Wrestling Observer Newsletter
PO Box 1228, Campbell, CA 95009-1228 ISSN1083-9593 May 1, 2000
When the smoke cleared after nine months of title changes largely forced upon him and designed to surprise, Paul Heyman finally went back to the original Plan A--as the latest surprise.
Justin Credible (Peter Polaco), who Heyman had planned to be ECW heavyweight champion dating back more than 18 months, with the idea of not putting the title on him until he had a national television outlet, and being the wrestler that Rob Van Dam would chase in the company's top program, wound up with the title after two more switches at ECW's "Cyberslam" show on 4/22 in Philadelphia at the ECW Arena.
The title changes over the past year have all been mandated not by long-term planning, but by short term-reactions to various problems. The original plan was for Shane Douglas to hold it until getting a national outlet, going to Credible for a long run, finally building for Van Dam's big chase. But that was changed several times along the way. Douglas not only had injury problems that made Heyman feel he had to get the belt off him, as well as outside the ring problems between the two threatening and eventually terminating their relationship, which is where Taz, with one z, came in. When Taz, at first thought to be one of the few ECW wrestlers who, for various reasons due to his ties with the company that took him as a nobody in wrestling and made him into a top name, that wouldn't leave the promotion, ended up taking an offer from the WWF, Heyman had to take the title off him at the Anarchy Rulz PPV last August. He felt, needing a surprise, just before going on national TV as a third player, he'd bring in Mike Awesome, who had been out of action for much of the previous year due to reconstructive knee surgery, with the idea of having a champion who was both big and could do a lot of spectacular moves. The idea was to have a world champion he could push as being superior to whomever WWF or WCW was pushing as their champions at the time, which worked to a degree since many started considering the ECW title as more important than the mishandled WCW belt. When Awesome left for WCW, without giving notice or dropping the title in the ring, it led to a strange series of circumstances.
After getting a settlement from WCW, since Awesome did have a contract with ECW, that included Awesome coming back to do the "I've got to do a job and get it over with" match in 1:13 in Indianapolis and Heyman selling the idea of using Tazz to Vince McMahon, it created the Tazz to Tommy Dreamer to Credible scenario all taking place on 4/22.
Using Tazz, a WWF wrestler, enabled Tazz and Heyman to fully mend fences since there was some bitterness from both sides in the manner and timing of his departure last year and Heyman hoped it would at least gain exposure for his product on WWF TV. Whether getting the belt on WWF television, only to have it presented as a minor league belt and having his champion on TV do a job for the WWF's champion in ECW's home city was worth it on the other end due to the publicity of the belt being for one week on highly-rated programs is good or bad for the company will be evident over the next few weeks if there is any movement in television ratings. At present the evidence isn't there yet, and what little evidence is there hasn't been positive. WWF drew huge ratings on Monday, but the quarter hours don't indicate Tazz or the ECW title had anything to do with it. ECW the previous Friday, airing the title change, drew a rating a virtually identical to its average (1.12 as compared with a 1.09 average so far in 2000), which given all the insider wrestling talk for the show, if all that talk meant anything, it easily should have drawn a record not only on 4/14 but again on 4/21. The 4/21 show, after its belt was on Raw and featured on Smackdown in a key match with HHH the previous night and a week after it was also mentioned on WCW and again with all the "talk" in wrestling about another title change impending, whatever curiosity value the exposure should have meant in reality should have transpired specifically on that show, and it as far as ratings went meant less than nothing as the show did an 0.90, a 17% drop from its average so far this year. Smackdown on Thursday where the HHH vs. Tazz match was featured as a prominent match, even though it was made non-title and not put in the main event position on the show, drew one of the show's best ratings to date, although at press time we don't have the quarter hours to show if HHH vs. Tazz made a big or small difference. Certainly WWF officials, based on that rating, which was particularly strong in the New York market where Smackdown beat out "Friends" (in reruns) for the first time ever, seem to have more interest this week than last week in continuing to do something with ECW. Whether that helps ECW if the positioning continues with ECW portrayed in this manner is a question, since some thought it would also help Smoky Mountain Wrestling years back on a smaller scale and also didn't for most of the same reasons. At this point, the deal that was made to get Tazz in and feature the ECW title on WWF television has been completed and there are no future plans, but that could change at any time. While it would be premature to say ECW was a loser in this deal with WWF, it certainly hasn't proven to be a winner. WWF appears to be a winner in a game where WWF being a winner doesn't make ECW necessarily a loser.
Tazz was said to get the biggest pop, even above ECW's biggest star Rob Van Dam, from the packed house of an estimated 1,600 fans at the ECW Arena for the annual internet convention show, which Heyman considered as his biggest non-PPV show of the year. The original plan of using Perry Saturn for the finish, to hype the Tazz vs. Saturn WWF program, was nixed by WWF officials who instead sent Saturn to Columbia, SC even though he didn't have a match scheduled on the show to do his surprise run-in there during a Holly vs. Holly match. Dreamer pinned Tazz in about 5:00 with a reverse cradle spot of a match that received mixed reviews. Tazz made a speech about having done the right thing for business, a term that many were questioning being used with another match left to come on the card, afterwards, and put over many of the ECW champions of the past including Douglas and Sabu, who aren't on good terms with the company right now in what was considered a very strong interview. The gimmick was that even though Dreamer, who had never won the title although he'd always been pushed as the company's perennial babyface and behind the scenes has long been Heyman's right-hand man, won the title, he never actually got to strap it on before losing it.
As the various wrestlers congratulated Dreamer, including Raven, who hugged Dreamer, just weeks after doing the angle where he turned on him again, Credible came out. They had previously done an angle on the show to injure Lance Storm. Credible came out and caned Raven and gave him a tombstone, then caned Dreamer, the said that Mike Awesome was going to throw down the belt on Nitro and said how Tazz wanted to defend it on Raw, but that he's going to be the one to make an impact, and he threw down his tag team title belt in a scene attempting to recreate Douglas throwing down the old NWA heavyweight title belt to create "the new" ECW title. The idea, clearly, they were trying to get across, is that "old" title, which was held by a guy who walked out and did the job in a poor match, followed by a guy in another federation who was brought in as a panic move for publicity, that was tarnished is now gone with the new champion who had nothing to do with any of that mess, and as Heyman put it, Tazz was now two champs ago and Awesome was three champs ago.
Throwing down the tag title was secondarily a storyline way of getting the title off Storm, whose status in the company was and still is somewhat in question (he hasn't signed anything new but is said to be more interested in staying than leaving and negotiations are ongoing toward signing either another 30-day agreement or a long-term contract. At this point WCW has yet to make him a direct offer because they won't go after any ECW talent unless they have written proof presented to them that they aren't under contract and are free to negotiate). With Raven carried out, Francine mysteriously stayed at ringside during the Dreamer vs. Credible title match. After each kicked out of the other's finisher, Francine interfered and gave Dreamer a low blow leading to Credible scoring the pin, and then Francine ripped off her Raven clothes, so she's going to be paired with Credible.
