PO Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228 ISSN1083-9593 April 24, 2000
New Japan wrestler Masakazu Fukuda passed away of complications from a cerebral hemorrhage at 3:28 a.m. on 4/19 in the Public Kesennuma Synthesis Hospital in Kesennuma, Japan after collapsing in the ring on 4/14 at a match in the same city with Katsuyori Shibata.
Fukuda, 27, was rushed to the hospital when, after Shibata hit him with an elbow drop that he was supposed to kick out of. Instead he collapsed and began snoring in the ring, which caused everyone to panic. The snoring in the ring is heavily feared in both Japanese and Mexican wrestling culture because of what it signifies because of incidents in the past. It was similar to the situation with JWP woman wrestler Mariko Umeda (Plum Mariko), who passed away on August 16, 1997 after taking a power bomb in a match the night before, not getting up, and snoring in the ring. There are major similarities in both situations because both had histories of head problems. Umeda died from an abscess in the brain and a fractured skull, a condition she may have gone into the ring with since she had been complaining of headaches for some time and had not been herself. Fukuda had suffered a similar cerebral hemorrhage and underwent brain surgery last year and underwent brain surgery, and had been out of action for some time before collapsing in his first match back.
Fukuda underwent his second emergency brain surgery that evening. All of the wrestlers after their matches rushed to the hospital where virtually the entire company stayed much of the night including many of the company officials that weren't on the road on tour. Shinya Hashimoto, who is off the road due to his retirement gimmick, got the word at 11 p.m. and immediately rushed into his car and made the six hour, one-way drive to the hospital. Fukuda never regained consciousness, spending more than four days in a coma before passing away.
According to reports from the match, Fukuda never took any bumps on his head during the match and took nothing more than a few stiff elbows to the head the likes of which a normal New Japan opening match would contain. Apparently both the referee and Shibata felt something was wrong even before Fukuda went down and when he failed to kick out of the near fall, the ref counted three to end the match early.
Fukuda, born May 17, 1972, started wrestling in high school and became one of the top amateur wrestlers in Japan. In 1994, he placed second at 82 kilograms (180 pounds) in the Japanese national freestyle wrestling championships. He then started training for a pro wrestling career with RINGS, but quit the camp before ever wrestling with the group. He wound up with the small indie promotion Wrestle Dream Factory, debuting on March 20, 1996 at Korakuen Hall. Because of his amateur background, while still under contract to WDF, he was able to get loaned to Tatsumi Fujinami for some independent shows he promoted using 70s style called Muga in 1997. On November 24, 1997, he teamed with Hiroyoshi Kotsubo to defeat Yuji Yasuraoka & Tomohiro Ishii to win a tournament for the vacant WAR International jr. tag team titles in a cross-promotional tournament as the WDF team, but politics was never worked out between the two companies and they never came back to drop the titles.
His first real exposure was in May of 1998 when he was brought in as an outsider for the New Japan Top of the Super Junior tournament. While only gaining one win in the tournament (over Tatsuhito Takaiwa), he impressed New Japan officials with some of his moves, in particular a delayed german suplex that popped the crowd every night. It is very rare that New Japan actually signs up a wrestler full-time from a smaller company, but Fukuda, but Fukuda, both due to his amateur background and his pro potential, was signed to New Japan contract in January 1999 to add depth to the junior heavyweight division and be developed as a New Japan style prelim wrestler. Rare isn't actually the word as on the current active New Japan roster, he is the only wrestler who actually started out in Japanese indies. The only New Japan regulars not trained in Japan itself are front office worker Black Cat (Victor Mar), who started wrestling in Mexico and got a full-time position largely as a liaison for foreign wrestlers, and Shiro Koshinaka, who was originally trained by All Japan and made the switch early in his career. Fukuda's first year never got off the blocks due to the brain injury. The plan was for him to do well in the Young Lions tournament, which started on 4/14, and be elevated into the heavyweight ranks and put into the G-X group with fellow former amateur wrestlers Yuji Nagata, Manabu Nakanishi and Yutaka Yoshie as something of a "shooters club."
Funeral services were scheduled for 4/21 in Tokyo with Tatsumi Fujinami leading the pall bearers.
Fukuda's death is the third stemming from collapsing while in the course of a match in Japan in less than three years. Besides Umeda, another woman wrestler, Emiko Kado, 23, of the Arsion promotion, passed away under almost identical conditions on April 9, 1999. Kado never regaining consciousness after a brain injury and subsequent brain surgery from an incident in the ring on 3/31 in Fukuoka where she took a back suplex wrong from Mariko Yoshida.
Fukuda's death is the 13th known death of a pro wrestler over the past 20 years stemming from collapsing either during or shortly after a match. The most recent was Gary Albright, a Japanese star who was working an independent show in the United States on 1/7 and ironically was being honored with a Memorial event one day after Fukuda's death in Allentown, PA. Albright, 36, suffered a fatal heart attack during a match in Hazelton, PA.
The pro wrestling television landscape for next season, which seemed days from being sorted out, is back in a holding pattern after the USA Network filed suit against WWFE, Viacom Inc. and CBS Corporation on 4/13.
The suit filed in Delaware Chancery Court regards the language and interpretation of the right to match any outside offer to maintain WWF cable programming for the next five years as is in the contract between the two parties. Earlier in the day, in a strange announcement, the USA Network said that it was matching the offer that CBS and Viacom put down, and thus by doing so had retained the program rights to the WWF cable package through September of 2005.
WWF was not part of the announcement and had never agreed to keep its programming on USA. USA maintains that the right to match the offer only pertains to the offer as it relates to the four pro wrestling shows, Raw, Heat, Superstars and Livewire, and promises of advertising and additional non-wrestling programming or even new wrestling programming shouldn't have to be matched.
CBS and Viacom on 4/3 made an official five-year offer that the WWF took to USA Network to match, figuring USA would be unable to match it and they would be able to announce the CBS deal. The deal USA was asked to match included things they believed to things they shouldn't have to match because it didn't involve the four specific wrestling television shows they are attempting to maintain, in specific, broadcasting XFL football presumably on Sundays on UPN, a $500,000 movie developmental fund, producing a one-hour weekly drama series on UPN, a publishing joint venture with Simon & Schuster (owned by Viacom) for new books. In addition, the Viacom and CBS offer included syndicated radio specials, hosting theme park events and an equity investment in buying WWFE stock (a Los Angeles Times article pegged the stock investment at $30-$50 million, a lower figure than the $100 million figure that had been thrown around weeks ago).
The CBS/Viacom proposal was to move Raw, Superstars and Livewire to TNN and move Sunday Night Heat to MTV.
According to an article in Multi Channel News, the lawsuit states, "by tying the right of first refusal with respect to the (television series) to rights to different properties that Viacom and CBS wish to exploit. . . the `offer' represents a transparent and unlawful attempt by WWFE, Viacom and CBS to frustrate USA's contractual rights."
The USA Network had seemingly been priming itself for losing the WWF deal, as in its publicity and advertising package for the new season, there was no mention of pro wrestling. USA network releases have noted that even taking the Raw ratings, the highest rated weekly series on cable, out of the USA mix, the network would still remain the top rated cable network in prime time ratings.
What this may also be is simply that timing is of the essence, as fall season advertising pre-sales start on 4/21 and it is important for the cable networks to get their scheduled somewhat locked up to get the jump on the advertising dollars. If USA is aware they are going to lose WWF, the lawsuit from a timing standpoint throws a terrible monkey wrench into the plans of both WWFE and CBS/Viacom as far as finalizing the deal. Perhaps USA is simply looking for a fast cash settlement so the companies can avoid a lengthy lawsuit and can go on with their plans.
The situation involving Mike Awesome and the ECW heavyweight title took several turns over the past week, ending with the unique situation of a WCW and WWF contracted wrestler in a match, if that's what it can be called, over the ECW heavyweight title in the ECW ring.
The legal controversies at first appeared settled on 4/10 when ECW and WCW came to an agreement where WCW paid ECW a reported six figure settlement regarding the contract of Mike Alfonso and agreed to certain stipulations regarding his portrayal on the Nitro program that evening, and that he would drop the ECW title on 4/13 in Indianapolis. Alfonso reportedly had a three year signed contract with ECW. Alfonso himself denied that to people in WCW, but if ECW had no legal hold on him, there would be no need to reach an out of court settlement and contract buy-out on ECW's claim. There were numerous specifics of the agreement between ECW and WCW that was worked out just before the show went on the air, as to exactly what Awesome would do and how the announcers would handle it. According to ECW sources, two stipulations were violated, the main one is that the WCW announcers were to say that Awesome was the ECW champion and had a title defense upcoming that would air Friday on TNN. The other was that Awesome would not do an interview on the show, which he did. The wording of what Paul Heyman demanded and what was scripted for the WCW announcers to say has been confirmed as being identical. From watching the tape, it appeared Scott Hudson was reading the wording, and was cut off by Tony Schiavone. Exactly who made that call in WCW is unclear, but a call clearly was made, since several people after the fact emphasized words to the effect that there was no way WCW was going to plug the ECW TV show on their first "new era" Nitro. This led to another round of legal problems which occupied much of Bischoff's time on 4/11, and resulted in Awesome's planned segment on Thunder being canceled and him being taken out of the building. As Heyman was aware of before the show started, a clip of Awesome attacking Kevin Nash from Nitro did air at the start of Thunder.
While this was going on, Heyman came up with the idea to bring in Tazz as a surprise opponent to win the title, apparently formulated while eating dinner at a Chinese restaurant with the ECW production staff. Whether the original deal included shooting an angle on Smackdown, which also resulted in a week where the ECW champ went into the ring and lost when challenging for three different WWF major and minor titles, is unknown. Heyman called Vince McMahon, who accepted the proposal as Heyman laid it out, which at the time was for Tazz to win the ECW title, then drop it on 4/22 in Philadelphia to Tommy Dreamer (although McMahon apparently was willing to have Tazz drop it to anyone), with the original suggestion being to further McMahon's storylines, having Perry Saturn cost Tazz the match so he wouldn't have to lose cleanly to an ECW wrestler and even could potentially use the footage to hype their own WWF angle. As of last reports, it wasn't clear whether or not Saturn would still be doing the run-in. Saturn was booked to appear on the WWF house show in Columbia, SC that night and WWF didn't appear to even consider it an issue as to the idea of needing an "excuse" for Tazz to lose to Dreamer, or whomever, in the title match.
The match itself was completely anti-climactic as compared to the back story. Awesome showed up in Indianapolis with Doug Dillenger of WCW. Because of the belief there might have been dressing room tension involving the way Awesome left the company, he never came into the dressing room. The scenario saw Jeff Jones as Awesome's manager challenge anyone from the back to take the title from him. The crowd was into a heavy "You sold out" chant. To explain why nobody from ECW was coming out for the TV audience, the announcers said Rhino had taken out the entire locker room, which made little sense given Dreamer came out seconds later. Tazz came out to a tremendous pop, at a show which up to that point had below average crowd reactions. Tazz was totally pushed as his WWF gimmick, with WWF music and even referred to as "the human wrecking machine" as opposed to his ECW "human suplex machine" and on TV given the two z spelling of the character. The two traded punches outside the ring with neither really selling. There was a ref bump 45 seconds into the match. Dreamer came out and DDT'd Awesome and Tazz used his Tazzmission finisher. The entire match lasted 1:13. Awesome got right up, not selling the finish at all, climbed the guard rail and left the building. It was a scene totally reminiscent, except with the non-broadcast quality footage, of when in 1991, Sid Vicious, who was under contract to WCW, asked for his release in the middle of a wrestling war because Vince McMahon had promised him the main event against Hulk Hogan for the 1992 Wrestlemania. Jim Herd, who was running WCW, allowed him out of his contract rather than fight it, as long as Vicious agreed to put over El Gigante in St. Petersburg in his final match, a stretcher match. As it turned out, Vicious laid down for the pin in the most unconvincing manner possible, didn't ride the stretcher, got right up after the pin, and walked out, not selling a thing.
While many in ECW labeled it as the greatest moment in company history because Heyman manipulated a WWF wrestler to beat a WCW wrestler and thus stuck it to WCW as a response for WCW stealing the world champion (although Bischoff was aware of who Awesome was going to lose to and how it would be done and had to give his okay to the scenario since Awesome was at this point under contract with WCW), many in wrestling including several wrestlers in the company had a 180 degree divergent viewpoint. The upside is that ECW, and the ECW belt, as well as Dreamer got exposure on WWF television. The downside is the ECW belt was positioned similar to the NWA heavyweight title when Dan Severn wore it on WWF television, although Severn never actually did jobs while wearing the belt.
When the footage aired on ECW television, it seemed like it was something that may as well have never taken place as opposed to something historically significant. The footage itself wasn't even of television broadcast quality. If the idea was to embarrass Awesome on his way out, it seemingly accomplished the opposite. It took two guys to beat him in a match so short that nobody got over, and the guy winning wasn't even from the company. As one wrestler in the company put it, it was like somebody raped your sister, and then you went out and bought him a birthday present, and nobody has answered why Awesome wasn't beaten clean, unless it was a concession that had to be made to appease Bischoff, let alone by someone in the company in what looked like a wrestling match as opposed to coming in and making it obvious they were giving back the title to get out of a contract.
