the belt. Hogan sold his shoulder and they ended up telling him to go to the hospital in an ambulance. This injury angle was so soon after him doing the arm deal that his stuff has become a bad wrestling parody. Anderson was good, but nowhere close to the work Flair & Anderson did on the previous Thunder. Three Count beat Jung Dragons in 3:26 when Shannon Moore pinned Jamie Howard with a sleeper hold dropped like a neckbreaker. These six guys worked their asses off. I love WCW's creativity. When Jerry Lynn wore a mask (remember that?), he was called Mr. J.L. When Jamie Howard wears a mask and is supposed to be playing the part of a Japanese wrestler, they call him Jamie-san. Like there are any Japanese kids named Jamie. Shane Helms suffered a legit broken nose. Moore did a top rope Asai moonsault to the floor and everyone else did spectacular dives as well. It was slightly sloppy in spots but it was the most entertaining Nitro match in a while and for a few minutes it seemed like watching Nitro was something fun. Anderson left the building saying he was going home to see his kids. Silver King & Dandy tried to pick up on Miss Hancock. There was something about this skit that was funny. Bigelow beat Wall in :43 when he handcuffed him to the corner. Crowbar hit the ring and gave Wall the worst pipe shot in the history of wrestling. Wall then came back with a high kick to Crowbar, but fell down doing the move. Wait, it gets worse. Wall choke slammed Crowbar once and then threw him over the top rope. David Flair showed up with a better crowbar shot. David celebrated and looked ridiculous doing so and wound up choke slammed off the apron onto Crowbar through a table. Wall went back to beating up on Bigelow. Bigelow got released from the handcuffs and did a promo after the Jarrett interview calling Wall "World." Jarrett did an interview showing clips of guitar shots and called out the Harris Twins who challenged Sid and anyone to a tag match. Sid accepted and said he'd do it on his own. Vampiro came out and agreed to be Sid's partner. They did this embarrassingly bad vignette with Jake Strauss, the guy with the gigantic arms. Orndorff was running around at the Arnold Classic like the single most annoying mark at a wrestling show fawning over this guy like he's going to be the next Buddy Rogers simply because he's got big arms. Booker & Kidman beat Lane & Idol in 2:49. They're doing an angle where Miss Hancock likes Kidman and Torrie Wilson threatened her. That has potential, so they'll probably drop it next week. Idol's new name is Rave because apparently the people close to Billy Idol threatened WCW for using the name. It doesn't matter what his name is because he looked awful. Booker did all his moves on Lane and went to the top for the missile dropkick when Kidman ran in and schoolboyed Lane for the pin. Kidman and Booker argued again afterwards. Hogan drove the ambulance back. It was so predictable. Also, his shoulder was now all better. Hennig beat Luger via DQ in 1:39 when Flair interfered. Luger looked horrible even by his standards. Flair was whipping Hennig with the belt when Hogan limped in and ended up challenging them to a tag match in the main event. In one of the lamest gimmicks to date, Dog got loose from Knobs and apparently he was drinking out of the toilet. Actually I just saw him on his knees in the bathroom with Knobs telling him to stop. It took several minutes before it was explained what he was actually doing. It got worse, Dog wrestled Smiley. Smiley won in :56 with a chicken wing. Smiley spanked the dog before the match. Demon, Lane and Rave all showed up in this totally awful segment. After the match Dog went after Scott Dickinson, with Mark Madden mentioning that Dickinson's full-time job is a mailman (which is true). That idea when it was explained was really funny. Dog tried to tree Smiley backstage after the match. Knobs challenged anyone to a hardcore match so Funk showed up. They both smashed each other with garbage cans. Moore & Karagias came out and Knobs was giving them pitty city. Karagias came off the top hitting Knobs with the hardcore title belt and Karagias dragged Funk on top for the pin in 2:55. Then Karagias & Moore beat up Funk after until Funk & Knobs joined together to clean house with Funk using his loaded chicken. Finally Rhodes came out and hit Funk with a cowbell. None of this was good. Tony Schiavone put over "Beyond the Mat" and Funk's part in it strong in this match. Funk had asked him to mention the movie as a favor during his match and Schiavone played it up big because he personally loved it. Finlay did an interview vowing to shove Vampiro's head into the toilet at Uncensored since they are doing a falls count anywhere match. They also added a stip that will add zero buys to the show (these bookers have lost the very concept on why you book stip matches and why people want to see them) making Sting vs. Luger a lumberjack match with lumberjacks with casts on. The guys without broken arms are going to have to put casts on. I guess Hogan is the only guy allowed not to wear the cast after doing that gimmick. Sid & Vampiro beat Harris Twins in 3:41. Sid missed every move he tried. Vampiro was better, but really couldn't work at all with the twins. They did the H-bomb on Vampiro, making sure nobody took him seriously as a top guy even though he's the only new guy with a semblance of momentum, and Sid pinned Don after a power bomb. Stevie Ray beat Disco in 2:17 with a slapjack. Harris Twins attacked Mamalukes backstage so they didn't come out with Disco, who was oblivious to it. Disco tried to get out of the match but Big T and Cash surrounded him. Finally Flair & Luger beat Hogan & Hennig via DQ in nine of the most excruciating minutes in Flair's career. Again they end the show with nothing but guys over 40, and they were almost unwatchable. It was said because nobody cared at all. Hogan was DQ'd for shoving the ref. Liz hit Hogan with the bat and the lights went out. Somewhere in all this, Vampiro came out as did Sting. Crowd did pop for Sting. Vampiro & Sting cleaned house on Luger & Flair as the thing ended