This leads to the plans for the 5/14 PPV with Credible vs. Storm vs. Dreamer in a three-way, and a probable Credible vs. Storm feud with the women involved as a top program provided Storm stays, which if he does, the plans are for them to work a singles program leading to a potential PPV match in July. But with Credible, storyline wise, there are numerous potential challengers, in fact, basically every major player on the roster. Unlike Awesome (and even to an extent his predecessor Taz), Credible doesn't have to be protected by Heyman from doing singles matches with people like Sandman or Raven that there would be major style conflicts with. Whether Credible, 26, can get over as a credible world champion to the fans over the long-term, is the question that remains unanswered.
In the wake of the death of 27-year-old Masakazu Fukuda, the first male fatality (and third overall) stemming from an incident in the ring, in the 49-year history of Japanese pro wrestling, there has been a lot of calls for safety reforms, particularly due to Fukuda having suffered two prior cerebral hemorrhages and had brain surgery just six months earlier.
Fukuda suffered his first cerebral hemorrhage, which required surgery, during a match on 10/17 in Kobe against Shinya Makabe that he completed and won. He returned to action in February, but suffered a similar injury. The match on 4/14 was his first match back from that injury. Before he was allowed to come back, Fukuda was given a complete physical and got a clean bill of health on 4/12 at Tokyo Jikeidai Hospital, where he underwent both an MRI and a CATSCAN. New Japan had been something of a pioneer when it comes to health care in pro wrestling, having hired a company doctor back in 1988, before any other company had done so, and a full-time trainer on the road in 1996. The company had, before the death of Fukuda, scheduled a meeting for more input toward the health of the wrestlers which was to be headed by Kuniaki Kobayashi and three others, which was to take place later in the month.
New Japan held a ceremony in the ring on 4/20 in Chiba for Fukuda, with Yutaka Yoshie holding up a photo of him. Yoshie, Manabu Nakanishi and Yuji Nagata, who were going to form a group called G-Eggs, a cross between a shooters group and a DX gimmick starting on this current tour, were all wearing Fukuda t-shirts during the presentation.
His funeral took place the next afternoon at the Reishen Temple in Tokyo with all the wrestlers and officials from New Japan and the small Wrestle Dream Factory promotion, the company Fukuda started his career with in 1996, attending, as well as Antonio Inoki.
After his brain surgery after the match on 4/14 in Kesennuma, he remained in a coma until passing away at 3:28 a.m. on 4/19. He did show movement of his eyes, hands and legs while in the coma but he was in critical condition from the time he got to the hospital. His conditioned took a turn for the worst on the night of 4/18, and died in front of his family, his fiance and Shinya Hashimoto, who had stayed in Kesennuma since driving in from his home when he got the word at 11 p.m. the night of the accident.
Because of the death, which has been in the newspapers every day this past week, there has been a movement spurred on by the media that wrestlers should have better medical care and that the business was getting too dangerous citing three deaths in the ring in three years after gong the prior 46 years without even one. New Japan has always had a physician in attendance at its matches, as do most of the shoot organizations. All Japan hasn't in the past, but is talk about making it mandatory for its shows in the future.
As irony would have it, Fukuda's death came on the same day as a memorial show in Allentown, PA for a major star of 1990s Japanese wrestling, Gary Albright.
Albright had a show put on in his honor on 4/19 at the Allentown, PA Ag Hall, the regular site of WWF television tapings in the late 70s and early 80s, by his father-in-law, Afa Anoi'a, as a benefit for his daughter's family. Afa opened the show with three generations of "Wild Samoan" pro wrestlers, including Solofa Fatu (Rikishi Phatu of WWF fame), Afa Jr. (Samoan Storm), Lloyd Anoi'a (L.A. Smooth), Sika Anoi'a, Lance Ano'ia (Samu's seven-year-old son who had one of the biggest pops on the show when he did the bronco buster and people's elbow as a run-in on one of Afa's wrestling school students) and Albright's wife Monica. Monica gave a speech thanking everyone and in particular the WWF (Scotty 2 Hotty, Stevie Richards, Head Bangers, Kaientai, Road Dogg, Eddy Guerrero, Chris Jericho and Rikishi), WCW (Crowbar) and All Japan Pro Wrestling (Too Cold Scorpio, Steve Williams, Johnny Smith and Maunukea Mossman) for allowing their wrestlers to appear. They aired a six-minute video tribute to Albright, showing clips of his biggest career win over Nobuhiko Takada, some All Japan matches, and of his wedding. There were video tributes from Rock (who did a benefit autograph signing for the family earlier in the day) and Mick Foley (who missed the show due to a family illness), Rob Van Dam appeared to raise money signing autographs but didn't work due to his injury. There has been a lot said about Sabu not being there. At the show the people involved with it were under the impression Sabu was not allowed to work due to his legal dispute with Paul Heyman. It is clear from people close to Sabu that he was saying before the show that he wasn't going because he didn't want to get Afa in any sort of legal problems with Heyman on such a show. Heyman claims he specifically sent Sabu a letter allowing him to work the show because of the nature of the show, and Sabu didn't miss the show because of pressure from Heyman. Williams suffered food poisoning on the way to the event so wasn't able to wrestle in a scheduled three-way with Mossman and Smith, so their match became a singles match.
The report we got is that Smith and Mossman, who were two of Albright's best friends in wrestling, but on a wrestling clinic, although it did go over the head of some of the crowd and there were reports that Nicole Bass, who managed Mossman, after he got the pin after the Hawaiian crush, went into business for herself in doing a run-in after the match which was said to be unfortunate. The Chris Jericho-Eddy Guerrero match also got great reviews. The show ended, after a fast-paced Road Dogg vs. Rikishi main event, with Too Cool, Road Dogg, Rikishi and Jericho dancing wearing the sunglasses.
The 4/15 Madison Square Garden show being the 10th consecutive sellout for pro wrestling at Madison Square Garden appears to be a record, although that isn't conclusive, for the most famous pro wrestling arena in North America.
There is a tremendous book called "The History of Professional Wrestling" at Madison Square Garden (Check with Scott Teal, P.O. Box 2781, Hendersonville, TN 37077 for details) that goes back to 1880. While it may have the results of every major match ever held in MSG dating back 120 years, the attendance figures aren't there for every show but it's the best historical source there is. The WWF's own records on this subject only date back to the mid-1980s.
The first reported MSG sellout for pro wrestling was on March 26, 1898 for a match between Ernest Roeber vs. Ishmael Yousouf. There are no attendance figures listed for the Frank Gotch era, but many of the biggest historical matches of that period were held at the Garden with both Gotch and George Hackenschmidt, the two biggest stars of the era, against big-name opponents like Tom Jenkins (including two Jenkins vs. Gotch matches for the American title and Hackenschmidt vs. Jenkins for the world title), Stanislaus Zbyszko and Ben Roller (Gotch and Hackenschmidt only wrestled against each other twice, the two famous matches in Chicago), so they may have drawn some big crowds. There are no crowds listed for that era. The first recorded consecutive sellouts were in 1917 for Ed "Strangler" Lewis matches against Wladek Zbyszko and Joe Stecher (the second one being a 90 minute draw).