Awesome had gone through the ECW locker room and Heyman had kept him strong with the idea he and Rob Van Dam would the ultimate big money program, and he never returned the favor by putting over someone from the company he'd eaten up. To make matters worse, that same night Tazz was seen on WWF television being pinned by Crash Holly in a hardcore title match, two nights later he was in Madison Square Garden, never even acknowledged as champion and was pinned by Eddy Guerrero challenging for the European title, one of WWF's two comedy belts, in the second match on the card after taking a low blow from Chyna. The same thing happened the next night in Pittsburgh, another key ECW house show market. On the Monday television, he came out wearing the belt (and that wasn't even a definite as late as the day before the show) and was acknowledged as ECW champion, with Jim Ross saying he had won it "on his day off" in less than three minutes, with no mention of Awesome, who the WWF perceived as not being a big enough star to even be worth mentioning, clearly giving the perception of the ECW title as something any top WWF wrestler could win without much effort. Tazz then challenged for the hardcore title, the other comedy belt, in a three-way, and lost, although he wasn't pinned. At Smackdown, held in Philadelphia, ECW's home market, they had the illusory champion vs. champion match with Helmsley. Helmsley broke Tazz' winning maneuver and then set Tazz up for the pedigree. Dreamer got on the apron and Helmsley shoved him to the floor. Dreamer grabbed a chair, swung at Helmsley, who ducked, and of course hit Tazz to build the angle for their match four days later in the same city. HHH then delivered a pedigree to Dreamer and pinned Tazz.
While it is antiquated thinking to take wins and losses too seriously in the U.S. at this point because everyone is fully aware that aspect of wrestling is manipulated and it's not as important who "does the job" in a match anymore. But what isn't 80s thinking is this. Positioning is 100% real and it's the single most important thing for every wrestler and every company in the business today. While it doesn't matter who wins and loses matches, it is 100% important what position people and companies are put in on shows to how the public perceives their importance and star power. The ECW world title belt was positioned as being important enough that the champion appeared on the second match in Madison Square Garden without even being acknowledged as champion and important enough, or unimportant enough for the champion to go on Raw and challenge for the hardcore title. In exchange for that positioning, the belt and the company got more national exposure than it ever had before. Was it worth it to the NWA for Severn and is it worth it to ECW ultimately for Dreamer?
Tazz will drop the belt to whomever, and probably however Heyman wants, and hopefully in as good a match as possible this time to make at least the new champion appear to have earned something. This will almost surely never be acknowledged on WWF television. There are no plans at this point to have Dreamer come back to WWF to gain any revenge on Helmsley. But there is a working relationship and an angle could conceivably happen, but it's very doubtful WWF would allow Dreamer to be positioned as Helmsley's equal in that situation. If it is Dreamer who gets the title, it'll immediately be questioned within the business because it comes across as if Heyman is so concerned about losing talent that he's now putting his belt on the one wrestler he trusts won't be leaving, because Dreamer simply can't be taken by anyone as a serious major world champion.
It's almost like the final period of the AWA when all the champs kept leaving and Verne Gagne finally put the belt on his son-in-law, Larry Zbyszko, who at the time nobody took as a real world heavyweight champion, but by that point that perception wasn't as important as simply not having another champion simply disappear with no notice.
If it helps ECW ratings this week, it may be good, at least short-term. But that's an offshoot of the same argument used by smaller promotions (see the fate of NWA or Smoky Mountain Wrestling when it started interacting with the WWF, but in that argument it was the helping attendance as opposed to ratings) which only served to establish the local stars as "local stars" as opposed to guys on the level of the national stars but they just appear locally in the eyes of the local fans. That's the death perception of a promotion for healthy long-term business when it comes to attracting a mainstream audience.
The rating for the 4/14 TNN show (1.12; the title match itself drew a 1.11) after all the internet hype had to be a huge disappointment since the company's average over the months of February and March was a 1.06. The ECW Arena show on 4/22 is sold out, but according to company officials, due to it being "Cyberslam," it was almost sold out and had the fastest advance in the building in company history long before any of this took place.
The WCW turnaround that began less than one week earlier was met with mixed but skewing more on the positive side reviews for its first major show, Spring Stampede, on 4/16 at the United Center in Chicago.
The 14-match show, which was loaded up with angles, saw tremendous heat put on the New Blood as heels, featured more inspired work from the wrestlers than in months, was generally considered the best WCW PPV show since last year's Spring Stampede in Tacoma, WA. Still, with the quality of most of the WCW PPV shows over the past year, that's not in many cases even praiseworthy enough to categorize it as a good show.
But it was an improvement, and only time will tell if hard work, lots of angles, and finishes that are almost all screw-jobs and often completely lack consistency, with a product with WWF fingerprints all over it, done with an edge, will pay dividends to the WCW audience. The early signs are that it will, and even at worst, it is a huge improvement over the previous regime. But there were still more bad matches than good and the main event finish really hurt what up to that point had been the best match on the show. It was the exact same finish as Wrestlemania, set up the exact same way, just two weeks later. As it was being set up and telegraphed, it left the show with this feeling that WCW today is nothing but a copy of old WWF angles. As mentioned many times before, probably the single most overrated quality of a wrestling booker is creativity. A booker's job is to get results, not to make up a whole bunch of things never seen before in wrestling. Most of the best bookers in history have largely copied ideas that have worked elsewhere, and there is no crime in doing so. There should be no points for creativity if it doesn't achieve the actual goals, improving ratings, buy rates and attendance. And if repeating things that have already been done, with a new cast of characters, yields the same results it did with the old cast, that is good booking. If it doesn't, then it isn't.
With Chicago as the No. 1 wrestling market in the world right now, it was WCW's most successful event in months from a live show perspective, as they sold 8,377 tickets for $272,930 and had another 4,179 comps out. To give the impression it was a near sellout in a building set up for a 16,267-seat capacity due to the PPV set, would be totally misleading, but it did better than the previous three WCW PPV events in that regard.
The story of the show was putting heat on the heels, who wound up with every championship, all of which went into the show vacant. Jeff Jarrett got the WCW heavyweight title when Kimberly turned on DDP using a guitar instead of a chair in a scene visually identical to the Wrestlemania finish. Scott Steiner won the U.S. title when Vampiro, reprising a former Undertaker role, dragged Sting under the ring, he came up bloody and was then beaten in the tournament finals. Shane Douglas & Buff Bagwell won the tag team titles when Vince Russo, reprising a McMahon family member, put on the ref shirt after stopping ref Nick Patrick from making the count, and Bryan Clark & Brian Adams attacked Luger (who teamed with Ric Flair, wrestling the tournament in street clothes) costing him the match. The cruiserweight title match, which was a huge disappointment, wound up with Chris Candido winning due to help from the debuting Tammy Sytch. Terry Funk was the only NB member to win a title, which was because there was no NB member in the match, beating Norman Smiley in a surprisingly strong match. If you say this is nothing but a combination of WWF booking and the NWO, you're right. But if it works, there's nothing wrong. They also added a new element to the product, a lot of swearing, even by the announcers, which came off badly forced and out of character, which it was. The swearing was done under orders, and not all of the announcers were comfortable with it, nor was standards and practices.
1. Ric Flair (Richard Fliehr) & Lex Luger (Larry Pfohl) won the first round of the tag title tournament in a four-on-two match over The Mamalukes (Vito LoGrasso & John Hugger) and Ron & Don Harris in 6:11. The Harris Twins weren't scheduled but Russo, who came out to the Road Warriors entrance music in Chicago (which means they'd be passing up an angle not to bring the Road Warriors in), announced it would be a four-on-two. After Disco Inferno interfered, Liz ducked Disco. Two guys who didn't look like wrestlers then dragged Disco away. Flair, who sold most of the way, made a surprisingly cold hot tag to Luger. Luger at one point waited for a month for Vito to come off the top rope. Vito hit Johnny on a spot and Luger racked Johnny. *1/4
Mike Awesome did an interview. Bam Bam Bigelow came out. Awesome seemingly backed down. Bigelow turned his back and left. How many times have we seen that one? Awesome jumped him.
2. Mancow Muller (?) pinned Jimmy Hart in 2:48. Because this match had gotten no TV push, it should have been a pre-show dark match because Muller isn't known nationally. Hart, who played heel in this match even though he's a face on TV as Hogan's manager, came out with a bald-headed new physique Emory Hale as his bodyguard. Mancow came out with a million women, one of whom nearly killed herself walking on the world's most dangerous set. Mancow thanked Eric Bischoff, who is a heel. He then began kissing up to Chicago to the point you'd almost want to gag. Apparently a lot of the people there did because Muller got booed more than cheered even as he was kissing up to the fans. After a ref bump, Hale pressed Mancow over his head and threw him out of the ring onto some of his seconds, called Al Roker Jr. and Turd. Mancow ended up getting the pin after a chair shot. I've seen worse celebrity matches, which is about the nicest thing to say about this one. After the match Kidman came out and stomped the hell out of Hart. DUD
3. In the first round of the U.S. title tourney, Scott Steiner (Scott Rechsteiner) beat Wall (Jerry Tuite) via DQ in 3:53. Wall choke slammed ref Mark Johnson through a table, which was so devastating Johnson came back to be bumped later in the show. Billy Silverman called for the DQ. DUD
Ernest Miller was doing an interview for his upcoming match with Awesome, but Bigelow beat him up.
4. In another U.S. title tourney match, Mike Awesome (Mike Alfonso) made his in-ring debut for WCW pinning Ernest Miller, even though the match started as a singles match against Bigelow (Scott Bigelow) in 4:00. There was a loud ECW chant. Awesome, obviously, was never referred to as a former ECW champion. Awesome did his big dive over the top. Awesome after being whipped into the guard rail kept screaming at a spectator to get out of the way. Finally he got the message, allowing Bigelow to take the bump over the rail to where the spectator wasn't. Awesome did a running dive over the rail. They clearly had the chance to put on a good match. Not so fast. Miller came out and kicked Bigelow and started dancing while Awesome was selling. Awesome got up and destroyed Miller, pinning him with a high frog splash. **1/4
5. In a tag title tourney match, Shane Douglas (Troy Martin) & Buff Bagwell (Marcus Bagwell) beat Harlem Heat 2000 (Lane Huffman & Tony Norris) in 2:41 when Douglas pinned Ray with what was supposed to be a fisherman buster. About halfway into the move, Douglas lost Ray, but didn't hurt him. This was a real test for Douglas & Bagwell having to carry the worst tag team in wrestling, and it was better than it looked on paper. DUD
6. Sting (Steve Borden) pinned Booker T (Booker Huffman) in 6:34 in a U.S. title tourney first round match. Actually I'm not sure if Booker is Booker T or not. Dave Penzer announced him as Booker T. The TV announcers just called him Booker except in one instance when he was called Booker T. Sting got a huge pop, almost shockingly large. Booker did everything but carried it to a good match before Sting won with a scorpion death drop (reverse DDT). The two shook hands after the match, which was another instance for Russo and Bischoff to get mad at Booker. ***
7. Vampiro (Ian Hodgkinson) pinned Billy Kidman (Peter Gruner) in the final U.S. title tourney first round match in 8:28. A lot of big moves early but the match got no heat. Then Hogan showed up and was clearly the star of the show, which he should have been since he was responsible for selling most of the tickets, not selling anything as far as limping, but he was taped up in the ribs and shoulder. Hogan destroyed Kidman to the point because of the size difference and the manner it was done, it actually looked like child abuse. He gave him a neck hanging tree slam onto the announcers' table, which didn't break. He then bodyslammed him through the table and Vampiro pinned him. There was actually an attempt at an explanation as to why there was no DQ called, because Vampiro hadn't asked for Hogan to interfere. **1/2
Hogan then went after Bischoff. Russo told Bischoff he had a plan. Just before Hogan was going to throttle him, Russo came out with the police who all pulled guns on Hogan, and he backed off. Hogan sold the guns. I figured unless they had kryptonite he was just going to stand there and have the bullets bounce off his chest. The cops handcuffed him and dragged him out. Ever notice that in wrestling, the police never read guys their rights?
8. Terry Funk pinned Norman Smiley in 8:02 to win the hardcore title. The match started when Smiley wouldn't come out as he was hiding in the bathroom. Funk slammed him on a table. Smiley put Funk upside down into a garbage can. Funk destroyed Smiley with a lap top. Smiley climbed a pipe and was treed. Funk pounded him until he fell off the pipe through a table. Smiley destroyed Funk with all the chair shots. I hate watching Funk take chair shots to the head. They came back to the ring and Funk was bleeding from the elbow. He took a bunch more chair shots to the head. He must have been hurting because he was putting his hands up to block them, which he usually doesn't do. Funk pulled out a ladder. Dustin Rhodes came out and delivered more chair shots to Funk's head. At least Rhodes was pulling back a lot on them. Rhodes piledrove Funk on a chair. They set up what was supposed to be a teeter totter ladder spot with Rhodes and Smiley getting nailed but it was totally botched. Funk then had to take the ladder and throw it over the top rope onto Smiley on the floor and Funk pinned him on the floor. **3/4
9. Steiner beat Awesome in 3:14 in the U.S. title tourney semifinal. Steiner was rubbing Awesome's face in the mat and being particularly vicious with him. Awesome made a comeback until Kevin Nash came out and hit him with a crutch and Steiner won with the Steiner recliner. *
Russo fired Rhodes for screwing up the finish. He told Rhodes the only good character he ever had was Goldust and said he wrote all the words for him to say. Rhodes said he was the one who delivered the lines. Why didn't Russo just tell him he screwed up the teeter totter spot as well.
10. Sting pinned Vampiro in the other U.S. title tourney semifinal in 5:59. Vampiro didn't sell well for Sting. There were clearly lots of problems in this match, but the announcers were trying to sell it like it was a classic. That's where they blow credibility is when they try and sell a classic that isn't there, then nobody believes it. That's another example of Jim Ross being the best at this, because if a bunch of spots are missing, he may not say it's a bad match (although he sometimes hints when it's really bad), but he won't say it's a classic either. Vampiro missed something. Who knows what it was supposed to be because it appeared Sting was totally out of position and Vampiro tried to change his idea and didn't make it. Sting used the scorpion death drop and scorpion deathlock for the submission. 3/4*
Before the cruiserweight title match started, Shannon Moore & Shane Helms came out to lip synch.