Thunder was taped 3/7 in Winston-Salem, NC. There was one great thing and one good thing on the show. The angle with Flair and Anderson was the best angle on any WCW TV show in months, and except for the Foley retirement speech, Anderson did the best interview from any promotion so far this year. Also, on the World Wide tapings, apparently the tag match where Chavo Jr. & Parka beat Silver King & Dandy (who at one time were a great tag team together in Mexico) was really good and the crowd got into it. Thunder taping opened with Artist vs. Psicosis. Misterio Jr. came out and got a healthy pop doing commentary. Juventud Guerrera was at ringside. After a ref bump, Psicosis had a pin but Guerrera counted to three, but the ref instead DQ'd Artist at 3:01 to keep the title. They used to call that the Dusty finish and it was known for killing cities and territories. Now people just yawn. You know, the few that still buy tickets. Demon pinned Idol in 2:13 with a rock bottom. Miss Hancock came out and kissed Idol, who was stunned enough for Demon to score the pin. Lane laid out Demon after the match until Smiley made the save. What a tag match this is building up for. They did a lengthy interview where Bigelow was mad at Wall for starting him in the business (actually Wall was started by Larry Sharpe, who started Bigelow, but in storyline, wasn't Wall this German bodyguard for Alex Wright?) and what he turned into. The monster Wall then choke slammed Bigelow through a table and destroyed David Flair and Crowbar again, winding up with all three going out on a stretcher. Miller beat Maestro in 1:29 after hitting him with the boom box. Rhodes pinned Leroux in 1:07 with a bulldog. This started when Rhodes attacked Leroux during an interview. The interview was suspicious from the start since Leroux never gets interview time and he had nothing to say. Come to think of it, the latter is no different than most of WCW's main eventers when a mic is put in their face. Funk attacked Rhodes after the match, knocking him out with a loaded chicken. Now that was funny. Rhodes made a comeback beating up Funk with a loaded chicken. Flair & Luger did an interview with Elizabeth. Flair told Luger that Anderson would apologize to him. Flair called out Anderson. This started out as sad as it could be because Anderson got no pop in Winston-Salem. But Anderson did a great promo, made even stronger with Flair standing there and saying more standing there than just about anyone in wrestling says when they won't be quiet. They suddenly transformed, for one brief moment, WCW into the best wrestling company of all-time. It was almost like a dream. Then came the next commercial, and it was a dream. Luger was standing there like a bump on a log, well, a bump on a log with 4% bodyfat. Basically, Anderson said they were both lousy fathers and husbands since they were on the road 200 days a year. Flair came off like a crazed overaged playboy hanging around Luger so he could still be cool. It was great, but in a sad sort of way. The negative is that even if these guys do the greatest promos, or even the greatest matches, which isn't going to happen since Anderson can't wrestle, they are doing nothing to help the problem which is WCW does nothing to build for the future. If this was a build-up for Flair vs. Benoit with Anderson in the corner, it would be tremendous. As a build-up for nothing, it is a very entertaining moment that means nothing for the company. I guess we should just be thankful that there are any entertaining moments on the show. When Mark Madden told Anderson how well received that segment was, Anderson responded saying, "That must mean I'm going to get fired." We're told the people in charge didn't like the segment, under the guise that there was nothing in the angle that built anything to the upcoming PPV or house shows thus it was counterproductive. Meng wrestled Finlay. Abbott came out and all three destroyed all the NWA Nashville guys acting as security. Now think about this logic. Abbott hits the ring to get at Meng. He and Meng beat up everyone in their path until they are the last two standing. Then they both leave without even going after each other. Then it was asked if we would ever see Meng vs. Abbott. Didn't we already see it months ago and it was lousy at the time? A WCW Saturday Night promo aired, building up a Jarrett U.S. title defense and a Mamalukes tag title defense. What was funny about that is both still had title matches left on the show so they basically gave away in the promo that neither title was changing. A four-way saw Mamalukes beat Harris Twins, Kidman & Booker and New Harlem Heat in 10:47. What a mess. Heat was out first. Then Booker accidentally kicked Kidman, who was pinned after an H-bomb. Finally Johnny was bloodied up by accident (cameras panned away from him fast). Disco hit Don Harris with the title belt and Johnny pinned him. They gave Disco an H-bomb after the match. Match was real bad. Only thing good was Disco's commentary at ringside. They announced Heat vs. Booker & Kidman for the PPV. Add that to the string of great matches Kidman has been put in. They announced Knobs having to run the gauntlet against all three members of 3 Count on the PPV. Finally Jarrett pinned Vampiro in 4:59 to keep the U.S. title. The Harris Twins came out but the Mamalukes chased them away. Match had no heat and even though they did a lot of false finishes, they didn't work together well so it was disappointing. Told that Jarrett somewhat blamed himself because he was suffering from the flu. Vampiro had the title won after hitting Jarrett with the belt and Jamie Tucker was in to count the fall after Nick Patrick had been bumped, but Patrick pulled Tucker out. While both were distracted, Jarrett used the stroke on the belt for the pin. The original plan for this match was for Vampiro to get the title when Vicious laid out Jarrett after a ref bump. Either earlier in the day or the previous night, Vicious asked for Thunder off and was given the day off. The feeling, and this is correct, is that it would be stupid to beat Jarrett in any way except Sid costing him the title, because it would weaken the PPV main event, so they changed the finish to Jarrett going over, but probably sometime within the next month they'll do the match again with the planned title change