There were at least four consecutive sellouts from November 17, 1930 through February 23, 1931 drawn by Jim Londos against Ferenc Holuban, Gino Garibaldi and two against Jim McMillen. There is no record of another MSG sellout until the rise of Antonino Rocca in late 1949 when he drew two in a row against Gene Stanlee. But even with Rocca, there wasn't another sellout until 1957 when Rocca drew three in a row, a singles match against Edouard Carpentier and two tag matches with Miguel Perez (father of the current Puerto Rican wrestler of the same name) as his partner against Killer Kowalski & Dick the Bruiser and Roy Shire & Jerry Graham. Rocca drew very well for some time, with occasional sellouts, but never more than two in a row at any point, including two in a row for the 1958 Rocca & Perez vs. Fabulous Kangaroos tag team feud and two more in a row for Rocca & Perez vs. Jerry & Eddie Graham. There was a streak of three in a row in 1962 headlined by Buddy Rogers against Primo Carnera and Argentina Apollo and a third for Rogers & Bob Orton (father of the 1980s WWF star) against Apollo & Johnny Valentine.
It looks like the first streak of five in a row was in 1962 with Buddy Rogers as the headliner, three times with Cowboy Bob Ellis, once with Rogers & Orton vs. Valentine & Bearcat Wright and once with Rogers & Orton vs. Valentine & Ellis. Rocca was still strong in the semifinals on all five shows. After Bruno Sammartino won the title in 1963, the crowds were usually strong but the mythology that the Garden sold out every month was definitely not the case.
Sammartino drew two sellouts in a row in late 1963 against Gorilla Monsoon, two more in a row together with Fred Blassie in 1964 and two in a row with Bill Watts in 1965. After Watts, while crowds were almost always 9,500 plus every time out until a down period in 1969 where a Sammartino title defense against George Steele drew only a reported 5,527 (and keep in mind I would suspect the low numbers to be inflated because these are based on newspaper reports called in by the promotion itself), it was never full during a five year period.
There is no record of an MSG sellout until a 1970 match against Crusher Verdue, which drew two sellouts in succession. There are some missing attendances, but the first three shows of 1971, with Sammartino's loss to Ivan Koloff and Pedro Morales title win over Koloff and first title defense against Blackjack Mulligan were all sellouts. There are some missing figures but it is clear a string of five straight sellouts were from October 25, 1971 through February 21, 1972 by Morales for a match against Stan Stasiak, two matches against Blassie and two more matches against Toru Tanaka. There was another string from December 18, 1972 through July 23, 1973 of eight straight sellouts with Morales headlining against Ray Stevens, Moondog Mayne, King Curtis Iaukea, Blassie and two matches each with Steele and Don Leo Jonathan.
With Morales not drawing comparable figures in the rest of the Northeast, the title was moved back to Sammartino in late 1973 since he was a bigger drawing card in cities like Boston and Philadelphia. Sammartino's title win over Stan Stasiak (who had beaten Morales nine days earlier in Philadelphia) drew a sellout, as did his first two title defenses against Jonathan and Nikolai Volkoff.
At this point, the numbers are hard to come by, but Sammartino was a far stronger draw in his second reign than the first and there was a long streak which may have been in 1974 and 1975 that could rival the current one. The only thing I know is from memory that Sammartino and Spyros Arion drew four straight sellouts in 1975, but shows before and after could have lengthened that streak. There was probably another long streak in late 1975 and early 1976 when Sammartino headlined against Koloff and Superstar Billy Graham that was at least four in a row, and may have been longer. There was another streak of at least five in a row in 1977 all headlined by Graham, two with Sammartino, two with Dusty Rhodes and one with Ivan Putski. From late 1977 to 1978 there was another streak of at least five headlined by Graham, two with Mil Mascaras and three with Bob Backlund, including the match Backlund won the title and two subsequent rematches.
There are a lot of missing figures in the Backlund era, but there were many sellouts, in fact far more sellouts than not, during his early reign and perhaps a streak that rivalled the current ten in a row, but with so many missing figures that can't be said conclusively.
The dawning of the new era starting with Iron Sheik's title win over Backlund on December 26, 1983, followed by Hulk Hogan's win over Sheik, brought a streak of at least seven or eight, with the main events spread around, including Hogan matches with Greg Valentine, David Shults and Paul Orndorff, two Backlund-Valentine matches and the famous Sgt. Slaughter vs. Iron Sheik boot camp match.
We have full documentation of everything past this point. There is a streak of four in a row from December 30, 1985 through March 16, 1986 all headlined by Randy Savage, with three matches against Hogan and one against Tito Santana. There were two in a row in 1987 headlined by Hogan vs. One Man Gang and a surprising sellout at that point for Graham (in his final Madison Square Garden main event) vs. Butch Reed. There was another streak of two in a row on December 26, 1987 and January 25, 1988 for Savage vs. Honky Tonk Man and Hogan & Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Ted DiBiase & Virgil. The final two show sellout streak before 1996 was in February and March of 1989 for Savage vs. Ultimate Warrior and Hogan vs. Big Bossman.
Sellouts for the rest of the 80s and the early 90s were rare, mainly limited to Wrestlemanias or SummerSlams. There wasn't another set of two in a row again until 1996 for Bret Hart & Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels & Diesel (Kevin Nash) and Michaels vs. Diesel cage match. What appears to be a low point in 1994 was for a show headlined by Michaels & Diesel vs. The Head Shrinkers with a crowd of 4,300. The were no non-PPV house show sellout from the 1989 for a Warrior vs. Andre the Giant main event all the way until the two straight in 1996. After that there wasn't another non-PPV sellout until January 10, 1998 for Cactus Jack & Steve Austin vs. Rock & D-Lo Brown. The last time Madison Square Garden failed to sellout for a pro wrestling show was October 25, 1998 when a four-way with Austin vs. Rock vs. Undertaker vs. Kane drew 1,000 shy of capacity. The current streak began on December 27, 1998 with a Rock vs. HHH WWF title match.
WRESTLERS WITH MORE THAN ONE MADISON SQUARE GARDEN MAIN EVENT SELLOUT (Source: The History of Pro Wrestling at Madison Square Garden; plus our own records filling in the blanks. Because there are not accurate records of all shows (WWF's own records only date back to 1985), plus the probability that many announced houses had padded numbers, for instance in the 70s and 80s numerous MSG sellouts were announced as drawing more than 22,000 fans when the building for wrestling held 20,225, these numbers should be taken as a very close to accurate estimate as opposed to being foolproof numbers)
41 - Bruno Sammartino, Bob Backlund
24 - Antonino Rocca
19 - Pedro Morales
17 - Superstar Billy Graham, Hulk Hogan
13 - Miguel Perez Sr.