11. Chris Candido (Chris Candito) won the cruiserweight title in 5:12 over Moore, Juventud Guerrera (Edouardo Anibal Gonzalez), TAF KAPI (Mike Haynor), Crowbar (Chris Ford) and Lash Leroux (Mark Leroux). This was advertised as an elimination match, but without warning the rules were changed to first pin. The first hint of that was when guys were breaking up pins after the match had started. This was really disappointing. A bunch of spots thrown out there with not enough time to get anything over. Daffney did a flying huracanrana off the top onto Crowbar. Leroux did a pescado, Artist did a springboard plancha, Guerrera did a plancha, Moore did a crazy dive off Helms' (who wasn't in the match) back. David Flair, also not in the match, attacked Helms. Artist and Candido were both in the ring and Artist used a Samoan drop and went to the top when Tammy Sytch came out and knocked him off the top and Candido pinned him. This wasn't on camera, but Sytch was the victim of the world's most dangerous ramp, and fell flat on her butt when she came out for the run-in, which is why they were clearly on pause waiting for something to happen. It should also be mentioned that every time Elizabeth came out, they had carpeting put over the world's most dangerous entrance way so she wouldn't be embarrassed trying to navigate that thing in high heels. They did a Paisley/Sytch confrontation, which included Sytch giving Moore a low blow and Paisley giving ref Charles Robinson one. *1/2
12. Douglas & Bagwell won the tag titles over Flair & Luger in 8:29. Russo came out with a baseball bat to do commentary. Did I mention there was tons of swearing on this show. You know things are bad when Schiavone starts swearing on the air. Flair's selling was good enough to keep the match decent, but when Luger worked with both guys, particularly Douglas, it was bad. Flair had Douglas pinned after Bagwell hit Douglas with a blockbuster. Russo pulled ref Nick Patrick out of the ring. Poor Patrick had to sell for Russo beating him up so Russo could steal his ref shirt. Bryan Clark & Brian Adams then came out and destroyed Luger so Bagwell could pin him with Russo counting the fall. **1/4
13. Steiner pinned Sting to win the U.S. title in 5:33. These two are long-time friends and have had some great matches in the past. It was a hot match until, you guessed it, a ref bump. Vampiro came from under the ring and dragged Sting down to hell, as they said. Well, that's the same thing they said when Undertaker did it to Kevin Nash. Sting came up bleeding from the mouth. Apparently they wanted Sting covered in blood but that was as far as he'd go, and Steiner used the recliner for the win. **3/4
14. Jeff Jarrett pinned Diamond Dallas Page (Page Falkinburg) in 15:02 to win the vacant WCW heavyweight title. Page, smart promoter that he is, littered the building with signs promoting his book. You don't actually believe fans would bring signs like that to a show, do you? He even had a spot where Jarrett tore up a copy of the book. Bischoff came out. This was a really good match. Jarrett had a long figure four. Page tried to reverse it but god a rope break. Page got a few quick cradles and a uranage for a near fall. Page moved amazingly well for someone who has been out of action for so long with a back injury that didn't even heel until his former next door neighbor was back in charge. Finish saw Bischoff distract Charles Robinson (who took a bump halfway through the match to tease a near fall from a belt shot by Jarrett) and Kimberly got in the ring holding the guitar and clocked Page with it for the pin. All the champs came to the ring to celebrate with Russo and Bischoff to end the show. ***1/2
Kenta Kobashi captured the first Champion Carnival tournament of his career pinning surprise finalist Takao Omori in 25:12 after a lariat before an announced full house of 16,300 at Tokyo Budokan Hall.
Omori worked on Kobashi's leg for most of the match, which saw Kobashi make a comeback doing a power bomb into the turnbuckles, a second power bomb and a lariat for the pin.
In what was heavily pushed in both house show advertising and on the commemorative t-shirt as the 20th annual tournament (which started in 1973, but there was no tournament from 1983-90 due to booking difficulty in a period when the top stars didn't want to do jobs, and re-opened in an era when every wrestler in the company did jobs after the company went to the all clean finish booking style, with the winners history) was a single-elimination for the first time since 1975. This meant fewer marquee match-ups than any recent tournament and probably the least interest of any Carnival tournament in history. The Carnival tournament in the past, particularly the ones booked by Shohei Baba with his famed Rubik's Cube booking where all the jobs are laid out perfectly to give almost everyone some sort of positive upward momentum and keep several people in contention going into the final days, used to have intrigue going into the final show with several people involved and numerous possibilities for the finals. This year, several days ahead, the final match was announced in a tournament that really only benefitted Omori, who had never done well or been pushed as a top singles star in the past, in the past and this time scored his three highest profile singles wins of his career, over Jun Akiyama, Mike Barton and Steve Williams, all in a row, before losing; and Kobashi, who won the tournament for the first time with wins over Johnny Ace, Johnny Smith, Mitsuharu Misawa and Omori. Kobashi had lost in the finals to Vader last year and losing in the finals after a three-way playoff in 1997 won by Toshiaki Kawada.
The Spring Carnival tournament actually stems from the old World League tournament originated by Rikidozan in 1959 in the old Japanese Wrestling Association, which Baba re-named in 1973 after formation of All Japan Pro Wrestling.
The tournament history since its inception: 1959 - Rikidozan beat Jesse Ortega; 1960 - Rikidozan beat Leo Nomellini; 1961 - Rikidozan beat Mr. X (Big Bill Miller); 1962 - Rikidozan beat Lou Thesz; 1963 - Rikidozan beat Killer Kowalski; 1964 - Toyonobori beat Gene Kiniski; 1965 - Toyonobori beat Fred Blassie; 1966 - Giant Baba beat Wilbur Snyder; 1967 - Baba beat The Destroyer; 1968 - Baba beat Kowalski; 1969 - Antonio Inoki beat Chris Markoff; 1970 - Baba beat Don Leo Jonathan; 1971 - Baba beat Abdullah the Butcher; 1972 - Baba beat Gorilla Monsoon; 1973 - Baba beat Mark Lewin; 1974 - Baba beat Mr. Wrestling (Tim Woods); 1975 - Baba beat Kiniski; 1976 - Butcher beat Baba; 1977 - Baba beat Jumbo Tsuruta; 1978 - Baba beat Butcher; 1979 - Butcher beat Tsuruta; 1980 - Tsuruta beat Dick Slater; 1981 - Baba beat Bruiser Brody; 1982 - Baba won via points over Brody, Ted DiBiase and Tsuruta; 1991 - Tsuruta beat Stan Hansen; 1992 - Hansen beat Mitsuharu Misawa; 1993 - Hansen beat Misawa; 1994 - Toshiaki Kawada beat Steve Williams; 1995 - Misawa beat Akira Taue; 1996 - Taue beat Williams; 1997 - Kawada beat Kenta Kobashi (in a three way playoff with Misawa); 1998 - Misawa beat Jun Akiyama; 1999 - Vader beat Kobashi.
Reports from the UFC Japan show held 4/14 at Tokyo Yoyogi Gym II indicate it was the strongest by far of the three UFC events held in the Tokyo area.
The show, which airs on PPV in the United States on 4/21, was headlined from an American standpoint by Tito Ortiz capturing the UFC middleweight title left vacant by Frank Shamrock with a five round decision over Vanderlei Silva of Brazil. The scorecards were relatively one-sided, with Ortiz winning 49-47, 49-46 and 49-46, by using his wrestling ability to dominate positioning in what was regarded in Japan as a boring match.
The show drew a crowd announced as a sellout of 3,850 fans to the gym, although live reports indicate it was just shy of capacity to that the real figure would have been around 2,500 to 3,000, much of which was papered as one report has the paid figure at 1,000, basically the Tokyo area super hardcore shoot fan population since this show had no general public appeal during a time period when there are three marquee Tokyo Dome shows and numerous typical minor shows all in the same market over a seven week period. Still, UFC Japan officials announced they would run two more shows this year, one in late July and another in December. The company can survive whether people buy tickets or not because DirecTV in Japan pays the PPV rights fees for the events. The next UFC is at this point scheduled for 6/9 in Cedar Rapids, IA, at this point most likely headlined by the Kevin Randleman vs. Pedro Rizzo UFC heavyweight title match that was postponed in March due to Randleman's concussion backstage just hours before the match was to take place.
1. LaVerne Clark won a much tougher fight than expected over Koji Oishi, going the three round time limit (15:00) and getting the nod from two of the three judges by a 29-28 score, with the other voting it 29-29. Oishi, a college wrestler who weighed only 156 pounds at the weigh-in, put up a very strong performance against someone who had him outsized, winning one of the rounds on all three cards. Clark was 169 at weigh in but probably in the ring at around 175-180 and had trained specifically for the match. Clark's scheduled opponent, Daijyu Takase, suffered a knee injury in training and Oishi took the fight on just a few days notice. Reports are he was able to use his wrestling to somewhat neutralize Clark's strong boxing skills, and hung on and was competitive.
2. In what was called almost unanimously as the best match on the show, Ikuhisa Minowa of Pancrase defeated Joe Slick of Extreme Challenge when the doctor stopped the match at 2:02 of the third round. This was something of a grudge match since on the previous UFC show in Japan, Slick defeated Pancrase star Jason DeLucia, who ended up having his knee destroyed when it went the wrong way on a fall, in a Theismanesque injury. The match was considered very even, with Minowa coming it and only 179 pounds while Slick was at 198. Minowa unleashed a flurry of blows, ending with a high kick to the left side of his face which opened him up so severely that within seconds his head was covered in blood. Ref John McCarthy stopped the action to have the doctor check the cut, and he stopped the match. The injury wasn't serious.
3. Ron Waterman, at 260 pounds, overpowered 218-pound Satoshi Honma for all of their three round fight winning a unanimous decision. Waterman, a former college heavyweight wrestler with a Goldberg-like look, continually took Honma down and pounded on him from the side mount. The only crowd pop was when Waterman took off his shirt. At one point Waterman hit Honma with 24 unanswered punches and seven knees, but Honma was never totally out of it even though he got almost no offense in. Honma took no risks and seemingly was just trying to survive.
4. Sanae Kikuta of Pancrase, 198, defeated Eugene Jackson, 197, in 4:38. Both men came into the octagon ill. Jackson had a fever and the flu, while Kikuta was also sick. Once the match started, Kikuta showed no signs of being ill while Jackson never got untracked. Kikuta outwrestled him the entire match before winning with an armbar submission. This was also considered something of Pancrase revenge match since Jackson on the last Japanese show had knocked out Pancrase fighter Kei Yamamiya.
5. Ortiz, 198 (fighting at 213 in the ring and said to be in by far the best condition he has ever fought at that weight) won the middleweight title after a five round decision over Silva, 198. The first, third and fifth round consisted of Ortiz taking a few punches before stopping Silva's offense by taking him down and controlling him on the ground. In the second round, Ortiz landed a strong punch knocking Silva down and leaving him wobbly. Silva's knees buckled between rounds. In the fourth round, Silva caught Ortiz with a strong punch and knocked him silly, but was unable to finish him off. Ortiz was the big favorite of the American fans at the show. The Japanese generally considered the match boring and the fans lost interest in the long match. Ortiz had a smart strategy, as Silva usually tries to make a move on wrestlers when they shoot. Ortiz refused to shoot, and would wait for Silva to commit himself to punches before he'd take him down as a counter.
6. In the main event for Japan, pro wrestler Yoji Anjoh, trimmed down to his best condition in years at 196 pounds, lost to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu former world champion Murillo Bustamante, 199. Anjoh, the only Japanese mainstream name fighter on the show, got the biggest pop coming out. Anjoh is the managing director of the UFC Japan company but nobody takes him seriously as a legitimate opponent for such a high level fighter. When Bustamante started taking control, the crowd began to catcall Anjoh, saying he should try and sucker punch him, or screaming at Anjoh that Akira Maeda (who Anjoh sucker punched backstage in the hall at the last UFC show in Japan and was later brought up on charges for it) was there. Bustamante, who is undefeated in MMA competition, dominated him throughout the fight, winning at :38 of the second round with a katagatamae, a head and shoulder side choke. Japanese reports were that Bustamante looked far better than Rickson Gracie has ever looked fighting in Japan. Anjoh got little offense in, and in frustration, tried a haymaker punch that Bustamante easily sidestepped in the second round.
In yet another strange story stemming from the split in the Hart Family, Stampede Wrestling announced a Stu Hart 85th birthday show in conjunction with the World Wrestling Federation for Calgary, and the next day Hart said he wouldn't be attending, leaving everyone politically jockeying for position.
The story probably started more than one month ago. Bruce Hart, who is running the Stampede Wrestling promotion with brother Ross, shows that Stu regularly attends when they run Calgary, was talking about doing some sort of a memorial show in honor of Owen, since it was coming up to the one year anniversary of his death. We're told, in order to make it politically more palatable, due to the lawsuit involving the death of Owen which had divided the family, it was planned to be dressed up as an 85th birthday celebration for Stu, whose actual birthday is on 5/3 and the show was scheduled for 5/31 at the 7,000-seat Stampede Corral, home of Stampede's biggest shows during its glory days in the 70s and 80s. Bruce first contacted Vince McMahon and Jim Ross by fax about it, and they approved allowing the wrestlers, since it would be held on an off-day and as things were booked, the WWF would be in that part of the world with house shows the previous weekend in Calgary and Edmonton and television tapings on 5/29 and 5/30 in Vancouver and Tacoma, WA. According to WWF officials, it was to be a birthday celebration for Stu, similar to the show held in 1995 for Stu's 80th birthday which saw many of Stu's biggest stars from the past attend. They would shoot angles at the 5/27 house show to build for 5/31, and WWF would book the matches involving its talent on the show.