Thunder on 3/14 in Fairfax, VA in front of a hot crowd and was said to have been a major step in the right direction with an overall very good show. They opened taping Worldwide with Moore & Karagias vs. Jamie-san & Yang ending in a double count out. Said to be a really good match, even better than the Nitro match but the finish left it flat. THE ARTIST HIT THE DDT. TWICE ON THE SAME NIGHT. You read that front page headline correctly and it was an omen of good things to come, until Hogan's match of course. Prince retained the title over Leroux in a match described as being much better than their SuperBrawl match. Lane pinned Chuck Palumbo. Thunder started with Parka & Chavo Jr. over Silver King & Dandy. Some good stuff and some awkward stuff. Silver King & Dandy are now called Los Fabulosos with the idea that they think they are the latino gift to women. Luger & Flair did an interview. Jimmy Hart came out and said that Flair was like he is because he's jealous he'll always be second best to Hogan, bringing up Hogan being asked to be on Larry King and not Flair, etc. Team Package ended up beating up on Hart and whipped him with the belt. Hart told Flair to make it as legitimate as possible and he ended up with major welts on his back, side and stomach legit. Psicosis pinned Hayashi in a hot match. After the match Artist DDT'd Psicosis. Abbott destroyed Buzzkill in 15 seconds. Wall attacked David Flair backstage and teased choke slamming him off the balcony. Before he could, Bigelow attacked Wall and they had a pull-apart. Wall was then arrested. Jarrett kept the U.S. title beating Booker when the Harris Twins interfered giving him the H-bomb. Another really good match with lots of near falls. They all beat up on Booker until Sid cleaned house, throwing the worst punches in history. It looked so bad for Jarrett having to sell as Sid looked the absolute worst he has on this run. Booker yelled at Kidman backstage for not making a save for him. Vampiro pinned Hugh Morrus in what we're told was the match of the show. Morrus got most of the offense in and looked great including a Cactus Jack elbow off the apron. Dog & Knobs beat Smiley & Demon when they did the dog pound, (double-team powerslam off the ropes) on Demon. Real bad. Rhodes pinned Kidman after hitting him with the cowbell. Rhodes kept pounding on Kidman until Booker made the save but Booker was still mad at Kidman. The show didn't end on a good note as Hogan wrestled a handicap match against Flair & Luger. Hogan threw a horrible big kick, being unable to get his leg up, threw horrible punches and even worse chair shots and clotheslines. There was no finish as Hogan chased Flair to the back and his music played
Luger and Elizabeth were apparently in a car accident before the show and it was touch-and-go if they would appear. Their rental car was said to have been hit by a bus, and a back-up plan for the main event was talked about, but they did arrive and Luger was able to work
"Entertainment Tonight" interviewed Hogan at the show
Bischoff has another meeting this week with TBS brass about trying to get out of his contract and the no-compete clause
D.J. Ran has been signed for a new contract
Kanyon, Sting, Crowbar, Leroux, Kid Romeo and others will be appearing in a Bif Naked Music video debuting on MTV Total Request Live next weekend
Morale is at an even lower level than before. The latest stems from Bret Hart having his contract cut in half while being out of action due to the injury. While in England, Hart privately told several of the wrestlers the first two nights most of what he pretty well said in the ring in Manchester about there being a good chance his career is over and he was pretty choked up about it. When the word got out about his contract, it brought up the old double standard and selective enforcement since Goldberg in the same situation for the same amount of time hasn't gotten his pay cut, as haven't virtually all the big names when they've had time off for injuries like Sting. The feeling is also if they would do it to Hart, that you'd have to be really high on the food chain now to avoid it, but still with the knowledge the people they see as the very top people still won't have the rules applying to them
Knobs shaved Wall's eyebrow and some of Flair's eyebrow while both were out of it during the England tour
Latest idea regarding shootfighters is to bring Mark Coleman, Don Frye and maybe one or two others in, include Rick Steiner in the group, and have them be managed by Paul Orndorff. God they have no clue how to do this
I'll bet this will surprise everyone. Jake Strauss, the bodybuilder they showed with Arnold Schwarzeneggar with the gigantic arms and with Orndorff embarrassingly fawning over him on the second Nitro segment, has been training at the Power Plant under Orndorff since WCW signed him with the idea of giving him a big push, but he's showing no potential at all
Bret Hart will be taping two episodes of "Off the Record" on 3/17. The first will be a panel discussion with Terry Holt of the St. Louis Rams and a comedian which airs on 3/17 and the second will be a solo episode which airs on 4/4
Gene Okerlund, 57, was arrested for a DUI late on 3/10 in Sarasota, FL, actually booked at 1:26 a.m. the morning of 3/11. His arraignment is 4/7
The release of "Ready to Rumble" has been moved up from 4/14 to 4/7