11 - Buddy Rogers
9 - Jim Londos
8 - Ivan Koloff, Steve Austin, Hunter Hearst Helmsley, Randy Savage
7 - Rock
6 - Johnny Valentine, Fred Blassie, Greg Valentine, Roddy Piper
5 - Dr. Jerry Graham, George Steele, Stan Hansen, Iron Sheik, Undertaker, Ken Patera, Andre the Giant
4 - Bob Orton Sr., Cowboy Bob Ellis, Chief Peter Maivia, Pat Patterson, Don Muraco, Jimmy Snuka, Bret Hart, Shawn Michaels, Mick Foley, Paul Orndorff
3 - Fabulous Kangaroos (Al Costello & Roy Heffernan), Ed "Strangler" Lewis, Gene Stanlee, Eddie Graham, Argentina Apollo, Gorilla Monsoon, Waldo Von Erich, Ernie Ladd, Don Leo Jonathan, Spyros Arion, Ken Patera, Larry Zbyszko, Sgt. Slaughter, Ultimate Warrior, Big Show
2 - Jim McMillen, Hans Schmidt, Jackie Fargo, Don Stevens, Mighty Zuma, Killer Kowalski, Bill Watts, Crusher Verdu, Stan Stasiak, Toru Tanaka, Nikolai Volkoff, Chief Jay Strongbow, Ivan Putski, Bruiser Brody, Dusty Rhodes, Mil Mascaras, Big Bossman, Diesel, Kimala, Ted DiBiase
Of the top draws, Graham has the highest percentage, selling out 17 of 18 (.944) Madison Square Garden main events, all but one being singles matches. His only non-sellout was a crowd announced at 17,914 for a 1977 match with Peter Maivia, the grandfather of the guy who will probably someday equal his record. Backlund had 41 of 69 (.594), Sammartino had 41 of 127 (both Backlund and Sammartino's numbers may be slightly low, in particular Sammartino in the 70s. Sammartino's records from the 60s are complete), Morales had 19 of 30 (.633) (this may also be slightly low by a few), Rocca had 24 of 69, Perez had 13 of 29 (unlike every other name on the high end, Perez never once headlined as a single. All 29 of his main events were as Rocca's partner), Rogers had 11 of 26 and Hogan had 17 of 42.
Of the modern wrestlers, Austin has 8 of 11 (.727), Helmsley has 8 of 10 (.800), Rock has seven of eight (.875), Savage had eight of 20, Piper had six of 12, Undertaker had five of 16, Hart had four of 11, Michaels had four of 11, Andre had five of 12, Foley had four of six (.667) and Warrior had three of eight. Unlike the wrestlers of the past where MSG was almost always headlined by a singles match, the current shows are drawn largely by the name "WWF" and the show itself as opposed to a singular match, and thus the current wrestlers have a distinct advantage both in that way, as well as numerous three and four man matches as opposed to straight singles on top almost every month.
New York State Senator Thomas Libous of Binghamton gained some national attention over the weekend when he proposed that pro wrestlers should be drug tested.
In a story in the 4/24 New York Daily News, Libous said that pro wrestlers should be tested both to protect them and create "more suitable role models for young spectators
Almost all other major professional sports have adopted similar requirements for legal participation."
His proposal would be similar to Oregon's, apparently, where wrestlers would have to pass a drug test before being allowed to wrestle in the state of New York. The nature of the testing and what drugs to be tested for weren't outlined. The realities at least of the short-term when it comes to pro wrestlers is that the biggest problem seems to be pain pills, as most of the recent deaths appear to have been from accidental overdoses. Wrestlers can routinely get legal prescriptions for from doctors in most cities that want to pal around with wrestlers. They are often routinely passed around by wrestlers. In a business such as pro wrestling, while there are notable exceptions, the realities of the business make it difficult for someone without very strong will power to survive without using them and the problem is when use turns into dangerous abuse. That type of use, if the drugs are obtained legally (and they aren't always), is a problem that it is unclear how drug testing can curb.
While wrestlers, and athletes in all sports, can work their way around steroid testing and there is no viable test in use for HGH which more wrestlers than ever use in conjunction with steroids to build and maintain their physiques, those are the drugs that shift the competitive balance (the competition for spots in wrestling is no less fierce than the more "real" competition in regards to winning and losing in a traditional sport) and if there is such a thing, by juiced up wrestlers being marketed as superstuds to teenage boys, there is probably a link (the current issue of Time Magazine actually examined it) toward those learning the secrets that are hardly secrets from emulating their television heroes and while wrestlers are not alone as athletes in using these drugs, or actors for that matter, they are the current TV stars of choice for teenage males.
According to Libous, a wrestler who tested positive for an illegal drug would be banned from wrestling for 24 hours. A second positive would mandate a one year suspension and a fine of $25,000 to the promotion. A wrestlers who fails three drug tests would be given lifetime bans in the state (and if this testing was done under the auspices of the state athletic commission which it surely would be, generally speaking all commissions enforce suspensions from other commissions so it would be equivalent to not quite a national ban, but a ban in probably 20 states which would make it very difficult for someone to be used in a touring organization). Libous would also fine the promotion $100,000 if any wrestler were to test positive a third time.
The story quoted Vince McMahon as saying that pro wrestlers are entertainers. "We are performers. We are showmen. He'd be drug testing everyone on Broadway. He'd be drug testing the circus."
McMahon also claimed that pro wrestling being singled out in legislation like this would be unconstitutional.
Many, but not all pro sports, have some form of drug testing procedures. Both the NHL and Major League Baseball don't have drug testing, although usage of certain drugs including steroids are illegal in those sports. Technically, under terms of the contracts, in WWF and WCW, usage of steroids are also illegal but nobody even pretends to say use isn't widespread again, and to infer at this point in time there isn't a tacit understanding it is part of the game would be a joke. But there is no question there is some, and probably a significant amount of usage of steroids and pain killers in all those sports as well. College Football and the NFL have drug testing, but it is internal within the sport, without an outside overseeing body in charge of enforcement. When it comes to pro wrestling by the very nature of the beast, something similar would be open to suspicion for all the right reasons. Without outside overseeing with power to enforce, it's basically asking for inconsistent enforcement. We've already seen examples of main eventers (and in some cases prelim wrestlers as well) testing positive for steroids or other illegal drugs and their suspensions are delayed until a more convenient time so as not to break the storyline (read that delayed until starting the day after they leave the company because they seem to not happen even with wrestlers who don't actually have a storyline). There is drug testing currently employed by WCW and UFC (which tests for many drugs, steroids not being among them) and formerly done widespread by the WWF (the WWF has provisions for testing based on probable cause, but tests are virtually never administered). There have been scandals in the past in both college football and the NFL (and this is the case in the Olympics as well) where positive test results have also been overlooked or discarded which the reality of the world has it would be the case in anything done by teams or organizations internally, and any corruption problem in real sports would only be magnified in an industry as steeped in dishonesty as pro wrestling. There is state mandated drug testing in many states for boxers, although those procedures can be a joke as well. Leagues like the Canadian Football League and Arena Football, as well as the NBC/WWF proposed XFL, don't have any drug testing.
WWF and WCW have avoided running shows in Oregon for years. In the early 90s, a similar bill was introduced in Florida, in some ways based on the death of Ed Gantner, a huge pro wrestler with a long history of steroid use whose kidneys went bad and ended up undergoing a kidney transplant, and in the aftermath of that, as well as the subsequent loss of his muscle size, committed suicide. Both WWF and WCW threatened to pull out of the state if it was enacted and the wrestling industry hired highly-paid lobbyists to get it killed. The bill ended up dying in committee. Pulling out of Oregon was never a major issue for national wrestling organizations, as there is only one city of major size in the state and it's in a part of the country that hard, not impossible by any means, but hardly like running a city like Baltimore with plenty of major markets within driving distance, to route (running a weekend tour in the area) so it has other inconveniences of booking there. Florida, with many major cities, would have been a real pain to avoid. New York, on the other hand, would be next to impossible to pull out of. The WWF does more arena business, and probably more business as a whole of every kind, in New York than any other state in the country. Taking New York state shows out of the equation would make everyone's life in that company miserable, because WWF likes to book closer to the Northeast to keep things convenient now that they produce television every Monday and Tuesday and want to have the main employees as close to the home base as often as possible. If WWF stopped running Madison Square Garden regularly, WCW would likely snap it up in a heartbeat and giving away the New York home base can't be overemphasized in a country where so much of national thinking is based around what's hot in New York City because of it being the media center.