It is clear that many members of the family were in regular contact with the WWF, in particular Bruce Prichard, according to some reports almost on a daily basis, regarding the show, in particular Ellie and Diana, whose husbands Jim Neidhart and Davey Boy Smith work for the WWF, and who are expected to testify against sister-in-law Martha Hart in the wrongful death lawsuit that goes to court in February of 2001 in Kansas City and where depositions with family members have already started.
At a recent television taping, the wrestlers who signed up were claiming to be under the impression it was more something for Owen and it was approved by everyone in the family and not a political issue, with the belief it was non-political and that Bret and Martha would be part of the show. They may not have been told that specifically but likely thought that because they'd be under the impression any benefit for Owen or a birthday for Stu would involve the family and it wouldn't become part of a political game of taking sides. Virtually all the Canadian based wrestlers including Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Edge, Christian, Test and Val Venis signed up as well as many other major stars including Eddy Guerrero, Perry Saturn and Dean Malenko. The belief is they were working the show free, as they agreed to do for benefit shows in the past such as for Brian Pillman and the WWF would pay for the trans. The show was publicly announced on 4/15 on the Stampede Wrestling web site with a Jericho vs. Benoit main event, and also listed Terry and Dory Funk, who wrestled on Stu's 80th birthday show, as being expected to attend. And it started falling apart from there.
The next morning, there was an article in the Calgary Sun headlined "Hart slams event," quoting Stu as saying he wouldn't take part in the event because it was too close to the one year anniversary of Owen's death. "They can do whatever they like, but I won't be involved. . . I would like to support Ross and Bruce in this, but it would be in poor taste for me to be celebrating." It also should be noted that Stu is involved in the lawsuit against the WWF. Whether Stu ever even knew about this event before it was announced publicly has been questioned. There are those who claim Bruce Prichard, who was the company point man for the event, spoke with Stu personally and he claimed to be looking forward to the event. Others claim Stu knew nothing about it until it was already out publicly and that Bruce Hart had brought it up with Helen Hart for approval and she said no. On 4/15, both Bruce and Bret were at the house talking with Stu, who refused to be part of the show. Bruce had stayed out of the lawsuit, even though he actually spoke publicly strongly against the actions of the WWF after the death of Owen. From a business standpoint, Stampede Wrestling's best chance for long-term survival would be as a training ground for WWF or WCW developmental talent and politically it would be easier to work with WWF.
In the same newspaper article, Bret was quoted as saying, "My father has no involvement with the birthday show, he wasn't aware it was being planned. He has nothing to do with the WWF."
Martha, the widow of Owen, in the same article claimed the WWF is trying to take the legal battle outside the courts to score points in the arena of public opinion saying, "They're going to come in here and try to do something that's in poor taste and I'm ready for that."
When the situation came out on 4/15, several of the WWF wrestlers that had signed up were wanting to pull out. Benoit, in particular, at Raw asked out of his commitment feeling he was misled about what the show was going to be, and that all it would end up being was a Stampede wrestling major house show. McMahon that day directly gave word that everyone who signed up had to attend unless the show is canceled, apparently because some people started taking it as another Vince vs. Bret battle that he didn't want to be seen as coming out on the losing end of. Stampede Wrestling has removed any mention of the show from its web site but the show was not officially canceled as of press time.
It only took EMLL one show to get the PPV formula down. But it was a completely different formula than everyone else.
The oldest pro wrestling company in the world's first-ever PPV show in Mexico on 3/17, headlined by what will clearly go down in history as one of the classic struggles in Lucha Libre history in the mask vs. mask match with Atlantis vs. Villano III, was probably the best PPV event so far this year. It was almost an amazing show. With the drastic changes in such a short time in U.S. wrestling, and the relative lack thereof in EMLL, which, like All Japan, remains a traditional old-style and some would even say antiquated style of wrestling, watching this EMLL show, as different as American and Lucha Libre style of wrestling are from a psychology standpoint, was more like watching old-style U.S. wrestling than any major show in the world this year. It worked like a charm to its audience, with strong heat in every match on the show, and a climactic pop, the likes of which is almost never seen on any level in this industry. Whether this is good or bad in an industry so heavily driven by youth, is that the sellout crowd reported at 20,000 overflowing Arena Mexico (listed capacity of 17,670) clearly had the widest demographic range of any major show this year. You saw old people, some very old, very young people, and many in the middle, all reacting almost as one, in some very unique ways at times. It's unusual in this day and age to see, not just a standing ovation, but people jumping up and down at a finish like the one in the main event. It's unheard of seeing audience members old enough to be great-grandparents showing such enthusiasm. This would bring up the natural comparison with the 1994 AAA When World's Collide PPV at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, and as good as this show was, it couldn't compare to the AAA show. It didn't have the overall work rate, and as good as the crowd enthusiasm was for this show, it still was a good two steps behind Los Angeles. And even if the mask match was as good, if not better, than any match this year, it couldn't hold a candle to the mask match in Los Angeles. But I'd strongly recommend seeing this match to almost any wrestling fan. For older fans who don't like the current U.S. style, this has every element missing. For newer fans, who have never seen what the older style was at its best, while they may not enjoy it because there was no brawling, no objects, no run-ins, no referee bumps and no sex, at least it's a chance to see what some people romanticize about and what people who have cloudy memories of the past, think wrestling was, but only in the rarest of circumstances in those days it really was.
This show had its aged veteran performers with big names in bad matches. The crowd was into their two matches every bit as much as the better matches with the younger wrestlers. But in the year 2000, it was unique to see very long dramatic matches, old-style crowd intensity from a packed house, modern production values, clean finishes in every match, and not a referee bump, nor a run-in.
1. Ricky Marvin won 2/3 falls from Sangre Azteca in 9:50. These two are young, very small high fliers. Marvin, with his acrobatic spots, is becoming something of a hardcore favorite in Japan. They had a good opener, with the only negative being it was too short for a three fall match. Marvin in the first fall did a springboard corkscrew plancha to the floor which looked far more impressive than it sounds. In the second fall, Azteca did a tope con hilo and landed straight down on his head from the top rope to the floor when Marvin didn't catch him. This looked unbelievably scary, like a sure fire broken neck or potentially worse. Azteca, after being stunned momentarily, got up and didn't even show any immediate effects and continued the match and won the fall after a unique move where he held Marvin in fisherman buster starting position and dropped him down like a shoulderbreaker for the pin. Third fall saw Marvin did a springboard moonsault to the floor and a springboard screw plancha from the apron back into the ring for the pin. Marvin seemed to hurt his knee on the landing from his winning move. ***
2. Dr. O'Borman Jr. & Arkanagel & Ultimo Guerrero & Zumbido & Rencor Latino & Mr. Mexico & Violencia & Rey Bucanero won Torneo Siglo XXI over Tigre Blanco & Mascara Magica & Astro Rey Jr. & Starman & Antifaz (the same wrestler who worked ECW some months back) & Tony Rivera & Safari & Olimpico in an elimination match which went 24:16 with Guerrero as the final survivor. This was their typical Torneo Siglo annual match, which I guess can be described as Arena Mexico's version of the Royal Rumble with a much better workrate. It's not a Battle Royal, but an elimination rules match like the old Survivor Series matches, loaded up with a lot of good workers. There was far too much to this match to try and recount. There were some amazing submissions and matwork with moves never seen before in the United States. It also featured rapid fire high spots and submissions from start to finish. The negative is that not all the workers in the ring were good, so even though they all worked fast and hard, some points were incredible and others were only so-so. The hottest move of the match was an awesome spinning dive by Antifaz on Zumbido. It came down to Guerrero against Olimpico, with Guerrero getting the pin after a reverse position superplex. ***3/4
3. Brazo de Plata & Mr. Niebla & Emilio Charles Jr. won 2/3 falls over Apolo Dantes & Cien Caras & Universo 2000 in 16:05. It was funny to see the heels come out and bring their own pyro to the ring. The fans were into this because they were the veteran names, but only Niebla, and in some brawling instances Charles, looked good. Super Porky is fatter than ever, he's got to be pushing 330-340 on a 5-4 frame, almost all right in the belly. He's reminiscent of a more agile Dusty Rhodes in his prime, as his comedy and charisma is great, and his work in other ways totally sucks. Overall a terrible match although some of Porky's comedy got over. It ended up with Porky doing a splash off the top rope, which, since everyone doing the same basic move has a different name, ought to be named the pig splash, on all three rudos. 1/4*
4. Shocker & Mascara Ano 2000 & Scorpio Jr. beat Perro Aguayo & Tarzan Boy & Rayo de Jalisco Jr. in a 2/3 fall match in 17:30. Also mostly comedy. This match had great heat but wasn't much for the wrestling. The crowd reactions were the most unique part of the match. Of course the crowd loved Aguayo, who in the manner he's been booked over the past ten years has been the living embodiment of how Ric Flair should have been used. Aguayo was one of Mexico's legendary heels, who got old, and the people started loving him. He's now 54 and due to all the years of incredible blade jobs, being almost a Mexican Abby, looks hideous but he's been protected in booking, knows exactly what to do and to this day remains the biggest drawing card in the entire country. The big crowed seemed to juice him up a little and as old and beat up and as many crazy bumps as he's taken in his career, he still blows away many of the older wrestlers in WCW. He is, on this never-ending retirement tour which I think started when he was 48 or 49, starting to overstay his welcome but on this show he was a friendly legend for both young and old to cling to his every move. Tarzan Boy, who worked harder than anyone else, even though he's a face and Aguayo's partner, had the fans booing the hell out of him because he's got that Evan Karagias thing going and the wrestling fans resent his push. The minute he'd tag in, the booing was unbelievable, and he couldn't stop it no matter how hard he worked and how many good moves he'd do. Then he'd tag Perro, or even worse Rayo, who is really bad and has nothing going for him except he was good when he was young and his father was really charismatic (a pairing that has hardly kept Dustin Rhodes at any level of stardom in the U.S.) and the crowd would go crazy for what little they'd do. Shocker and Scorpio Jr. have bleached blond hair doing almost a Hollywood Blonds deal. It was a surprise finish to build heat for something down the line as Mascara Ano 2000, his long-time rival, pinned Aguayo after a low blow. Back in 1993 before what is believed to be the largest crowd ever to witness pro wrestling in Mexico on the semifinal of the Konnan vs. Cien Caras retirement match (there's that word again), Aguayo beat Mascara in a hair vs. mask match and they've brought the feud back numerous times since then. *1/4
5. Atlantis beat Villano III in their mask vs. mask match in 25:28. I can only come up with two comparable matches this year, the Cactus Jack vs. HHH match at the Royal Rumble and the Toshiaki Kawada vs. Kenta Kobashi match in Kawada's first match back from the eye injury. Jack vs. HHH, through use of gimmicks, built to every bit as much drama as this match had by the end, but came nowhere close to sustaining the level of heat from start to finish and couldn't compare to the closing pop. They were entirely different as this was a totally scientific bloodbath while that was a brawl with gimmicks. Kawada-Kobashi involved two far better wrestlers, larger, faster, younger and harder hitting athletes. As superior athletically as that match was, and it also built to great heat, it came off as a great match in the long line of All Japan great matches but nothing anyone will remember above any of the others. This had the total aura of an all-time classic in the Jack Brisco-Dory Funk Jr. mode but even in some ways superior, not in work or technique, but in being a memorable match in the culture, not to mention what's happened in the past month where a 47-year-old heel who has been considered past his prime for more than a decade is now the hottest wrestler in the country. The Funk-Brisco comparison, except using more modern moves to basically create the same aura, is the best for an American equivalent, and overall this is the best match I've seen this year. It was a one fall match, which was kind of strange since every prelim was best-of-three. Rayo de Jalisco Jr. was in Atlantis' corner while V-3's father, Ray Mendoza, was in his corner. The atmosphere, with two of the most famous masks in Mexican history at stake, was there all night before the match started, almost equivalent to the big heavyweight boxing title fight of the decade. They argued over the ref early, and got a big pop when Babe Richard, the heel ref, got tossed. It started slow for about four minutes until they did a spot where Villano III did a tope and they cracked heads and both bladed huge. Atlantis' mask was torn up, and his white mask that wasn't torn, was soaked in red. Villano was also juicing heavy, but it was less noticeable with his pink-colored mask. Atlantis was bleeding so badly they brought the doctor out to check his cut, teasing the match would be stopped and he'd have to lose his mask. It should be mentioned that the crowd was cheering both men the entire match. Whomever seemed on the verge of losing, the entire crowd would chant his name looking for a comeback. Villano went for near falls and submissions, including many old-style moves as well as moves rarely seen. Villano used a surfboard, a camel clutch with a face lock, Atlantis did a bow and arrow, Villano brought back the old abdominal stretch and Atlantis did a rocking horse. There were all the Ric Flair style near falls. Atlantis hit a plancha about 19:00 in. Villano did a combination abdominal stretch with an entangled armlock (combining 1950s pro wrestling with 2000 submission fighting). Every move and movement got over. At the 22:00 mark, announcer Dr. Alfonso Morales, one of the country's most famous mainstream sportscasters who has maintained his credibility in the sport world while doing wrestling weekly by not overhyping and losing credibility calling what he's seeing, said in his distinctive voice that this match was an all-time classic. Atlantis got the Gori special (called by Morales the Gori invertiva) and fans started screaming for Villano, thinking it was the finish, and he reversed it into a sunset flip. Atlantis then got his finisher, the torture rack, which he's won most of his big matches in his career with. Villano slipped out and the place went nuts at this point. Atlantis got the rack again, then in that position, dropped down hard to his knees, theoretically putting more pressure on back, and Villano submitted. The pop, one of the most emotional I've ever seen and probably more reminiscent of the New Years Eve 1999 pop than a pro wrestling pop, lasted 90 seconds of the big pop and the fans were still on their feet minutes later. Villanos IV and V came out and put their older brother on their shoulders while fans chanted for him. He had his father (who was later in tears hugging Morales during the post-match interview) take off his mask while his young son was also in the ring. ****1/2
The move to regulate at least some forms of pro wrestling, but not any popular forms, in New Jersey, gained strength this past week.