The Larry King Live segment for "Beyond the Mat" scheduled for 3/15, was at press time scheduled to be taped on 3/15, but moved to 3/17, because the King people felt it would be in their best interest not to put is head-to-head with either Thunder or Smackdown
Christopher Daniels was signed this past week
Michael Modest is expected to get a try-out on the 3/21 Thunder tapings in Orlando
Jay Haseman, who headed the PPV division, was fired. There had been heat on him ever since he was the one who got the blame for the screw-up at Havoc in 1998 when WCW increased the show to 3:30 from the usual 2:47, and somehow most of the cable companies never got the word, leading to most of the companies cutting off the Goldberg vs. Page title match
Casey Collins, who was the licensing director for the company for the past three years, gave notice that he'd be leaving for an internet job in Tampa
The Jung Dragons are Kaz Hayashi, Yong Yang (a Power Plant guy) and the masked guy is Jamie Howard from Florida who they pretend is oriental
Chris Candito and Tammy Sytch were backstage at Nitro in Providence, RI and are both in. They want Candito to do the cruiserweight bully gimmick (you know, the idea that Nash bounced around where an American would beat up all the cruiserweights and thus expose their moves as ineffective except against each other, which is exactly the kind of mind set the company needs to build for the future) and there are no concrete plans for Sytch
Apparently the latest WCW Magazine has a photo of Tank Abbott holding the knife to Big Al's throat and even says as much in the caption
Trainees Kid Romeo (shoulder injury, possible torn rotator cuff) and Mike Sanders (double hernia operation) that were working Nashville are on the shelf
Former WCW announcer Lee Marshall's morning show on KVEN in Ventura, CA was selected as one of the three finalists for Best Radio Newscast by the Southern California branch of the Associated Press. That isn't a made up story
Thunder on 3/7 in Winston-Salem, NC drew 1,098 paid for $31,030
For the period from 2/28 through 3/7, merchandise at the arenas was $92,431 or $5.93 per head.
WWF: Wrestlemania tickets at Southern California ticket brokers are going from $100 for the nosebleed seats up to $1,000 for the first four rows and they are having no trouble getting people to pay those prices
For whatever this is worth, Kevin Kelly was on WNEW in New York on 3/14 saying the Wrestlemania main event was going to end up being the three-way instead of Rock vs. HHH in a single
Raw at the Continental Airlines Arena on 3/13 drew a sellout 15,003 paying $389,196. It was the same open with Shane & Stephanie saying they made a truce, and brought out two midgets saying they were going to be Rock's opponents at Wrestlemania and made a bunch of short people jokes. They joked about making it a tuxedo match but said they don't make tuxedos small enough so it should be an evening gown match. Rock came out and challenged Show to a match for the title shot and agreed to retire if he lost, but made the stipulation that any interference helping Show would result in Rock getting the title shot and not having to interfere. The rest of the show was filled with interviews from people predicting the outcome, similar to what WCW did to build a huge rating for Sid vs. Tank a few weeks back. Actually that idea is good when you've got a big match, and they definitely pushed the idea this was a big match. Hardys beat Snow & Blackman in 3:17. Blackman came off the top with a high kick on Jeff. Matt then was supposed to hit Blackman with a moonsault block, but missed him completely on the move, so Matt got up, not selling the missed move, and used an inside cradle. This wasn't one of the Hardys good matches. Dudleys vs. Henry in a handicap match ended without a finish. Buh Buh took a bad bump from a backdrop. When he got up, he left to kidnap Mae Young in a wheelchair. Moolah was supposed to be guarding her but they were starting the Moolah heel turn apparently for a Moolah vs. Mae match at Mania. Buh Buh brought her to the entrance ramp and teased the idea of shoving her off the wheelchair to the floor. When he teased doing it, the entire crowd cheered their approval. Before getting to this point, they laid Henry out with a 3-D but never bothered to pin him. Buh Buh picked Young out of the wheelchair and power bombed her off the stage onto a table. He protected her well, and it was set up with a table and lots of cardboard underneath so it wasn't that dangerous, except they overshot and Young's head missed the table and nearly hit the floor, which would have had a really tragic result. Buh Buh was concerned about it to be worried at the bottom until she squeezed his wrist to indicate she was okay. The place erupted for the spot. Maybe some day someone can label it a pop for die for. Angle won a three-way over Jericho and Tazz in 3:10 when Chyna gave Backlund a low blow and Angle hit Jericho with the title belt and got the pin. Tazz choked out Backlund at one point earlier. HHH & Road Dogg & X-Pac beat Too Cool when HHH pinned Rikishi clean after X-Pac hit him with the ring bell in 4:59. Somebody is getting over a little too strong for some people, which will become really apparent with the Smackdown results. Kane pinned Bossman in 3:09 with a choke slam. By the way, last week when we wrote Mae Young was aging fast, it was because she facially is looking noticeably older in the past few weeks. But it's now part of the angle, since two weeks ago she was 76 and now she's 80. Moolah called her a bitch several times saying she was stealing Moolah's spotlight. The idea out of all this looks to be that they have to have Moolah over as a huge babyface by the first of the year because she's got a book coming out then. The only way to make a huge babyface out of her is to make her a strong heel first (same way the only way McMahon could rehab his image after the Hart deal was to become a super heel, so when he made his turn, he'd become an instant super face). Malenko won the light heavyweight title form Esse Rios in 4:15 with a heel