Exactly what category pro wrestling fits into (which, for promoters, seemingly is whatever category it seemingly fits into best for each apparent issue) is a semantic argument as wrestling is athletic, soap opera and some circus. Pro wrestlers' high preponderance of drug problems including deaths, and the apparent lack of action by some promotions (WCW in particular because in no sport and on few if any major television shows or movie sets would someone who went through the past two years in the same way Scott Hall did still be employed let alone had six of wrestlers and referees die in such a relatively short period of time) makes them a category unto themselves when it comes to being discussed when it comes to drug testing as opposed to Broadway actors, who clearly don't have the inherent institutionalized steroid problem or the injury rate and pressures to return to taking bumps, or have the contracted salary cuts in their contract while injured that doesn't apply in baseball and basketball (there are those pressures in football monetarily in regard to a season-by-season time frame but not a month-by-month). And steroids and other physique enhancing chemicals are the same, if not more, of a competitive advantage among pro wrestlers than they are in almost any other real sport because both the promoters and fan judge wrestlers so harshly on their physique, while in other sports, a man with a below average physique who can perform well is not kept from stardom (if a swimmer or a boxer could perform the skills required in their sport as well as Ric Flair can in wrestling, nobody would be writing about or forcing him to perform in street clothes), not that drugs haven't changed the game in football, track and baseball because clearly they have greatly. Nevertheless, it's also not fair to propose a bill for pro wrestlers only, and not have similar legislation for major league sports such as baseball and hockey that are far bigger money forms of entertainment where the competitions are covered more seriously, and also don't steroid test their competitors. But pointing out baseball doesn't steroid test is a terribly weak defense by people in or around wrestling, even if it is one that has been conveniently used. Baseball, for whatever drug problems it may have, doesn't have the history of drug related deaths that pro wrestling has. And the argument that pro wrestling isn't a competitive sport in the traditional sense (because it is clearly an ultra-competitive sports entertainment world) falls apart because the fact its outcomes are predetermined doesn't make the health problems and deaths any less real.
Libous' knowledge of the efficiency of drug testing seemed weak with his statement that having drug tests as part of the state's licensing requirements would show fans that pro wrestlers are drug free. The reality is we're far from having tests that can effectively eliminate drug use. The best you can hope for is regular testing to curtail out of control levels of abuse, which is clearly far more dangerous than use in moderation.
Billy Kidman, Juventud Guerrera and Kid Romeo from WCW highlight the line-up for New Japan's annual Best of the Super Junior tournament which starts on 5/19 at Tokyo Korakuen Hall and ends on 6/9 at the Osaka Chuo Gymnasium.
This year's tournament will be broken up into two seven member blocks, although exactly who is bracketed where hasn't been announced. The tournament will have matches from the start, but pick up steam from 6/2 with a Budokan Hall show through 6/9, as Guerrera, Kidman and Gran Hamada will only be working the final week and have six tournament matches each during that period.
Also in the tournament will be defending champion Kendo Ka Shin, perennial contender Jushin Liger, Koji Kanemoto, Shinjiro Otani, Tatsuhito Takaiwa, El Samurai and Shinya Makabe from New Japan. Besides the three WCW wrestlers, also involved are Hamada from Michinoku Pro, Minoru Tanaka, who made a big hit in his involvement in the tournament last year, coming from Battlarts and Dr. Wagner Jr. from EMLL.
The proposed Stu Hart birthday show promoted by Stampede Wrestling on 5/31 in Calgary, which was to include 26 performers from the World Wrestling Federation, was officially postponed late this past week after it became clear it was a no-win situation to hold the event.
The only actual announcement of this came in a Jim Ross update on the WWF web site when he stated the show had been postponed. Stampede Wrestling, after getting negative publicity when Stu Hart said in a Calgary Sun article that he wouldn't be attending the show and thought that due to it being so close to the one year anniversary of Owen's death that he didn't feel it was appropriate to be celebrating, decided to quietly let the show die down. The company feeling was that since both Stu and Martha Hart, who are ultimate babyface in the community, had come out against the show, it had become a no-win proposition even though WWF has ordered all its wrestlers who had signed up to honor their commitments, even though many had wanted to pull out based on it becoming a controversial subject.
There is still talk of doing a Stu Hart birthday show in the fall, feeling getting it away from the month of May would eliminate some of the local media bad taste regarding the one year anniversary of the death of Owen. It is said that Stampede wanted the show on 6/1 rather than 5/31, just to get it out of the month of May, but because of travel problems with the wrestlers from the WWF, who would be in Tacoma for Smackdown on Tuesday, and Calgary isn't that bad of a flight from there, rather than going home for a day and flying back, or staying on the road on Wednesday rather than going home and basically destroying their time home with their families, it would be much easier for the wrestlers to have the show on a Wednesday.
Whether Stu Hart had initially agreed to do the show or not has become a major point of contention behind the scenes as people are equally insistent on both sides. It has been pointed out that Stu was at the Stampede house show where the card was first announced on 4/14. WWF officials claim Stu had spoken with Bruce Prichard and seemed happy about the show as well. On 4/15, after a heated discussion at the house involving both Bruce and Bret Hart, Stu said he was unaware of the show and wouldn't be attending.
It is said that Stampede Wrestling, run by Bruce and Ross Hart, were aware from the start that Bret and Martha would never be involved with a show that involved the WWF, although the WWF wrestlers signing up were never aware of this or had the knowledge this would turn into a political quagmire. While there was never going to be any public mention of Owen in regards to the hyping of the show, the idea that WWF wrestlers were of the impression it was partially (actually we've been told they were under the impression it was largely) about Owen was confirmed when Chris Benoit said as much on his web site about it being sold on the wrestlers as a tribute show for Owen as well as a birthday show for Stu.
It is said that Bruce and Ross Hart, when they first contacted Vince McMahon and Jim Ross about the event were really only looking for a few wrestlers were worked in the area early in their careers such as Benoit, Chris Jericho and Steve Blackman, and to use them as headliners along with using Sabu, the regular Stampede Wrestling crew and even inviting some wrestlers from WCW and perhaps even Lance Storm from ECW and The Funk Brothers (who appeared at Stu's 80th birthday show in 1995). When the WWF brought it up to the talent, 26 of the performers signed up (not just wrestlers but others including even ring announcer Howard Finkel), and WWF submitted a full card to Ross & Bruce, leaving them with only a few spots for local or outside talent.
The proposed line-up was to have Benoit vs. Jericho, HHH vs. Kane with Mick Foley as referee, Eddy Guerrero & Perry Saturn & Dean Malenko vs. Scotty 2 Hotty & Edge & Christian, a three-way with Taka Michinoku & Sho Funaki, Headbangers and Mean Street Posse, Ivory vs. Lita, Stevie Richards vs. Gangrel, Rikishi vs. Road Dogg and Bull Buchanan vs. Mark Henry.