State Assembly Democratic Leader and Bayonne Mayor Joseph Doria officially announced some of the provisions for the bill he is going to introduce when the assembly goes back in session. At the same time, so-called extreme wrestling garnered more front page news due to a 19-year-old female wrestler suffering a broken neck in a match on 4/7 in Bayonne, NJ.
Doria, in a press release, said, "Extreme wrestling is a grotesque and depraved activity. It's not entertainment. It's a blood sport with no redeeming value for our children. The state needs to step into the void here to regulate the fledgling extreme wrestling industry before someone gets seriously hurt. Moreover, municipalities should be empowered with the opportunity to have the final right of refusal to hosting this bizarre sort of entertainment within their borders. . . The legislative challenge here is to protect legitimate professional wrestling while giving the state and municipalities the legal means to control the violent sport of extreme wrestling. I applaud the Governor's (Christine Whitman) speedy response to this commercialized form of brutality."
Doria's bill would prohibit anyone under the age of 19 from attending what is deemed as an extreme wrestling show, which is not believed to include ECW itself despite the similarities in name, although there has actually been nothing specific on that issue spelled out anywhere. All promotions deemed as extreme would be put under the control and regulation of the state athletic commission and local municipalities would be given the right to ban such events. Doria had been frustrated because as Mayor of Bayonne, the home of Jersey All Pro Wrestling, the law didn't give him the power to ban the promotion from running shows in the city.
Doria's bill gained at least media momentum due to a neck injury to Kristy Timper, who wrestled under the name Kristy Kiss on the 4/7 show in Bayonne, NJ. The story took a number of strange turns, with it being placed on the front page of the Newark Star-Ledger, which broke the original story critical of Jersey All Pro Wrestling several weeks back on the front page and has printed several stories and at least two editorials since that point stemming at first from antics on a JAPW show. It was these articles that directly led to the Republican Governor joining with the Democratic Assemblyman for bi-partisan support of new legislation. As mentioned here previously, the stories and much of the media coverage of this has been filled with inaccuracies, including portrayals that have attempted to separate so-called extreme wrestling with WWF wrestling with the idea that pro wrestling uses fake blood while extreme wrestling has wrestlers cut themselves with razor blades. Roughly 90% of the items complained about in the articles occur with regularity on WWF events and virtually all have occurred frequently at ECW events. Both the WWF and ECW have come out publicly favoring this form of regulation, because it is believed the regulation won't apply to them. To both companies credit, they are probably far more responsible in aspects of at least training talent than independents, but that doesn't make the product mix they are presenting, which is often not that much different, any more or less suited for children, which is the buzz word on who needs to be protected from these types of shows.
Because of the media heat, JAPW promoters said the 4/7 show would be toned down with the elimination of controversial weapons such as cheese graters and staple guns, as well as cutting down on blading (there was juice in one match). However, Timper was power bombed through a table and her head cracked on the floor in the landing. The injury, while serious, became an even bigger story because of the aftermath, landing it on the front page of the 4/13 paper, causing comments from wrestling fans, who noted that serious injuries are not uncommon in sports, but even more comments from wrestling fans defensive and complaining about the reporter actually doing his job in exposing a promotional lie in the story. When Steve Austin was injured far more seriously in 1997 at the Meadowlands and Darren Drozdov, who is from Mays Landing, NJ, was left wheelchair bound, perhaps for life, from an accident at the Nassau Coliseum, that the same newspaper never covered either story.
After the incident, Timper was diagnosed with a transverse process fracture of the C-7 vertebra, or a breaking of the wing that juts out from the side of the small bone at the base of the neck. Timper, who was copying the stunt from seeing women on WWF programming take the same bump of late on television, was helped to the back room and it was first believed she had suffered a concussion and was walking around after the show with an ice pack on her neck. Her parents took her to the emergency room the next morning where the injury was diagnosed.
On 4/9, Timper posted on her web site that X-rays showed she had a broken neck. Two days later, when the paper contacted Iadavaia about the incident, he said, "We're faking her injury. It's part of the story line. If you heard about it, I'm glad. It's good the story is getting out there. She's not really hurt, though. She'll tell you it's all fake. She's 100% fine." Timper then called the newspaper and said her neck was a little sore but that she was fine, that she never went to the hospital but they were doing a storyline claiming that she broke her neck. But when reporters learned about the injury being real, they went to her parents home, and she answered the door wearing a protective collar and admitted that she had broken a bone in her neck, that Iadavaia knew about the injury, but they agreed to tell people it was fake.
Jeff Shapiro, the other co-owner of the company said that the company would pay for all her hospital bills even though they weren't legally obligated. Timper, due to the injury, had to leave her job as a waitress at a pizza parlor and doesn't have medical insurance. She will be able to make a full recovery and return to wrestle in about six months.
To make things even sleazier to the general public, Timper had wrestled earlier on the 4/7 show in a womens match where she had her evening gown torn off and was left in her bra and panties. On 4/14, the newspaper ran an editorial, noting that Timper was auctioning off her gown, bra and panties that she wore at the show on the internet. While that item is really irrelevant to the issues of this story, the behavior of all parties involved only served to strengthen the case of those attempting to both regulate and shut down the company, at a time when everyone in the company should have been smart enough to stay on their best behavior. Taking bumps on tables is actually far safer than it looks to the public viewing it. And it has become a staple of today's wrestling because the audience demands it due to what they've been educated to on televised wrestling. This leads what independent promoters largely have to do. They either follow television's lead and do what the current audience believes pro wrestling is, or unless they have their own television to educate and sell the audience on their version of the product, they leave audiences disappointed. But at a time when the media spotlight is on the company with the issue of regulation and even the introduction of a bill that would give communities the power to ban the promotion in general out there ready to be put on the table, the idea that they strip a women of her clothes and power bomb her through a table on that very show is at best inviting the problems that are likely coming, whether fair logically or not, even without the freak injury that took place. The idea that they lied about the injury to the media with the spotlight on them is only begging for further embarrassment. To sell someone's bra and panties on the internet after such an incident, while totally irrelevant to the issue of regulation for reasons of danger (although an argument can be made regarding the issue of allowing young children to attend), would only serve to make the company, the people involved and the industry on the local level to have even more of a black eye to the general public. To do this, on top of everything else, at a time when the media and political spotlight is on them, shows even worse judgement.
The 4/17 ratings had to be a huge blow to break up what had been a week of good momentum for WCW. Raw drew a 6.75 rating (6.24 first hour; 7.21 second hour) and a 10.3 share, largely built around Linda McMahon's announcement of the return of Steve Austin. Nitro its lowest live rating since the earliest days of the program with a 2.47 (2.86 first hour; 2.09 second hour) and a 3.7 share. The lowest Kevin Sullivan booked show did a 2.51. The rating can't be blamed on the strength of the Raw show because the first hour did so poorly and that was before anyone knew that Raw was opening with the title match. The total pro wrestling audience remained at 9.7 million viewers.
It was the total domination of the McMahon announcement of the return of Austin (7.68) that destroyed the over-run with the Hogan/Bischoff Nitro climax and Bret Hart cliffhanger (1.73) that was the big story on a night of total domination by the WWF. The WWF main event of Jericho & Acolytes vs. DX drew a 6.83 final quarter and a 7.65 over-run, both above normal levels. Nitro's Jarrett vs. Scott Steiner title match drew a 2.10 quarter, terrible for a TV main event.
In the battle of head-to-head quarters, Raw opened at 5.90 (HHH vs. Jericho) to 2.22 (Adams & Clark vs. Vito & Johnny, Sting-Vampiro confrontation); Raw went to a 6.66 (HHH vs. Jericho conclusion) to Nitro's 1.79 (DDP vs. Awesome; Abbott segment); Raw did a 6.01 (Hardys vs. Guerrero & Rios) to 2.29 (Luger vs. Douglas; Hogan brawl with Kidman) and finally Raw did a 6.32 (Tazz vs. Saturn vs. Crash) to 2.10 (Jarrett vs. Steiner).
Smackdown on 4/13 drew a 4.73 rating and 7.6 share. The audience grew consistently throughout the show, peaking with the Rock & Acolytes vs. HHH & Bossman & Buchanan main event which did a 5.34 quarter.
Thunder on 4/12 was the first direct sign that the first Nitro was a major hit as it drew a 3.11 rating and 5.0 share, which is the highest rating for a Thunder since late April of last year and more than a full point higher than what the show had been averaging. The show had excellent growth over the first 70 minutes, something it hasn't shown in the past, peaking at 3.55 for the Royal Rumble style match with the U.S. title contenders. It also fell hard, perhaps due to the production snafu because there is no logical reason for an unopposed wrestling show that was a good show to fall hard like this. The Sting vs. Villanos & Jarrett match dropped all the way to 2.82 and the Page vs. Bigelow main event after that fell to 2.21.
In the weekend numbers for 4/15-16, Livewire did a 1.5 (2nd highest on station all day), Superstars a 1.7 (3rd highest of the day) and Heat did a 2.89 (highest). WCW Saturday Night did a 1.6, which was the third highest rated show on the station all day.
ECW on TNN drew a 1.12 rating (highest) and 2.0 share even with all the hype on the internet about the show. The show peaked at 1.29 for the TV title change with Tajiri over Crazy and Guido and the post-match angle with Cyrus, Rhino and Sandman. RollerJam did an 0.69.
The EMLL/AAA block on Galavision on 4/11 drew an 0.7 rating.
OBSERVER POLL RESULTS
Traditional Observer PPV poll results based on phone calls, fax messages and e-mails to the Observer as of Tuesday, 4/18.
ECW: This week's TNN tapings took place on 4/16 in St. Charles, MO, which is a suburb of St. Louis, before about 2,500 fans. In the TNN open, the Impact Players and Dawn Marie talked about not being afraid of any woman in the business. Raven & Francine came out and it turned into a tag title match with Raven teaming with Whipwreck (who was already out there lighting something at ringside on fire) ending when Credible pinned Whipwreck with his spinning tombstone. Credible only worked the TV tapings because his wife just gave birth to a boy last week. They appeared to set up C.W. Anderson vs. Angel, but Cyrus came out and talked both into leaving the ring. Cyrus called out Scotty Anton (formerly Scotty Riggs) making homosexual allusions about his friendship with Van Dam and making comments about him not being cleared to wrestle for ECW. Rhino came out and they had something of a match which saw Rhino spear both Anton and the ref through a table before Van Dam hit the ring for a pull-apart. The main event was one of the bloodier matches they've had in a long time and said to be among the best brawls the company has put on. It started as a bullrope match with Corino vs. Dreamer but ended up as an eight-man with Rhino & Victory & Tajiri on Corino's side and New Jack & Sandman & Dusty Rhodes on the other side, ending when Jack pinned Corino and the faces all drinking beer and throwing foreign objects to the crowd. . . The legal problems continue between Paul Heyman and Sabu. Heyman successfully blocked Sabu from working the Insane Clown Posse's Juggalo Championshit (correct spelling) Wrestling tour where he was scheduled to be the headline attraction. Xtreme Pro Wrestling announced for the show on 4/15 at the Los Angeles Sports Arena that Heyman's legal maneuverings had blocked Sabu from appearing on the show the day before, except they used him anyway as an unannounced surprise as he showed up during the Candido vs. Douglas XPW title match which turned into a three-way which Candido retained pinning Sabu. The word given to us is that, wink, wink, Sabu was able to do the show because he wasn't getting paid. They are clearly trying to force Heyman's hand since Heyman had told so many people he was able to block Sabu from working in the U.S. because of Sabu's contract breach. . . TNN show on 4/14 was largely taped in Buffalo the previous week except for the brief cut-in from Indianapolis the night before to show the title change. They pushed the idea that Tazz had shocked the world in Indianapolis, referring to him under his WWF gimmicks with the two z's and the human wrecking machine as opposed to suplex machine (his ECW moniker) in two insets, without saying it was a title change. They aired basically only the piledriver finish of a Rhino win over Cash. Jazz went to see the Devil (Vandenburg), who asked her for sex. She told him to go to church. The segment ended with the dressing room floor on fire and Devil and Whipwreck laughing hysterically. It was a very weird segment. Storm & Credible retained the tag titles beating Chetti & Nova in 9:15 in a good almost Japanese style match. Good innovative spots. The negative was that the crowd didn't buy Chetti & Nova as having a chance to win the belts so their near falls didn't pop the crowd. They did build to a big pop when Chetti hip tossed Credible through a table and went for a pin but Dawn Marie saved the titles. Jazz made the save. The finish came quickly thereafter with Credible hitting Chetti with a title belt and Storm pinning him. The footage from Indianapolis aired next. Next was the TV title switch in a three-way with Tajiri winning over Crazy and Guido. Tajiri was the total star of this match, which was their typical very good match. It is weird to say this, but it's almost a big risk today running a TV show with a match that goes 13:56 and another as long as the tag title match. Crazy juiced heavy early. Guido then juiced heavy, actually juicing before Tajiri dropkicked a table into his forehead. Tajiri bladed himself under the ring and then Guido slammed his head into Sal E. Graziano's chair. Tajiri used a Gori especial and in that position spun him around like a whirly bird. Tajiri set up a table with Crazy on it and Guido under it. He did a double foot stomp off the top rope, but Crazy moved, so he went through the table onto Guido and both guys pinned Guido. Corino & Victory came out at this point to underdog Crazy. Tajiri used a crowbar and dug it into Crazy's forehead. He then blew mist at the ref, so there was no ref as Crazy did a top rope quebrada. Rhino interfered spearing Crazy and piledrove him off the apron through a table, totally protecting him int he process and Tajiri got the pin. Cyrus came out doing a Ric Flair out of control promo. Sandman came out for the save and this time got a lot of offense in, including caning the hell out of Rhino. When he threatened Cyrus, Tajiri blew the mist in his eyes and gave Sandman one of his wicked kicks. Rhino then speared ref H.C. Loc, who they are now calling the Extreme Official (ie babyface ref) and Sandman both through two tables set up vertically on the turnbuckle. Why does Cyrus have a headset mic and a hand mic? Scotty Riggs, called Scott Anton (real name Scott Antol) and Rob Van Dam came out with Van Dam cleaning house on all the riff raff until he squared off with Rhino, and the show ended before they touched. . . Storm posted on his web site a message actually repeating a viewpoint the vast majority of those we've heard from, including more than one wrestler in the company has espoused about the entire nature of the title change with outside interference and putting it on Tazz. He got so much heat that he took it down. Storm, despite rumors to the contrary, is going to be sitting down this week trying to finalize a contract extension with ECW. . . The ECW Arena on 4/22 is already sold out, making it the earliest sellout in company history for the building. The show was basically sold out before any of the Awesome situation got out so the idea that Tazz is going to defend the title can't be fairly given as a reason. . . Vic Grimes missed the weekend because he got married. . . Ikuto Hidaka is expected back for the summer. . . Masato Tanaka should start back this coming week. Kintaro Kanemura was also scheduled to return this week but that fell through at the last minute. There have been no further negotiations toward bringing in some of the Toryumon wrestlers.