block. No heat but technically this was the best wrestling on the show. Actually, most of the matches again had little heat but this was deathly silent. Lita went for her huracanrana off the apron onto Guerrero, but he caught her and power bombed her on the floor in a great spot. Acolytes beat Edge & Christian when Edge speared Mideon, who is an Acolyte protege flunky type role now, and Bradshaw hit the stiff clothesline on Edge for the pin in 3:05. Edge & Christian beat up Mideon after. They pushed Chyna on 3rd Rock and Rock on SNL. In the shortest lived title reign in history, they had a brawl at the baggage claim at the airport and Pete Gas got a three count on Crash Holly, but literally seconds later, Crash pinned Gas, was given back the belt, and ran to safety. Benoit & Saturn beat Venis & Test in 4:25 when Benoit pinned Test with a german suplex after Guerrero interfered. Rock pinned Show in 9:15. Shane booted out Earl Hebner and took over as biased ref. Show accidentally clotheslined Shane. Rock gave Show the people's elbow and Hebner ran down to make the count but Shane stopped him. The limo showed up and Vince got out and he decked HHH with one punch and stormed to the ring to a gigantic pop. Hands of stone then KO'd Shane with one punch and took his ref shirt off and put it on himself. Rock used a piss poor rock bottom on Show and Vince counted the fall
Smackdown on 3/13 at the Nassau Coliseum. The show opened with dark matches with Scott Vick over Sho Funaki. Vick looked bad as he missed a lot of spots and these two didn't look like they were on the same page. The Dupps, now called The Dupes, beat Fantastico & J.R. Ryder. For Heat on 3/19, Test pinned Gangrel. Trish Stratus was out there scouting and Test "noticed" her. Scottie 2 Hottie pinned Rios in a fast paced match. Mideon beat Bossman via DQ when a bald guy ran in attacking Mideon. Albert pinned Abs and Venis pinned Viscera in a terrible match. Stratus was scouting Albert. For Smackdown, it opened Shane saying that he never said if Show lost he was out of Mania, only that if Rock won he was in, so it's a three way dance. HHH & Stephanie came out with Show & Shane. Finally Vince came out and said what they have been doing is bad for business (yep, sellout crowds almost every night are the worst things possible for business) and he'd make things right. Dudleys beat Edge & Christian. After a ref bump, Terri threw in a chair and Buh Buh hit Christian with it for the pin. As Terri left, the Hardys threw her back in the ring and Edge speared her. Godfather beat HHH when Show and Shane interfered. Acolytes beat Snow & Blackman. Rikishi pinned Show when HHH and Stephanie came out and HHH gave Show the Pedigree. Jericho & Tazz NC Angle & Backlund via DQ. Tazz and Backlund brawled into the crowd and never came back. Benoit attacked both Angle and Jericho. Crash Holly was at Funland USA when the Head Bangers attacked him. Crash ended up running away before losing the title. Malenko retained the light heavyweight title pinning Grandmaster Sexay when Guerrero interfered. Not that great. Chyna danced with Too Cool after the match. Caryn Mawr came out, probably not for TV. Saturn & Benoit double count out Hardys. Said to be a disappointing match. HHH & Show attacked Kane backstage and threw him in a box and locked him up. Kane was supposed to wrestle Rock. Vince said that X-Pac would wrestle Rock instead. Match ended with Kane escaping and going after X-Pac, so Rock was DQ'd, and Kane cleaned house with Rock on everyone as the show ended and Rock & Kane did their poon tang pie speech
The Jim Hellwig lawsuit against WWF claiming breach of service marks, unauthorized use of servicemarks and trademarks (in particular using the phrase "Always believe" in merchandise which Hellwig had come up with) as well as defamation of character (for going on television and saying Hellwig was suspended for no-showing dates) as well as WWF's lawsuit against Hellwig (to keep Hellwig from using the names Warrior or Ultimate Warrior in any business endeavors in the future) were both settled out of court on 3/3 in the middle of the Arizona lawsuit with Hellwig as the plaintiff. Terms of the settlement were kept confidential
Billy Gunn, after his shoulder surgery, was given word that it would be about six months before he could return to action
Some notes from the Continental Airlines Arena show before Raw started. They had dark matches where the Dupp Brothers, doing the same picking their butts and picking their noses gimmick as in ECW, lost to Rodney & Pete Gas in a match nobody cared about. Scott Vick, who looked impressive, beat Joey Abs. They taped several matches for the syndicated show. Caryn Mawr also did a couple of segments. Overall reaction was that the crowd popped huge for the Dudleys putting Mae Young through the table and of course for the return of Vince, but was dead during Kane vs. Bossman, Acolytes vs. Edge & Christian and Malenko vs. Rios. When the cameras went off, they didn't do anything added big since the fans live already got their babyface pop finish and went home happy
The Village Voice for 3/14 had a brief item about Bob Backlund and his run for the U.S. House of Representatives. According to his January filing with the Federal Election Commission, Backlund had only raised $38,874 for his campaign, more than 90 percent of the income coming from unitemized donations (t-shirts and photos). Backlund since September had spent $10,000 just to make the t-shirts. The paper noted a campaign violation, Backlund making mostly cash transactions, never handing out receipts and only asking for names when it means personalizing photos. According to law, anonymous contributions are limited to $50 and the Voice stated, "Jockbeat recommends he take a look at `Campaign Guide for Congressional Candidates and Committees' available from the FEC's web site before the feds smack him down." They also noted Backlund's business cards state, "I will increase my ability to READ.