Monday Night Raw scored its second highest rating in history on 4/24 with a 7.15 rating (6.32 first hour; 7.91 second hour) and a 10.9 share. The rating trails only an 8.09 rating for an unopposed show on May 10, 1999 and actually beats out the Owen Hart tribute show on May 24, 1999 that did a 7.14, although that show had competition for two hours while this show picked up its strong ratings in the unopposed second hour. The second hour was the second highest rated hour in the history of the program. Even with Raw's huge number, Nitro also picked up with a 3.05 rating (3.68 first hour; 2.44 second hour) and a 4.6 share. The combined wrestling viewing audience was 10.2 million, which is the first time the ten million barrier has been broken in months, but is still nowhere close to the 12 million mark wrestling was drawing last summer. The strong audience for each show (well, strong for WCW by standards of the year 2000) was largely the result of strong numbers watching the respective unopposed hours.
The Rock & Jericho vs. Benoit & HHH main event which drew a 7.76 final quarter and an 8.59 over-run was the third highest rated match in Monday night wrestling history, trailing a 9.5 drawn on June 28, 1999 (Austin vs. Undertaker title change, which was even more impressive because much of that 9.5 was drawn opposed a WCW world title match) and a 9.17 on May 10, 1999 (Rock & Austin & Vince vs. HHH & Undertaker & Shane) which went unopposed all night during the NBA playoffs. The WCW Sting vs. Vampiro first blood main event drew a 2.70 rating which is very impressive since it was going against the Vince interview that did an 8.12 quarter and Raw also set a record as equivalent to approximately 70% of the Nitro audience switched to Raw when Nitro went off the air.
Nitro opened with a strong first hour, and did a good job of keeping the audience (well, better than usual) at the top of the hour with the continuation of the Hogan vs. Kidman & Awesome and the Bischoff vs. Arquette matches which did a 2.89 rating to Raw's 5.37 for Rikishi vs. Angle and the beginning of the usual opening soliloquy. It was the first time in a long time that a Nitro quarter did better than half of a head-to-head Raw quarter. After that, the numbers got uglier. Raw did a 6.81 (Helmsley, Stephanie, Shane and Jericho interview) to 2.01 (Steiner-Booker T angle); Raw did a 6.56 (Benoit vs. Road Dogg, Hardys vs. Hollys) to 2.18 (Douglas & Bagwell vs. Clark & Adams plus Abbott angle) and 6.41 (Show vs. Bossman & Buchanan and beginning of Vince interview) to 2.46 (Jarrett vs. Page title change).
Thunder was pre-empted this week due to NBA basketball. Smackdown on 4/20 drew a 5.21 rating which is one of its highest ever. In New York, for the first time ever, Smackdown won its time slot with an average of 769,812 homes tuned into the show on WWOR, beating among other things, a rerun of "Friends."
Weekend numbers for 4/22-23 saw Livewire at 1.5 (highest rated show on USA network all day), Superstars at 1.6 (7th highest) and Heat at 2.97 (2nd highest as lead-in "Clear and Present Danger" did a 3.5). WCW Saturday Night in its new format with no new matches did a 1.6 (4th highest).
ECW on TNN drew an 0.90 rating and 1.7 share, staying at a weak level for the first three quarters before the Corino & Victory & Tajiri bloodbath with Sandman & Dreamer & New Jack with Rhodes and Rhino involved did an 0.87 beginning and grew to a 1.06 final quarter. Ironically this below average number came on a night when TNN numbers were generally above average. RollerJam did an 0.74 while TNN's Motor Madness drew its highest rating of the year at 0.78.
The AAA/EMLL Tuesday night block on Galavision drew a 1.9 Hispanic rating (it should be pointed out it doesn't take many homes to get a rating on Galavision because the Hispanic universe and Galavision universe are tiny compared with a major cable station available nationwide), including a 3.2 in their target ages 18-34 and 2.6 in ages 18-49.
EYADA POLL RESULTS
Results of the daily poll on the eyada.com web site. New questions will be up every day at approximately 3 p.m. Eastern time with the results being announced at the start of the Wrestling Observer Live internet audio show the following day as well as each week here.
What did you think of Monday night's (4/17) wrestling?: a) Raw better 79%; b) Nitro was better 13%; c) Didn't watch Raw 1%; d) Didn't watch Nitro 5%; e) Didn't watch Raw or Nitro 2%
What did you think about Sting coming from the ceiling on Nitro? a) It's okay because it's been long enough since Owen Hart's death 26%; b) It would be okay under any circumstances 11%; c) It's in poor taste at this point in time 6%; d) It's in poor taste because Bret Hart was in the arena 10%; e) It's in poor taste under any circumstances and will be for some time to come 47%
Who do you think makes the best of the current world heavyweight champions? a) Hunter Hearst Helmsley 67.6%; b) Jeff Jarrett 5.1%; c) Kenta Kobashi 16.4%; d) Kensuke Sasaki 0.4%; e) Tazz 10.4%
Do you feel the ECW interplay with WWF and WCW over the past two weeks has? a) Strengthened ECW on a national basis 50%; b) Weakened ECW on a national basis 9%; c) Made absolutely no difference 41%
What was the best TV match of the past week? a) HHH vs. Chris Jericho 72.8%; b) Chris Benoit vs. Kurt Angle 15.3%; c) Rock vs. Chris Jericho 3.6%; d) X-Pac vs. Christian 2.7%; e) HHH vs. Tazz 5.7%
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Bryan Alvarez and I open the show every day running down the latest news. We either have guests the remainder of the show, taking listener's phone calls and e-mails, or we take calls and e-mails. Even if you don't have access to a computer and just want to talk wrestling, you can reach us between those hours within North America at 1-877-392-3200 (1-877-eyada-00) or from outside North America you can call collect and reverse charges at 1-212-977-1859. You can always e-mail questions for the show 24 hours a day to us at davemeltzer@eyada.com. You can always check the wrestlingobserver.com web-site for the latest guest information. Upcoming shows include on 4/28 a taped show with Ric Flair, 5/1 will have Michael Modest, Alex Marvez on 5/2 and Justin Credible on 5/3 as well as Lance Storm on 5/9.