WCW: Nitro on 4/17 in Rockford, IL drew 3,177 paid and 1,168 comps for a $98,990 house. The show opened with a celebration with Russo (who was better on TV this week) and all the new champs with confetti and balloons. It came off like an NWO party rerun. Russo and Jarrett cut a promo on Jim Ross, which probably served to confuse 95% of the audience and made them come off as bush leagues to most of the remaining 5% especially when the ratings came out the next day. If Jarrett holding a belt given to him because his best friend in the company is writing the scripts want to rub it in Ross' face for losing him, he should wait until after the ratings gap closes to one point or he's the one who headlines a PPV that does a 1.0 buy rate because until that time he's proven nothing as a headliner. Jarrett challenged DDP to a rematch at Slamboree on 5/7 in Kansas City at Kemper Arena in the three tier cage that was in "Ready to Rumble." Bischoff & Kimberly came out. Kimberly even called DDP "DD-Me." Bruce Mitchell should charge a commission. Kimberly claimed she had to keep turning down opportunities because DDP was trying to keep her down. Page showed up and security told him he wasn't allowed in. Page beat them all up and came in anyway. As he was going to the ring, he passed by Stasiak and Hennig, who, seriously, were backstage talking over their match. Page ran in the ring but was attacked five-on-one however the helmeted Riot Squad at ringside turned out to be the Millionaires Club to even the score, which came off as a WWF rerun. Bischoff and Russo then yelled at Booker and guys like Morrus, Flynn, Chavo Jr. and Bigelow for not helping out backstage. Then the security quit. Bischoff then picked up a phone that never rang and it was Hogan's voice threatening him. Stasiak beat Hennig in 3:48 with a spin around slam type of move they called the Perfect Plex. Stasiak is now "The Perfect One" as the non-charismatic version of Hennig's Mr. Perfect character. Hennig threw water all over Madden, who didn't know it was coming, so he's clearly the WCW Howard Finkel. There was a ref bump in this match, since I think there can't be a match on Nitro without one. Miss Hancock came out, I guess to show she's still around. Stasiak hit Hennig with a foreign object before doing his finish. With security gone, they had police officers guarding the back to keep Stone Cold Hulk Hogan from coming in. They were ready to pull their guns, but Hogan gave them a dirty look and they all backed off and let him in. I'm just glad I don't live in Rockford. Hogan went to the ring to beat up Stasiak. Hogan then did an interview and challenged anyone to come out. It was probably his best promo in a long time and he is still the smartest man in wrestling and the show wasn't even half over yet. Although he nearly died one week ago, and was bandaged up one day ago, he was 100% selling nothing tonight. He challenged Kidman, who was shown on the video wall challenging Hogan to fight him in the back. Hogan ran off. Hogan, like Nash, should never be put in a position that requires immediate intensity because he can't run and he exposes he's no longer athletic when put in that position and ruins the fantasy. Funk beat Wall to keep the hardcore title in 4:57. They traded chair shots. Funk actually did an Orihara moonsault off the top rope to the floor and Wall didn't catch him right and he made a scary landing. But no matter how bad he really hurt, he got up, took a piledriver on the table, and even got his head slammed several times on the cage door and took a bunch of more chair shots. The match ended when a whole bunch of tables fell from the sky on Wall and Funk pinned him. Funk was probably hurting terribly the next day from the match, but it was easily the best match of Wall's life. Adams & Clark, called Team Kronic, demanded a title shot from Russo. Russo admitted he promised them a shot, but told him he didn't promise when, and to be patient. They beat up the Harris Twins backstage, and then beat up the Mamalukes in the ring. They physically looked like monsters. They used their double choke slam finisher on both Vito and Johnny and threw them out of the ring. Vampiro did an interview. The best thing to say about the interview is it was a great light show. Sting then came down from the ceiling and destroyed Vampiro, killing him with a ton of bat shots and the scorpion death drop. There was a lot of talk the next day about him coming from the ceiling. The NBA banned all mascots or anyone at their games from coming from the ceiling immediately after Owen Hart died out of respect to Hart, who didn't even play their sport, a ban that has not been rescinded, but to be the slightest bit surprised would be to think WCW has the same class as the NBA. For a pro wrestling company to do this, for nothing more than a pop, whether it's dangerous or not, and Sting was clearly dropped too fast, in front of wrestling fans, at least some of whom watched the Over the Edge PPV and have bad memories of it, let alone with his brother in the same state, let alone the same building, is terribly insensitive. I just hope they have enough class not to duplicate this when they run Kansas City. DDP no contest Awesome. They were having a good match when Mark Madden said how in the new WCW they are going to have winners and losers and the refs aren't going to be calling DQ's. Literally seconds later, Billy Silverman called the DDQ. Kanyon ran in when Page was out of the ring, which truly makes Page look strong for his world title match on the PPV, and Awesome german suplexed Kanyon. Nash came in from behind and power bombed Awesome through a table, and came way too close to impaling him while doing the move. Abbott came out and went after Bruce MacArthur, who in real life is one of Ric Flair's best friends I think dating back more than 30 years. MacArthur, whose family owns the United Center and the Black Hawks, was sitting with NHL tough guy Bob Probert. Abbott grabbed MacArthur and before he could do much, Probert hit the ring. They had a quick pull-apart and nothing happened far too quickly as if booked right and pushed hard, at least they could have made Sports Center. Luger NC Douglas in 3:52. The stips were if Russo interfered, then Luger & Flair would get the tag belts. Bagwell came out, but a fan dressed as Sting, who of course was Flair, destroyed Douglas. Hogan found Kidman and beat him up with one hand tied behind his back. He then chased Bischoff, who was about to drive off in the hummer, but it wouldn't start. He left the keys behind and ran away. So Hogan started it immediately using his supernatural powers, and drove into the garbage bin Kidman was trapped in, destroying it. Kidman was left on a stretcher dead. Thankfully, if he's got Hogan's recuperative powers, and being that he's 23 years younger and takes better bumps, he should have them, he should be fine by next week's Nitro. Main event, which was pushed the whole show as a mystery non-millionaire against Jarrett, who Jarrett was clearly afraid of and wanted Russo to talk out of the match but Russo couldn't. As a shoot, there was debate between different factions regarding the hype during the show. The general feeling was to announce Steiner, but Russo thought keeping it a surprise would be better for ratings. The 2.1 made Russo look bad, but the truth is, if they had announced Steiner, it probably wouldn't have made much difference. Match wasn't any good. Just as Madden talked about how they don't do DQ's (after doing them in the previous two matches), Booker ran in and kicked Steiner while he had Jarrett just about beat for the DQ in 3:28. The fans clearly hated this. To send them home happy, Hogan was still chasing Bischoff and got him in the ring. Hart then showed up with a chair and swung it just as the show went off the air. I guess we have to wait until 4/24 to find out who he hit with the chair, but he did hit Hogan with it live. Actually it was a pretty good cliffhanger ending, but it won't help ratings since nobody saw it. The show was never boring, but the show was never that good and the in-ring product left a lot to be desired. . . Thunder taped on 4/11 in Colorado Springs, CO was the second straight good show, one under the all-time company record for the past 18 months. Tony Schiavone joined Mike Tenay and Bobby Heenan on the team. Who would have ever thought the announcing changes would result in more Schiavone? David Arquette was there and they pretty well had telegraphed him doing an angle at Nitro. They've now got the "New Blood" team focused on being Kidman, Booker, Miller, Vampiro, Scott Steiner, Douglas and Wall. I know Steiner is 38 and Douglas is 37 and both are years past their prime due to so many injuries, but this is wrestling. Bischoff announced Kimberly vs. Madusa, which brought out Page. Page was headed to the ring when Bigelow jumped him and everyone joined in pounding on him. Crowbar & Leroux & Moore beat Candido & Guerrera & Artist in 6:30. This was a fast-paced very entertaining match that made not a lick of sense. They had David Flair, Helms, Paisley and Daffney at ringside as if the six guys in the ring weren't providing enough action. Everyone did dives early including Moore doing a top rope Asai moonsault to the floor. Daffney did a Frankensteiner off the top on Helms and seemed really happy she pulled it off. Then the Guerrera team kept having the match won, but a partner would break up the pin and cost his own team the match. This actually happened time after time. The announcers clearly weren't clued in, because nobody said a word nor were telling the story of the match and sometimes when a partner made the save it was presented as if it was a member of the opposing team. Finally they came up with the explanation that the wrestlers are trying so hard to impress Russo and Bischoff that, I guess, they are trying to make sure their team doesn't win. I guess it makes sense now that I think about it. They wanted to make sure they did the job so they get over with the bosses. Artist must have impressed them since he hit his DDT, on Candido. It was clear nobody could even keep track, or by this point even cared, who was on what team. Crowbar pinned Candido after a gordbuster that was set up by Artist costing his team the match. Nobody actually said this or got it over, however. Bischoff told Harlem Heat 2000 to beat up Sid. Hennig attacked Stasiak who was in make-up. They are calling Stasiak "The Perfect One." As many have noted, a more apt retro name, based on his debut, would have been Shock Master 2000. Sid wrestled all three members of Heat in a no DQ match. This was among the most awful matches you'll ever see. They missed more moves in this match than in a usual month of Thunder and that's not an exaggeration. There was a good deal of heat anyway because of the three-on-one for so long. Finally Booker made the save and cleaned house, leading to Sid pinning Ray after a power bomb in 2:43. See Booker hates his brother more than he hates the millionaires that were holding him down for so long. Wall hit Sid with a chair and then Bischoff got mad at Booker for helping Sid, thus there is dissension in the NB ranks. Bischoff then said Sid was DQ'd, you know, in a no DQ mach, due to outside interference and thus Sid was eliminated from the U.S. title tournament on the PPV. Luger beat Douglas in 3:44 with the rack due to help from Flair after a ref bump. Another bad match. Jimmy Hart was in the ring crying about how Hogan made Bischoff and how Bischoff turned his back and demanded Bischoff to come out. Kidman came out instead, and Hart called him the flea market champion. X-Pac, I mean Kidman, beat him up and spray painted him. They did a Royal Rumble rules match, although they called it something else, with all the U.S. title contenders. Booker and Wall stated and it wasn't even bad. Miller came in. Wall choke slammed Booker through the table and both were counted out. Not sure why Wall just didn't get back in the ring but they had to eliminate him and logic is hardly relevant to today's wrestling. Steiner and Kidman came in. Miller was pinned and then Steiner pinned Kidman, who actually got zero offense in against Steiner when they locked up. Vampiro was the last guy in, but before anything happened, Sting gave Vampiro the SDD and Steiner put Vampiro in the recliner in 5:31. Madusa vs. Kimberly barely happened. Page came out almost immediately and Madusa started kicking him, so he gave her the diamond cutter for a DQ in 1:25. Kimberly was then mad at Page since he cost her the match. In a three-way hardcore match to determine the two participants in the hardcore title match on the PPV, somehow Smiley & Funk won when Smiley pinned Funk. The wrestling was bad but they did enough stunts that it was good TV. Morrus came off the stage through a table that he only caught the corner of. I was really scared watching this because Morrus has had so many concussions in his career and every time he takes a chair to the head he's taking a risk he really shouldn't be put in the position of taking. Meng and Knobs ended up in the concourse of the arena. Meng speared a life-sized poster of Goldberg which was funny. Meng then used the poster to block Knobs spraying him with the fire extinguisher. Meng then threw Knobs off a 30-foot balcony. I presume Knobs is either dead, or landed in Lake Michigan. Funk whipped Finlay through a table. The announcers acted as if Knobs was gravely injured, and were so concerned, that a moment later they forgot about it and never brought it up again. Rhodes came out and destroyed Funk dead, so Smiley, seeing Funk was out, and I guess the fact they were partners to begin with was irrelevant, pinned him at 7:13. Logically, if the hardcore title was prestigious and you could pin your own partner to get both of you into the title match, shouldn't everyone have raced from the opening bell to lie down and let their partner pin them before the other two teams did the same thing? Now at this point in the show live, they had a match with Sting against three Villanos, one of which was Jarrett. However, in the production blunder of the year, they skipped that match and came back from the commercial showing the replay of the finish where Jarrett hit Sting with a guitar and Page saved Sting so Sting won the match to get into the U.S. title tournament. Ric Flair beat Bagwell via DQ in 3:08 when Russo, dressed up in a Sting costume with a bat, at ringside next to David Arquette, hit the ring and beat up Flair with the bat. Douglas came out to help until Luger tried to make the save, but Bagwell hit Luger with the bat. Never mind they now let fans at ringside bring fake baseball bats. Flair once again wrestled in clothes. They actually had a reason for it again. They should just have Russo and Bischoff make a ruling on TV that Flair is fired if he ever wears wrestling trunks, since it makes as much sense as anything and it all accomplishes the desired purpose. You've got to give them tons of credit, though. They've got Flair as a babyface and wrestling with a shirt. Then they showed the Sting match, complete with Russo back at ringside in the Sting costume. Sting had to pin all three. What was really funny is seeing the two Villanos from Mexico and Jarrett together, that Jarrett was actually tiny next to the Mexican cruiserweights who are considered too small to be taken seriously. Sting pinned both of them. Jarrett then crashed the guitar on Sting and unmasked. Page ran in and hit Jarrett with a diamond cutter but Sting