L. Brent Bozell wrote a column in the 3/10 New York Post regarding the CBS/Viacom merger, and claimed it would unite two giants of cultural sleaze, Howard Stern and the WWF. He also brought up the murder case in South Florida, quoting the attorney for the family of the six-year-old girl that was murdered saying the brain damage was consistent with the effects of a stone cold stunner (?) pointing out the 12-year-old boy (whose own lawyers, headed by Jim Lewis, are also blaming pro wrestling for his behavior) was a big wrestling fan. The attorney for the family of six-year-old Tiffany Eunick said it is probable the family will sue the WWF. The defendants lawyers, in also blaming pro wrestling for the murder, claimed he was influenced by the TV soft drink commercial where Sting comes in the living room and throws the kid around
Dwayne Johnson's testimony scheduled for this past week was postponed. Jim Lewis, the attorney for the defendant, Lionel Tate, in the murder case, who had subpoenaed Johnson, agreed to the delay pending a ruling by the judge in the case as WWF attorneys were trying to get his subpoena dismissed on the grounds it would have no bearing on the trial. There was also an article in the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel saying that less than one month after the killing, Tate told psychologists that he knew pro wrestling was "fake." Dr. Michael Brannon, the psychologist ordered by the court (it should be noted that Brannon was a former pro wrestler years back under the name Dr. Red Roberts for the Florida based Global Wrestling promotion), wrote in his report that Tate understood pro wrestling wasn't real. Tate said he knew people would get hurt if they jumped off the top rope on somebody and he explained some of the tricks wrestlers do, but he did think wrestlers sometimes got mad at each other in the ring, but that most of it wasn't real. Tate has also seen a TV show that revealed the secrets of how wrestlers did their moves (most likely the NBC Secrets of Pro Wrestling special). Tate's attorney said the report doesn't change his defense, claiming that realizing pro wrestling isn't real doesn't mean a child isn't going to be influenced to imitate the moves. Another psychologist, Joel Klass, described Tate's explanation of what he did was roughhousing "similar to throwing someone into the ring ropes, like they do in wrestling. He said he was swinging her very hard, and the grip was released and she struck an iron pole." Eunick died from a sustained brutal beating, suffering more than 30 internal and external contusions, abrasions, fractures and scratches include a blow so severe it detached part of her liver. The WWF released a written statement regarding the case saying, "To try to blame the World Wrestling Federation for the acts of this delinquent is a pathetic excuse being offered by a defense attorney without a defense.
Some U.K. numbers for the weekend of 2/24-25. Raw did 350,000 viewers, Smackdown did 260,000, Thunder did 170,000, Nitro did 110,000 and the No Way Out PPV live starting at 1 a.m. did 180,000 viewers
Richard Wilner in the 3/12 New York Post did a column on "Beyond the Mat," critical of the movie claiming it pulled its punches. Wilner was critical of the movie for not delving into issues like the steroid abuse of wrestlers or profanity-laced shows being aimed at children. Wilner was critical that subjects of steroids, profanity, risky stunts and ethnic baiting were never even raised in the movie. It's a fair criticism as far as all but risky stunts, an issue that was raised strongly in the film. It's also impossible to do a movie on wrestling and raise every important issue without it being bogged down in so many issues that none will make a point, and Blaustein chose to make his risky stunt point through the dichotomy of such an otherwise brilliant man being the one who took the stunts to new levels. Wilner wrote that Lions Gate would like you to believe the movie has gotten under the WWF's skin, saying producer Barry Blaustein has gotten a lot of media coverage based on that assumption. Wilner noted that Lions Continued on page 17.
THE READERS PAGES
BEYOND THE MAT
I caught the Thursday evening showing at San Jose Cinequest festival. It's an absolute masterpiece and I can't recommend it highly enough. I found parts of the movie very disturbing, particularly the footage of Mick Foley's family at ringside at the Royal Rumble. Parts of it were very sad. Seeing Jake Roberts staggering around drunk in a pair of torn tights practically passed out on an indie show in the Midwest and the scenes where Blaustein cut back-and-forth between Roberts in his prime and today was brilliant and heartbreaking. The Terry Funk stuff was classic.
Jim Tripp
FOLEY
I can't believe Vince McMahon is so pompous to actually believe his proposed football league, the XFL, has a snowball's chance in hell of succeeding. There have been several pro football leagues in the last 25 years that were headed by football people that flopped miserably, the WFL, USFL and the NFL backed WLAF. What will his stockholders feel once they see how much red ink the company will be in after such a disastrous endeavor? In your opinion, do you actually think McMahon will succeed in his attempt to make a mark in the legitimate sports world. Being the most successful pro wrestling promoter of all-time is one thing. Entering an arena where those with greater knowledge of the sport have failed is another. Doesn't McMahon remember his failures in boxing and bodybuilding? In your opinion, what are the possible repercussions for McMahon, the WWF and its stockholders when the XFL folds like a cheap kite?