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RESULTS
4/15 Palo Alto, PA (FWA - 275): Abunai won three-way over Ric Blade and Enbalmer, Lil Cholo & Mariachi Loco & Matt Shaft b Black Metal & King Jackal & Ice Kid, High Voltage b Nick Burke, Low-Ki b Mike Mayhem, Bad Crew b Mafia & Monsta Mack, El Hijo del Santo d Mike Quackenbush, Tommy Idol & Qeenan Creed b Gregory Martin & Danny Rose, Jake Daniels b Cremator
4/16 Camp Gary Owen, Korea (NWA Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling): Madd Maxx won three-way over Chris Hamrick and Rikki Nelson, Strawberry b Leilani Kai, Craig Pittman b Bunkhouse Buck, Drake Dawson & Curtis Thompson DDQ L.A. Stephens & Bubba Bain, Bushwhackers b Solviacks, NWA tag titles: Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson b Steven Dunn & Reno Riggins
4/17 Osan Air Force Base, Korea (NWA Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling - 1,500): American Eagle & Madd Maxx b Rikki Nelson & Chris Hamrick, Strawberry b Leilani Kai, Bushwhackers b Solviacks, Craig Pittman b Bunkhouse Buck, Drake Dawson & Curtis Thompson b Steven Dunn & Reno Riggins, NWA tag titles: L.A. Stephens & Bubba Bain b Ricky Morton & Robert Gibson to win titles
4/18 Philadelphia First Union Center (WWF Smackdown/Heat tapings - 14,364 sellout): Val Venis b Mark Henry, Jimmy Snuka Jr. b Elvis Elliott, Scott Vick b Pete Gas, Hardys b Al Snow & Steve Blackman, Bob Holly NC Perry Saturn, Three-way for lt hwt title: Scotty 2 Hotty won over Dean Malenko and Taka Michinoku, Faarooq b Bull Buchanan-DQ, Road Dogg b Edge, Dudleys b Eddy Guerrero & Essa Rios, Rikishi Phatu DCOR Big Show, Non-title: Hunter Hearst Helmsley b Tazz, Test & Albert b Godfather & D-Lo Brown, X-Pac b Christian, IC title: Chris Benoit b Kurt Angle-DQ, Lumberjack match: Chris Jericho b Rock
4/19 Allentown, PA (Gary Albright Memorial show - 1,500): Too Cold Scorpio b Sugaa b American Society, Jimmy Snuka b Jak Molson, Doink the Clown b Shane Black, Head Shrinkers b Hungarian Barbarian & Big Dick Dudley, Scotty 2 Hotty b Stevie Richards, Afa Jr. won three-way over Lucifer Grimm and Gillberg, Crowbar b Judas Young, Head Bangers b Taka Michinoku & Sho Funaki, Maunukea Mossman b Johnny Smith, Chris Jericho b Eddy Guerrero, Rikishi Phatu b Road Dogg
4/19 Okinawa, Japan (NWA Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling - 2,500): Leilani Kai b Strawberry, American Eagle & Madd Maxx b Rikki Nelson & Chris Hamrick, Bushwhackers b Solviacks, Craig Pittman b Bunkhouse Buck, Ricky Morton b Steven Dunn, NWA tag titles: Drake Dawson & Curtis Thompson b L.A. Stephens & Bubba Bain to win titles
4/19 Tokyo Korakuen Hall (LLPW): Sayuri Okino b Mako Koga, Harley Saito b Noriyo Tateno, Rumi Kazama & Takako Inoue b Aya Koyama & Miho Watabe, Eagle Sawai & Carol Midori b Mizuki Endo & Keiko Aono, Kazama & Inoue b Sawai & Midori
4/20 Tokyo Yoyogi Gym II (RINGS - 3,600 sellout): Allister Overeem b Yasuhito Namekawa, Wataru Sakata b Brandon Lee Hinkle, Bobby Hoffman b Boris Jeliaskov, Renato Babalu b Travis Fulton, Ricardo Arona b Andrei Kopylov, Jeremy Horn b Yoshihisa Yamamoto, RINGS hwt title: Gilbert Yvel b Kiyoshi Tamura
4/20 Chiba (New Japan - 2,000): Hiroshi Tanahashi b Wataru Inoue, Kenzo Suzuki b Katsuyoshi Shibata, Rick Cornell & Chuck Palumbo & Dan Devine b Osamu Kido & Junji Hirata & Black Cat, Jushin Liger & El Samurai & Kendo Ka Shin & Minoru Tanaka b Koji Kanemoto & Shinjiro Otani & Tatsuhito Takaiwa & Shinya Makabe, Takashi Iizuka & Tadao Yasuda b Michiyoshi Ohara & Hiro Saito, Manabu Nakanishi & Yutaka Yoshie b Super J & Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Masahiro Chono & Satoshi Kojima & Tatsutoshi Goto b Kensuke Sasaki & Shiro Koshinaka & Yuji Nagata
4/20 Tokyo Korakuen Hall (Arsion): Mari & Fabi Apache b Gran Apache & Linda Starr, Mima Shimoda & Bionic J b Rie Tamada & Hiromi Yagi, Michiko Omukai & Yumi Fukawa & Xochitl Hamada b Mariko Yoshida & Ayako Hamada & Akino, Queen of Arsion title: Aja Kong b Etsuko Mita
4/20 Cuernavaca (EMLL): Sakura & Super Colt b Itar & Pulsar, Ricky Marvin & Turbo b Sangre Azteca & Black Thunder, Brazo de Oro & Brazo de Platino & Brazo de Oro Jr. NC Las Bestias Negras I & II & III, Rayo de Jalisco Jr. & Tinieblas Jr. & Mascara Sagrada b Cien Caras & Mascara Ano 2000 & Universo 2000
4/20 Bristol, England (All-Star Wrestling - 750): Vic Powers b Tiger Mask (Jason Cross), Gary Ware b Cowboy Carter, Mal Sanders b Alan Kilby, Marty Jones & Biker Groves (Duke Lynch) b Frankie Sloane & Lee Diamond (Mark Myers), Jones won Royal Rumble
4/20 Medicine Hat, Alberta (Stampede Wrestling - 140): Abdul Shikat b Red O'Riordan, Harry Smith won three-way over Dwight Davis and T.J. Wilson, Dick Raines b Johnny Devine-DQ, Cuban Assassin b Ruffy Silverstein, Dick Pound & William Yeats b Red Thunder & Wavell Starr, Tiger Khan b Greg Pawluk, Eddie Mustang & Rick Titan (Big Titan from Japan) b Vic Viper & Scott D'Amore
4/21 Tokyo Korakuen Hall (New Japan - 1,850 sellout): Katsuyori Shibata b Wataru Inoue, Tatsuhito Takaiwa & Shinjiro Otani & Koji Kanemoto b Minoru Tanaka & Kendo Ka Shin & El Samurai, Hiro Saito & Super J b Junji Hirata & Osamu Kido, Brian Johnston & Takashi Iizuka & Shiro Koshinaka b Dan Devine & Chuck Palumbo & Rick Cornell, Jushin Liger b Kuniaki Kobayashi, Masahiro Chono & Tatsutoshi Goto b Kenzo Suzuki & Kensuke Sasaki, Yutaka Yoshie & Yuji Nagata & Manabu Nakanishi b Michiyoshi Ohara & Satoshi Kojima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan
4/21 Bethlehem, PA (ECW - 1,500): Chilly Willy b Johnny Swinger, Mikey Whipwreck b Simon Diamond, Danny Doring & Roadkill b Little Guido & Sal E. Graziano, Masato Tanaka & Balls Mahoney b Vic Grimes & Angel, ECW tag titles: Lance Storm & Justin Credible b Chris Chetti & Nova, Rhino b Super Crazy, Tommy Dreamer & Sandman & New Jack b Steve Corino & Jack Victory & Yoshihiro Tajiri
4/21 Mexico City Arena Mexico (EMLL): Tiger Blanco & Mano Negra Jr. b Virus & Dr. O'Borman Jr.-DQ, One-night parejas increibles tournament: Dr. Wagner Jr. & El Satanico & Tarzan Boy b Violencia & Fuerza Guerrera & Villano III, Zumbido & Shocker & Negro Casas b Blue Panther & Black Warrior & Felino, Atlantis & Brazo de Plata & Cien Caras b Universo 2000 & Apolo Dantes & Rayo de Jalisco Jr., Mr. Niebla & Rey Bucanero & Ultimo Guerrero b Perro Aguayo & Mascara Ano 2000 & Pierroth Jr., Casas & Shocker & Zumbido b Wagner Jr. & Satanico & Tarzan Boy, Niebla & Guerrero & Bucanero b Atlantis & Caras & Brazo de Plata, Guerrero & Bucanero & Niebla b Zumbido & Shocker & Casas to win tournament