pinned him in 2:28. This probably would have been a good angle, except for the production screw up. Finally DDP wrestled Bigelow and we had another ref bump. Page hit the diamond cutter and Bischoff came out, counted to two and stopped. Jarrett hit Page with a guitar shot. Arquette finally did his run-in with them explaining that Arquette is now close friends with Page. Arquette took a hell of a bump over the top, but then, even though he looks to be about 150, Jarrett couldn't pick him up for a bodyslam because he mistimed his jump before he clumsily got dropped on the rail. Jarrett gave Arquette the stroke. Kanyon, who I guess is now a Millionaire and over 40, saved Page for a second until Bischoff hit him with a weak chair shot and Kidman came out and spray painted NB on Page. After the show went off the air, the faces all got to make a comeback so they sent the people home happy. . . "Ready to Rumble" did $2,685,718 in its second weekend so it's now at $9,093,168 after its first ten days of release. It ranked No. 10 for the weekend but it's per screen average in 2,585 theaters of $1,019 is not good, nor is a 53% drop off its open. "Beyond the Mat," which is only out in 26 theaters nationwide, did $9,990 for the weekend so it's just about at the end of its run grossing $1,945,267. . . Morale is said to be way up for the first time in a long time. . . The reason they did the angle getting Sid off the PPV is because he's not supposed to be wrestling due to his shoulder injury. . . Add Mark Kerr to the list of shootfighters on their way to WCW. Kerr was contacted by Bischoff and told they are going to have a group called "Fight Club" composed of Mark Coleman, Don Frye, Kerr, Rick Steiner and Abbott. Kerr was told he'd be brought in after the concept is developed as a new monster rather than at first. . . Bill Goldberg was asked to appear on the 4/10 Nitro show but only appeared at the house show because with only a handful of workouts in, felt he shouldn't be appearing on television wrestling until he looked like Goldberg. . . They had a team meeting before the 4/10 Nitro and basically told everyone they need to pull together and be part of the same team. The basic feeling seemed to be that finally there was a boss in charge, as it was the first two television tapings where it was clear the inmates weren't running the asylum and there were very few changes made in the scripts as they were laid out for the first time in a year. There was a big difference backstage in that while everyone seemed to personally like Bill Busch, probably far more than Eric Bischoff, nobody respected him and it was really clear he quickly got the tag that he could be run all over. . . Scott Hudson's father actually passed away early in the Nitro show on 4/10 while he was on the air. His mother and father were watching the show at their home in Tifton, GA. His father had several heart attacks in the early 90s but had gotten into much better condition and his health had been improved over the past five years. When they saw Abbott go to the announcers desk, they both got very scared because it was obvious the angle was leading to an announcer getting beaten up. They were relieved when Abbott started spanking Madden. His father got up and took the garbage out and apparently while doing so suffered a heart attack and died. . . The Tijuana newspaper La Frontera ran another story on 4/13 on the Damian and Halloween (Ciclope) lawsuit against WCW saying that WCW has 180 days to respond to the suit. They are claiming to have been unjustly fired while both were injured and said they were working in a hostile environment where racist jokes were plentiful, even in the Atlanta office (that Bischoff secretary putting the racial joke on her computer where it was accidentally seen by several African American employees rears its ugly head again). . . WCW will start airing in Denmark in a few weeks making it the first pro wrestling to air in that country in five years. . . Starrcade will be on 12/17 at the MCI Center in Washington, DC. . . Michael Landsberg of TSN's "Off the Record" is back in negotiations with WCW about doing a monthly one hour biography show involving WCW wrestlers for both the network in Canada and attempting to syndicate it in the United States. . . We have a report of someone purchasing a WCW Kanyon doll and saw on their receipt that it scanned in as a doll of Dennis Rodman. . . 4/11 in Colorado Springs, CO for Thunder drew 3,118 paying $62,085. 4/13 in Sioux Falls, SD drew 1,664 paying $37,268. 4/14 in Omaha drew 4,042 paying $90,408. 4/15 in Peoria, IL drew 1,792 paying $42,480. Both Sioux Falls and Omaha largely saw the same show headlined by a six-man with Sting & Luger & Flair losing to Bagwell (Vampiro in Sioux Falls) & Booker & Kidman when outside interference from Douglas caused Flair to get pinned. Reports from both shows indicated major improvements in atmosphere and workrate, including a much improved sound system. Omaha in particular had a very unruly crowd but the show was a huge improvement over WCW house shows.
WWF: The 4/30 Backlash PPV from the MCI Center in Washington, DC at this point has eight matches booked. The main event is HHH vs. Rock for the title with Vince in HHH's corner, Austin in Rock's corner and Shane as referee. Also it'll be Benoit vs. Jericho for the IC title, Edge & Christian vs. Road Dogg & X-Pac for the tag titles, Show vs. Angle, Dudleys vs. T&A, a four-way elimination match for the hardcore title with Saturn, Tazz, Bob and Crash, Guerrero vs. Rios for the European title, Malenko vs. 2 Hotty for the light heavy title and Acolytes vs. Buchanan & Bossman. On paper, it's one of the strongest line-ups to date. . . The main event for the 5/6 WWF Insurrextion (that's how it's being spelled) PPV from Earls Court in London, England (U.K. only PPV) is being advertised as a three-way with HHH, Rock and Shane McMahon for the title. Keep in mind that as TV changes storylines, this line-up will probably change as well as the previous U.K. PPV line-up was changing on a weekly basis. Benoit wants to bring Dynamite Kid to this show. Rest of the show is Benoit vs. Angle for the IC, Guerrero vs. Jericho for the European, Edge & Christian vs. Dudleys vs. Hardys for the tag titles, Malenko vs. Crash Holly for the light heavyweight, Kat vs. Terri in an arm wrestling match, Rikishi vs. Show, Acolytes vs. X-Pac & Dogg, Saturn vs. 2 Hotty and Kane vs. Bossman. . . There has been no officially announced figure for Wrestlemania's PPV. The latest estimates are more than 800,000 buys. There is no solid estimate on the percentage of whom bought $34.95 or $49.95 other than the company's pre-show estimate of 20 percent buying the 12-hour more expensive version is going to be surpassed. . . Raw on 4/17 at Penn State University's Bryce Jordan Center in State College, PA drew a sellout 11,611 paying $298,364 for an excellent show. The show opened with a tremendous TV match with Jericho pinning HHH after a quebrada and a fast count by Earl Hebner, who was mad at HHH, in 8:37 to apparently win the WWF title which drew a tremendous pop for what can be described as the Dusty finish 2000. The Acolytes came out early as Jericho's protectors from a run-in. Jericho bled from the mouth. Ref Mike Kiota was bumped and Hebner ran in to take his place. Shane interfered but the Acolytes chased him away. After the match HHH and Shane grabbed Hebner and Kiota and brought them to the ring. HHH asked Kiota after watching the replay if it was a fair count and Kiota told Earl he screwed HHH. HHH told Hebner to reverse his decision but Hebner refused. Shane & HHH threatened to beat up Hebner, who agreed to reverse his decision but only if they agreed that as long as he worked in the WWF, they would never touch him. HHH then told Hebner to bring him the belt from the sawed off midget, cleverly burying Jericho the first time after putting him over in a segment clearly more designed at putting over HHH as a heel than getting Jericho over as a title contender. Jericho gave back the belt, and HHH told Hebner to put the belt around his waist. HHH then told Hebner he was fired, and since he no longer worked for the WWF, he and Shane destroyed Hebner and laid him out with a pedigree. This whole first hour was tremendous. Guerrero was studying with Chyna for his GED. Guerrero was so totally overplaying the stereotypical Mexican high school dropout low rider gimmick it was pretty racist, particularly his exaggerated speech pattern. Hardys beat Guerrero & Rios in 4:41 in a great match. Lita accidentally hit Guerrero with a moonsault block and Guerrero's positioning was perfect to take it. Matt then pinned him with the twist of fate. Chyna blamed Rios and she and Guerrero put the boots to him after the match. Crash won a three-way for the hardcore title over Tazz and Saturn which turned into a four-way with Bob. Very stiff as they were killing each other with a cookie sheet. Not much heat but the work was good. Crash pinned Saturn after Bob used his formerly known as the Holly-caust but now simply his whattamaneuver in 3:25. Linda came out for the interview to announce Austin in Rock's corner. HHH, Shane and Stephanie came out. The announcement of Austin's name tore the roof off the place. But between Linda and Stephanie, there was some major bad acting in the segment. Stephanie was about to hit Linda, but she blocked her blow and counterpunched and Stephanie went down. Linda freaked out about slapping her daughter. HHH went to Pedigree Linda but Shane saved her. Stephanie got between HHH and Shane and ended up slapping both of them. Maybe we'll end up with a three-way dance with those three. Rock came out and cut a promo, which, surprisingly, was his only appearance of the show. Snow & Blackman beat Dudleys in 1:30 when after Snow got the 3-D, Test & Albert interfered and Test came off the top with an elbow on D-Von and Snow pinned him. Buh Buh snatched Trish Stratus, but before he could molest her, she kissed him. He was smitten and went into his trance and she was saved. I'm not sure what message the WWF is sending to the new audience it is bragging about being strong in, the teenage girls, with that message. Crowd booed this heavily because they wanted to see Stratus go through the table. Angle did several vignettes on the Penn State campus throughout the show preaching abstinence. The segments were very funny, but they should put someone like Snow, who doesn't have the upward potential Angle has, to play this Bob Backlund role. Backlund was hilarious and a heat getting machine when he was in the early days of his heel role, but because of the gimmick, was a total failure as a draw when put on top years ago. The final segment ended with Show spoiling Angle's advice by throwing condoms everywhere. 2 Hotty won the light heavyweight strap from Malenko in 4:41 when Malenko did a superplex off the top and 2 Hotty caught him in a surprise inside cradle (the Dynamite Kid vs. Randy Savage Wrestling Classic PPV finish). Another really good match. Show beat Benoit in the IC title match via DQ in 2:21 for a low blow. On a night where there were about 2,000 low blows between the two shows, that was a lame finish. After the match, Angle ran in and gave Show another low blow. Edge & Christian kept the tag titles beating Buchanan & Bossman via DQ in 4:43. Not much heat. The heels were DQ'd for no apparent reason other than shoving Teddy Long, and considering refs are knocked unconscious with impunity, that was the second straight weak finish. Didn't Edge & Christian turn heels like three weeks ago? Kane came out with a cast on his hand and choke slammed Buchanan. Main event saw HHH & Dogg & X-Pac over Acolytes & Jericho in 7:36. Another good match. Everyone except Jericho and HHH brawled to the back. Bossman & Buchanan attacked the Acolytes. With just HHH and Jericho in the ring, HHH hit the pedigree for a clean pin. I defy anyone to give me a logical business explanation for that finish. Actually the reason was immediately obvious and that's that Hunter is the third smartest man in wrestling. If they wanted to give HHH a pin because he sort of lost earlier and after all, the champ should be kept strong, they should have taken the pin on Bradshaw or Faarooq rather than cut the legs off a guy who had seemingly just taken a big step and up until getting pinned seemed to have elevated himself into a position to being a viable challenger. . . 4/18 tapings from a sold out Core States Center in Philadelphia. They opened the show pushing the Gary Albright tribute show in Allentown the next night. Venis beat Henry with a money shot in a dark match. A try-out match saw Jimmy Snuka Jr. beat Elvis Elliot in what was described as not being good. Scott Vick beat Pete Gas with a jumping DDT. For Heat, Hardys beat Snow & Blackman when Jeff pinned Blackman with the swanton. After the match Snow brought out Harvey Cottontail (Harvey Wippleman in a bunny outfit) and he said, "Have an Egg-cellent Easter Steve." Blackman then attacked Snow seemingly breaking up the team. Bob Holly DDQ Saturn when both knocked down the ref. 2 Hotty beat Malenko & Michinoku in a three-way for the title when he pinned Michinoku with a bulldog off the top. Malenko put Scotty in the cloverleaf after the match. Benoit cut a promo on Jericho. Jericho came back and said Benoit would have been a superstar in the 60s but not in the year 2000 and they got in a brawl, ending in the back with Jericho applying the walls and Benoit tapping to set up their PPV title match. Faarooq beat Buchanan via DQ when Bossman interfered. Bradshaw tried to make the save but they beat on him until Kane choke slammed Bossman and ran off Buchanan to end the show. For Smackdown, Road Dogg pinned Edge by reversing a roll-up. They showed Mike Tyson in attendance at the show and a clip of his angle with Austin from 1998. HHH & Stephanie cut a promo. HHH said he was never going to pedigree Linda, just trying to scare her, but that Shane was a hothead and a mama's boy since they are building to a three-way in May, but he forgave Shane and ripped on bringing Austin back. Every mention of Austin got a huge pop. Tazz came out wearing the ECW belt and there was a loud ECW chant. HHH acknowledged the ECW belt saying he was going to show everyone why ECW sucks and WWF is great. Guerrero passed his GED test. Dudleys NC Guerrero & Rios (Guerrero said he was giving Rios another shot at being his partner). Lita accidentally hit Guerrero again. There was no finish but Chyna basically left Lita to be power bombed through a table by the Dudleys and she did a stretcher job. Rikishi DCOR Show. Fans booed the bad finish. Rikishi then invited Show to dance with him which the crowd loved. After the dancing, Rikishi kicked Show and took the glasses off him. HHH beat Tazz here. T&A beat Godfather & Brown when they had miscommunication and Godfather was pinned. Brown beat up Godfather after the match. X-Pac pinned Christian with the X-factor, but Edge & Christian laid out Dogg & X-Pac after the match. Benoit beat Angle via DQ in an IC title match when Show shoved Benoit off the top rope. Show then chased Angle to the back. Benoit, starting a face turn, was mad because he didn't win the match cleanly. Insane Clown Posse was back, in clown suits, attacking Crash at the Ringling Brothers Circus which was taking place next door at the Spectrum. Crash had elephant shit thrown at him in the brawl, but he escaped. Main event, ordered by HHH earlier in the show, was Rock vs. Jericho with all heel lumberjacks. The