The Mankind-HHH match was one of the greatest matches in the history of pro wrestling. It was the most flawless match since the Bret Hart vs. Steve Austin 1997 Wrestlemania match. For someone who is a shell of his former self, Mick Foley engaged in what I believe was his finest match ever. Definitely *****. It's time Foley leaves pro wrestling and tends to his family. He's given the wrestling fans some of the greatest matches of all-time and it's time he quits before he winds up like Muhammad Ali or Dynamite Kid. The interview he did using the Ali-Frazier Thrilla in Manila as an analogy to his career was eerie. The drama that Jim Ross brought to the Hell in a Cell match was not unlike the classic call of Howard Cosell for the Thrilla in Manila. It's time to re-name the announcer of the year award as the Jim Ross Award for Broadcasting Excellence. I'd rank the Hell in the Cell match as the third best match I've ever seen, behind the 1989 New Orleans match with Ric Flair vs. Ricky Steamboat and the Hart vs. Austin match.
Robert Silva Jr.
DM: They are making enough money that they can afford the start up costs for a football league. Whether it'll make it or not depends on whether or not it is entertaining to enough people. The odds are against them, but it's not fair to judge until you at least see the product and the landscape of the football industry when it comes to competition. I think there will be curiosity for the start-up, but the long term is going to be tough.
Mick Foley, without a doubt, went out of the game with all the class he should. But before everyone says how bad it is that his career ended so soon, you have to ask yourself why. Mick Foley is retiring because for 15 years he has literally destroyed his body to please the fans, but even more so, to please himself and his ego. I'm a pro wrestler and there are so many things that people say they'll never do or "I'm not that stupid" to do. Somehow, though, when the crowd is pumped and the adrenaline is flowing, more often than not we lose that sense of restraint. The appeal of the big pop is too much to hold back. Still, I've never been thrown off the roof of a cage or been hit 14 times in the head with a chair. I've been hit with dozens of chair shots, taken some devastating moves and some bumps on the cement. I even leapt off a 12 foot ladder for a frog splash. But everyone needs a limit. Without limits, every RVD, Y2J and Benoit that you call the future of wrestling will end up like Foley. It's not anyone's fault, but it's still wrong.
Backyard wrestlers should think of this. Foley started his hardcore style at the age of 21 and is leaving at the age of 34. People who are doing it now in their backyards at the age of 14, and doing things Foley never did until the latter stages of his career, are going to join Foley in retirement at 28. I love this sport more than anything else in the world. However, if I have to sacrifice part of myself away from my family later in life and almost kill myself to gain respect of the "hardcore" fans, screw it. I appreciate Foley's legacy and all he's done in wrestling, and the few times we met, trying to smarten me up and show me what to do. I appreciate Foley even more, sadly, for showing me what not to do.
J-Rocc
FIRST WORKED TITLE CHANGE
I'm not sure when the first worked finish in a world heavyweight title match was, but we can certainly go back several decades before 1925. Evan Lewis, the original Strangler Lewis, unquestionably participated in worked matches in the 1880s as champion, including his victory over Joe Acton in 1887, recognized in many accounts as a world title match.
The report of the match in the Chicago Tribune on April 12, 1887 described how nobody offered a dollar on the previously unbeatable Acton at the local betting houses because word had gotten around town that he was going to lay down for Lewis. The match was taken off the boards after one would-be better offered to call in advance the finish of every fall. The operator of the house was quoted as saying, "This match is already won; we don't take any betting here on a race of that kind."
A report on another of Lewis's matches in 1887 was headlined "A cooked-up contest" with the subhead "A regular exhibition of faking." The reporter said this was done to "excite the audience" with one source saying that several other wrestlers, including William Muldoon, "have done the same act."
I imagined worked finishes date back as far as pro wrestling itself does.
Gary Will
Waterloo, Ontario
Continued from page 16. Gate production offered to eliminate all shots of Vince McMahon in the commercials (and in fact, the scene in the original commercials of McMahon has been taken out of the recent commercials) in exchange for the WWF backing down on its ad ban, but the WWF still wouldn't back down. Wilner said because fans and wrestling executives say it was a fair portrayal of wrestling, that translated means it shows some nitty-gritty but is still positive in its portrayal, basically using the fact that two reporters from WOW Magazine said it doesn't do the WWF harm (which in the long run it doesn't at all) and justified the WWF's ban saying the WWF simply doesn't want anyone making money off WWF properties like Mankind, Chyna and Rock with the comment from Brad Perkins at the magazine saying "Why should he help. He's not making any money off the movie." Of course that misses the point. Nobody ever suggested McMahon should help with the promotion of the movie and that has never been the issue. The fact he's made an effort to keep it from being successful is a different issue, although he did end up allowing Foley to promote it if he wanted to on Larry King. Wilner claimed that Blaustein rebuffed McMahon's attempts to buy into the movie because he was concerned about it ruining his chance of winning an Oscar if one of the subjects in his movie had a financial interest in it. Jim Byrne of the WWF claimed Blaustein asked the WWF to use the WWF Restaurant in Times Square for a premiere party and wanted WWF wrestlers to hype the film. He also claimed the WWF screened the movie and found it boring and said it wasn't fun and claimed the movie would disappear on its own
At Mardi Gras in New Orleans this past week, the Endymin Parade was advertised as having Brittany Spears and WWF Superstars as the leading attraction in all the publicity. As it turned out, there was a pro wrestling float, which featured a huge statue of Hulk Hogan in his NWO costume. There were people wearing Kane masks on the float but there were no pro wrestling superstars
Perry Saturn on his web site said that he believes he acted childish with some of his comments regarding Hulk Hogan, as it pertains to the name calling. But he said he was furious about the comments Hogan made about Billy Kidman and that Hogan is in a position where he should be a team leader and thus should act like one. Saturn brought up the current state of WCW business and said if Hogan, as he has tried to say, said the whole Kidman thing was to start an angle, to follow through and work a program with Kidman
Foley's reasons for losing his last several matches was largely based on the influence of Terry Funk, feeling that the right thing to do for business on the way out of a territory is make the champion as strong as possible to strengthen the territory for the future. Literally two days before the taping of the show, Vince McMahon gave Foley the okay to do Larry King after all. There had been talk of not doing a retirement match and staying until Wrestlemania where it would be billed ahead of time, win or lose, as a final match. Apparently the vast majority of people he sees at autograph sessions ask him when he's coming back and he recognizes that nobody believes retirement stipulations. He now he wishes he wasn't so strong in saying he's giving his word about the retirement since people didn't believe it anyway, not to mention there is a lot of money looming for him if/when he comes back
About the only major notes on Smackdown from 3/9 from watching the TV is that Backlund suffered a bloody nose in his run-in working with Tazz and Jericho, apparently from something from Jericho since he already had it when he put the chicken wing on Tazz. Jeff Hardy also did an unreal high spot in the Steve Blackman match where he jumped from the ring steps, to the barricade, ran across the barricade when Blackman jumped on the barricade and back dropped him on the floor. Don't know why, but in the womens match with Luna vs. Jacqueline, it was hilarious when Michael Cole made the call that one of the women did a move to the others' Adam's Apple and Jerry Lawler really quietly said, I don't think she has an Adam's Apple, and then he corrected himself and said it was to the sternum, and then Lawler said, "I don't think she has a sternum, either.
. Brian Lawler is somewhat in the doghouse with a lot of the wrestlers who don't like his attitude backstage. Aside from the fact this is consistent seemingly across the board, one would think it's the same deal of guys who are getting over huge that had been prelim guys being viewed by the headliners in a negative way. However, there is no heat whatsoever on Scott Taylor. In tag matches, some guys do whatever they can to make Taylor look good, then work poorly with Lawler and guys have complained to agents that he, when it's almost designed that way, can't work a good match
A report we received on the WWF signees in San Antonio. It's said Lance Cade has a ton of potential and could be a big WWF star someday. He's tall and reminiscent of a young Kevin Von Erich or Barry Windham. Shooter Schultz was said to be okay, but needs more charisma. Spanky is said to be funny with great facial expressions but it really small
WWF the Music Volume 4 was No. 132 on the charts this past week selling 12,922 units. The Aggression CD which will be released on 3/21 is a collection of rap versions of the current WWF major stars entrance
music
There was a media controversy in Greely, CO because local Hispanic leaders were angry that Mick Foley was given star billing at the Independence Day Stampede on 7/4 on the same day Archbishop Charles Caput is scheduled to celebrate mass. They claim that Foley and other wrestlers will detract from the family day meant to highlight Mexican-American culture. Pro wrestling was booked to replace Latino entertainment, which hasn't drawn well in the past. Lynn Settje, the execute director of the festival said the fears the wrestling matches would be overly violent or demeaning toward women are unfounded because the promoters were given instructions the show has to be suitable for a family audience. About 2,000 tickets have already been sold, roughly 70% of buyers with hispanic last names, which the promoters are saying is proof Latinos are interested in a pro wrestling show. In one of the funniest quotes you'll ever read, Jorge Amaya, executive director of the Northern Colorado Latino Chamber of Commerce said, "that doesn't mean anything. Professional wrestling has nothing to do with our culture. The fact that people go to it doesn't make it acceptable on that day.
For the week ending 3/10 in the United Kingdom, in the non-fiction best selling hardback book list, Mankind's book was No. 1 and Rock's was No. 2
Tickets for King of the Ring on 6/25 at the Fleet Center in Boston sold out in less than five minutes
The Memphis Commercial Appeal in a story on local news, noted that the UPN station has had a huge ratings increase for its newscast and credited it to the UPN audience for Smackdown winning its time period over Friends and Frasier on NBC
Smackdown on 3/7 at the Fleet Center in Boston drew a sellout 12,951 paying $383,929. 3/8 house show in Indianapolis which was a make-up of a previously canceled date drew 16,874 paying $412,460. At one point they had a show scheduled for 3/11 in Rochester, NY but it was moved back to the wrestlers would get their three days off because of working the Wednesday date. 3/12 house show in Albany, NY drew 11,422 paying $318,850. Merchandise for the week was $435,971 which was $7.75 per head. Indianapolis was headlined by Rock & Kane over Show & HHH, while Albany was Rock & Kane over HHH & X-Pac.
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