heels kept breaking up both men's pins. Rock used two rock bottoms and went for the people's elbow, but HHH hit Rock with the title belt and Jericho scored the pin. . . New York Daily News, the Times Square restaurant that hasn't been talked about is in the midst of being revamped. The story, quoting a WWF insider, blamed the problems on Parkview Restaurant Group that the WWF hired to run the place, saying they could be out of the picture within a week. WWF has stopped hyping the place, which has been empty except during major WWF events. The insider said that Parkview managed it like it was a theme restaurant while the WWF's idea was for it to be an entertainment complex (sounds sort of like that statement they're in the rasslin' business and we're in the entertainment business which in reality is a semantic way of saying nothing). The WWF is attempting to buy Parkview out of the current deal according to the item. Of late, the WWF has basically stopped all promotion for the place. The WCW Nitro Grill in Las Vegas, which is a much less ambitious project, is suffering the same fate. They've laid off part of their staff and now have eliminated lunch service. Except on Monday nights during Nitro and during PPV shows or when wrestlers make special appearances, there is rarely any business to speak of at the place. . . The entire item reported on a 6/3 show in Ontario regarding advertising the Rock wouldn't be there in last week's issue is totally incorrect. There isn't even a WWF show in that part of the country on that date. . . SummerSlam this year will be in Raleigh, NC. . . Grand Master Sexay (Brian Lawler) is already walking without a limp so he should be in the ring very soon. . . Some notes on the 4/13 Smackdown. Benoit & Malenko vs. Hardys was a real good TV match. Kat must be a genetic freak because nobody has ever grown so much hair in just one day. Moolah nearly killed Mae Young twice doing monkey flips since Mae really couldn't get all the way over. Kat's spear on Moolah, as bad as it was, was 1,000 times better than the one they did in San Jose the previous week, which was just about move-for-move the exact same match except Mae dropped an elbow instead of doing the lowest big splash ever for the win. They announced a WWF TV special on UPN on 4/28. The interplay between Rock and Shane is just awesome. . . WWF Armageddon fell to No. 20 on the charts this week with 62,179 units sold. Unlike most records which in its early weeks have a bullet (which indicates sales increasing from the previous week), the WWF sales for this record are similar to many in the rap genre which open very strong and fade fast. By contrast, the previous CD, which wasn't rap, had much stronger legs and at this point has topped one million in sales directly to consumers (1,015,965 as of last week's tally). . . Depositions began in the Martha Hart wrongful death lawsuit against WWFE and several other plaintiffs in Kansas City over the past week. . . TSN's "Off the Record" should be having a one-on-one interview with the Rock taped in May. . . TSN is also petitioning the CRTC to relax its standards on violence toward women. Because of the current standards, TSN is forced to edit all the women taking power bombs through tables off Raw and in the future, Nitro as well, which results in complaints from wrestling fans every Tuesday morning. . . Tom Howard, who had worked numerous dark matches at tapings over the past year, was released from his developmental deal. . . We need to make a ratings correction. Last year, when Raw and Nitro opposed the NCAA basketball finals, it was the Raw the day after Wrestlemania and not the week after as we reported. The gist of the story is correct in that both the basketball and pro wrestling audience was far larger on that Monday one year ago than it was this season. . . Saturn on his web site apologized to Hogan because Hogan did the angle with Kidman. . . The Team Extreme who worked the dark match at the 4/4 tapings in San Jose was not Kit Carson & Khris Germany from Texas as many thought, but a tag team based in Southern California. The two were Justin McCulley, who has worked a shootfighter gimmick in New Japan and also done some legitimate shootfights in Japan for RINGS, and Aaron Aguilera (Southern California indie wrestler who goes by the ring name of Hard Kore Kid), whose father is their ringside manager El Jefe. . . WWF is scoring good ratings in New Zealand as the 4/8 show drew 126,200 viewers, making it the highest rated show on TV4, which is New Zealand's lowest rated free TV channel. . . Gangrel is out of action for at least one month due to a separated shoulder. . . Mick Foley will be taping an episode of "Now and Again" on CBS later this month. . . Rock's appearance for IWA in Puerto Rico on 4/28 at Juan Loubriel Stadium in Bayamon will be in a tag match teaming with Kane against the Dudleys. . . WWF.com had an article on the Court TV special, basically saying that Court TV asked for an interview to talk about a different subject and not about the deaths of children that have been tied in to copying pro wrestling moves. Because of that, they claimed Linda McMahon hadn't had time to prepare answers for the questions they were asking, as an apparent excuse for her not coming off well on the show. All I can tell you is that with zero exceptions, in every media interview I've ever done and they number well into the hundreds and maybe the thousands, not once have I had stipulations placed on what I would be asked and not once was I ever given more than a broad outline of what would be asked and usually not even that. The article insinuated Court TV was unethical by asking her questions she wasn't ready for. They also have the unedited version of the Catherine Crier interview with Linda McMahon. She actually came across far worse in the WWF unedited version than in the very edited version the show aired. Crier, who is a well known trial lawyer, so is very good at this sort of thing, aggressively interviewed her for more than 20 minutes. Even though it was clear Crier herself barely knew the subject, she had her looking very bad in many instances. McMahon avoided answering many questions and kept trying to divert the subject in others. While McMahon made valid points that in every one of the deaths, the parents deserve blame for having children too young supervising, or not being there or not responding to noises, and I'd agree they deserve primary blame in all cases well above whatever very minor blame if any pro wrestling deserves which is probably different in every case, that still doesn't change that kids were killed through imitation of moves they learned watching pro wrestling. McMahon at one point brought up that the kids could have died imitating tackling as goes on in the NFL or violence from Walker: Texas Ranger, which is true, except they didn't. Neither show she mentioned appeals to as young a demographic which makes their programming responsibility different, just as a comparison to afternoon soap operas (which she also brought up) or all-night porn on cable (which she smartly didn't) is ridiculous because for the same reasons. Kids didn't die from imitation of moves from those shows just like one could argue that double juice matches because of spreading of AIDS are more lethal than overdoing steroids, cocaine or pain pills, except that people have died in wrestling from the latter and nobody has died from double juice matches so I'd worry more about the problems that have caused deaths as opposed to the ones that could on paper but never have. She did bring up injuries from high school football, which is a valid point if you are trying to argue that there are dangerous things for children other than pro wrestling which hopefully nobody is ever trying to argue because that would be a stupid point. Far more media stories have been done about football injuries than have ever been done on wrestling until maybe this year. That's the same as when the steroid stories were written on wrestling in the early 90s and the people trying to defend wrestling against media stories by saying there are steroids in the Olympics and in football so why write about wrestling, when there was 50 times as many media stories on steroids in those sports than ever in wrestling to begin with. Kids could die from imitating moves in a war movie, and when kids die from imitating a movie (there was a scene in a football movie years ago of players laying on a freeway which kids imitated and were run over which caused a huge controversy regarding that movie at the time), that movie came under a ton of media scrutiny as well. McMahon claimed that the WWF doesn't spend a dime marketing to children, and when all the toys were brought up, claimed they were mainly as she called them, "adult collectibles" which is why they are sold at Toys R Us I'd suppose. She stated more than once that the WWF doesn't market to kids. Crier made her look bad even on the subject where it appeared Crier was going to look bad because she didn't know what she was talking about, the Al Snow head controversy. When Crier pointed out a female head with "help me" being written on the forehead, McMahon explained the Snow storyline. Crier came back asking if an eight year old buying the toy would know the storyline and McMahon said they would. Crier than said if they don't market toward eight year olds and if they think they shouldn't be watching the show, how would the eight year old understand that storyline that explains the character. Crier used numerous Vince Russo quotes about how when they write the show it is meant to be taken seriously (when McMahon tried to pass off some violent scenarios as comedy slapstick like on Saturday Night Live and not meant to be taken seriously); talking about booking hangings (Bossman on the PPV) which McMahon, who said the WWF was never done anything she believes is crossing the line but did say there does exist a line that shouldn't be crossed and she defended by saying he wasn't hung for very long (actually he was); and Russo saying that when he wrote Raw, their proviso was to do as much as they could get away with. McMahon responded by saying Russo no longer works for the company, intimating he was fired for having that attitude as opposed to quitting for whatever reason he really left for. McMahon kept using that parents need to monitor what their kids are watching and some of what they do isn't appropriate even for some 14-year-olds and parents should switch the channel if they don't like it. Crier then brought up shows that air on Saturday mornings when everyone knows kids watch TV while parents are still in bed, and McMahon blamed the parents again, saying they need to wake up earlier. She said she felt no sense of responsibility to children watching the shows. . . In some comparisons for what the XFL is getting into, the NBA game on 4/15 on NBC in prime time (Utah Jazz vs. San Antonio Spurs) drew a 3.2 rating. CBS had an Ice Wars special with figure skating that drew a 6.2. . . The country of Liberia is releasing a nine set stamp package of The Rock. These are the first postage stamps anywhere in the world of a WWF personality. . . In this week's Billboard listings of top selling rec sports videos, WWF occupied the top five spots ahead of the Super Bowl. The Rock's video remained No. 1, followed by Austin vs. McMahon, Best of Raw, Austin, and WWF Most Memorable moments of 1999. WWF also occupied spots No. 6 through No. 14 and had 16 of the top 20 spots. WCW had one, Sting at No. 18. The only non-wrestling videos in the top 20 were the Super Bowl, a Motocross video at No. 15 and a Michael Jordan video at No. 17. . . A special main event on 4/23 in Greensboro will have Rock & Hardys (from near Greensboro) against DX. . . The Raw show on 5/29 in Vancouver, BC sold out the G.M. Place in about 20 minutes. . . Smackdown tapings on 4/11 in Tampa at the Ice Palace drew a sellout 13,966 paying $354,003. House show on 4/15 at Madison Square Garden drew a sellout 16,925 paying $509,499. Total in the building was 19,588. It was the largest non-PPV gate in the history of wrestling at Madison Square Garden (which basically only means that the ticket prices are higher now than at any time in the past) and it was the tenth consecutive MSG sellout which I have a feeling may be an all-time record, although there were periods before accurate records were kept such as in the 70s when Pedro Morales and Bruno Sammartino were on top that MSG sold out most of the time as well. House show 4/16 in Pittsburgh drew 11,640 paying $352,801. Merchandise at the two tapings and two arena shows over the past week totalled $457,893 which is $8.46 per head. . . From MSG, Malenko kept the light heavy title beating 2 Hotty with one of those double pin finishes but Malenko raising his shoulder. Guerrero beat Tazz in the European title match when Chyna DDT'd Tazz. Bossman & Buchanan beat Head Bangers when Buchanan pinned Thrasher after a legdrop off the top. Kane then came out with Paul Bearer and choke slammed Buchanan and
destroyed the Bangers as well. Crash Holly beat Saturn in the hardcore match. Tazz came out with a second ref and while this was going on Crash got the pin. Crash then ran away while Tazz and Saturn fought. Edge & Christian won a three-way over Dudleys and Hardys. Crowd was heavily into the Dudleys, particularly the 3-D and table spots. T&A beat Snow & Blackman. Angle pinned Venis. Benoit pinned Jericho in the IC title match. Jericho got a great reaction. Good match. Rikishi DCOR Show. They did a dance contest before the match which the crowd got into. After the match the two danced together and left the ring together. HHH & X-Pac & Dogg beat Rock & Acolytes in the main event. It was like a TV match as X & Dog and Acolytes all brawled to the back. Shane & Vince were at ringside. Earl Hebner was bumped so Shane took over as ref and refused to count as Rock had HHH pinned. Finally Rock had HHH pinned and Hebner recovered but Vince pulled him out of the ring and decked him. Vince tried to attack Rock with a chair but Rock got the chair, but before he could use it he got ambushed by HHH and was given a pedigree and Shane counted the pin. One would suspect based on Rock getting pinned in a "send the fans home happy" match that he's getting the title on the PPV. He almost has to at this point after the WM finish or they're in danger of having the fans think he can't win the big one. The only other possible finish is Austin turning on Rock, but it seems several months early for that one because there is no point in the two of them wrestling each other until Wrestlemania next year. . . At this point, Benoit seems to be the leading candidate for King of the Ring, perhaps by that point as a face. . . The WWFE stock at press time on 4/18 closed at $13.75 per share. . . The skit being shot with Angle at Penn State about abstinence was almost stopped by local Penn State police giving the WWF a hard time about shooting in the HUB without a permit. The first skit took at least ten takes because the producers had a hard time trying to organize the onlookers to where it looked like a normal day at class. The second skit with the couple making out took a long time because the crowd watching kept laughing when Angle delivered his punch line and Angle also forgot his lines. The final segment had to be changed when one of the balloons on Show's head popped and ruined his hat,so they cut out the visual of his face after that point.
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