4/21 Calgary (Stampede Wrestling - 220): Dick Raines b Rowdy Radcliffe, Abdul Shikat b Red Thunder, Hercules Ayala b Gary Gallant, Vic Viper b Scott D'Amore-DQ, Harry Smith & Teddy Hart b T.J. Wilson & Dwight Davis, Wavell Starr b Thunder, Dick Pound & William Yeats & Ruffy Silverstein b Rick Titan & Cuban Assassin & Black Ninja, Greg Pawluk DCOR Tiger Khan, Sabu b Johnny Devine
4/21 Dorchester, MA (World Wrestling Alliance - 200): Abunai b Joey B, Alex Stevens & Jonathan Bagwell (no relation) b Johnny Idol & Mike Stock, Hardcore Hippie Freak b Tim McNeany, Dukes Dalton b Tre, Patriot (Tom Brandi) b Dalton, Gillberg b Earl the Pearl, Garibaldi Brothers (Tony Roy & Jerry Garibaldi) b John Diamond & Kevin Landry, Man from the Dark Side (Brian Lee) b Mike Hollow
4/22 Philadelphia ECW Arena (ECW - 1,600 sellout): Masato Tanaka b Too Cold Scorpio, Lance Storm & Dawn Marie b Nova & Jazz, Little Guido won three-way over Kid Kash and Super Crazy, C.W. Anderson & Bill Whiles b Danny Doring & Roadkill, Steve Corino b Dusty Rhodes, TV title: Rhino b Yoshihiro Tajiri to win title, ECW title: Tommy Dreamer b Tazz to win title, ECW title: Justin Credible b Dreamer to win title
4/22 Columbia, SC (WWF - 7,537): Godfather b Viscera, Test & Albert b Head Bangers, Hardcore title: Crash Holly b Bob Holly, Lt hwt title: Scotty 2 Hotty b Dean Malenko, Acolytes b Road Dogg & X-Pac, WWF title: Hunter Hearst Helmsley b Big Show, Fabulous Moolah & Terri b Mae Young & Kat, IC title: Chris Benoit b Kurt Angle, European title: Rikishi Phatu b Eddy Guerrero-DQ, Three-way for tag titles: Edge & Christian won over Dudleys and Hardys
4/22 Ohiryu (New Japan - 2,800): Hiroshi Tanahashi b Katsuyoshi Shibata, Kenzo Suzuki b Wataru Inoue, Minoru Tanaka & El Samurai b Tatsuhito Takaiwa & Shinya Makabe, Junji Hirata & Osamu Kido b Rick Cornell & Dan Devine, Jushin Liger & Kendo Ka Shin b Shinjiro Otani & Koji Kanemoto, Manabu Nakanishi & Chuck Palumbo & Brian Johnston b Michiyoshi Ohara & Tatsutoshi Goto & Super J, Masahiro Chono & Hiro Saito & Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima b Takashi Iizuka & Yuji Nagata & Yutaka Yoshie & Kensuke Sasaki
4/22 Nagoya (Toryumon): Kennichiro Arai b Ryo Saito, Masaaki Mochizuki b Stalker Ichikawa, Ikuto Hidaka b Yoshiyuki Saito, Dragon Kid & Tiger Mask & Genki Horiguchi b Sumo Dandy Fuji & Yoshikazu Taru & Makoto, Cima & Fuji b Yasushi Kanda & Susumu Mochizuki
4/23 Osaka Dome (K-1 - 30,082): Ernesto Hoost b
ECW: The PPV is officially going to be from Milwaukee at the Eagles Ballroom at the Rave on 5/14. The entire line-up will be announced on 4/28 TV show. As it stands right now, it'll be Credible vs. Dreamer vs. Storm for the ECW title, Rhino vs. Sandman for the TV title, Van Dam vs. Lynn, Crazy & Tajiri vs. Gedo & Jado which may wind up being something to determine the tag team titles, New Jack vs. Angel, Doring & Roadkill vs. Grimes & DeVito
Besides the double title switch, they also switched the TV title on the Cyberslam show which featured the Tajiri turn. Cyrus asked for Tajiri to give him the belt, and he refused and beat up everyone in the network until Rhino cut him off. This set up a match with Rhino for the title which Rhino won, which seemingly leads to Rhino being an opponent for Van Dam long before Van Dam challenges Credible. After Tajiri was pinned after a second Rhino piledriver, Sandman came in for the save. Rhino ended up spearing Sandman through a table, and then speared Lori Fullington, who ran in, into Sandman through a second table. This led to Scotty Anton and Rob Van Dam coming out. Van Dam did his first dive onto Rhino and at this point the ring was cleared of everyone but Cyrus. Jerry Lynn returned, yelled at Cyrus, but then cut a heel promo saying that he and Van Dam were injured at the same time and everyone talked about Van Dam and nobody talked about him, to set up the Van Dam vs. Lynn match for the PPV. The show opened with Masato Tanaka pinning Too Cold Scorpio. Apparently Scorpio didn't look good at all, but the crowd got into the near falls by the end of the match. Storm did an injury angle after he and Dawn Marie had beaten Jazz & Nova. They tried to work everyone on the injury including people backstage. Guido won a three-way over Crazy and Kid Kash which was said to be by far the best wrestling match on the show. C.W. Anderson & Bill Whiles beat Danny Doring & Roadkill when the Baldies interfered. New Jack then made a run-in and Balls Mahoney laid out Angel with a very stiff chair shot. Corino pinned Dusty Rhodes with an elbow using the cowbell taped to his elbow after interference from Victory
4/21 TV was from St. Charles, MO. Vandenberg and Whipwreck did their typical weird open. They did the regular open with Joey Styles & Joel Gertner with the Impact Players. Dawn Marie hit the line about not being afraid of any woman in the promotion, which brought Francine out for a challenge. This ended up setting up Raven & Whipwreck challenging Storm & Credible for the tag titles. Whipwreck worked real hard, with orange hair and a new outfit that makes him look like a half clown. After the cat fight spot, Credible caned Francine. Whipwreck hit his whipper-snapper (stunner) on both, but Credible then tombstoned him for the pin. Cyrus came out first with the Dangerous Alliance. He started screaming about someone getting TV time who isn't under contract, calling the former Scotty Riggs, "Scotty Anton." He ran down Van Dam saying Van Dam was using him like he used Sabu. Rhino came out and a bell rang so there was a match with Rhino vs. Anton. The match ended with no winner as Rhino speared the ref into Anton through a table in 2:41. Van Dam came out. He walked without a limp but his run-in was still a walk. Van Dam hit a cool looking kick before the pull-apart. The main event was actually a War Games type match, but not advertised as such, as every few minutes, a new wrestler would enter. It started as a Dreamer vs. Corino bullrope match. Corino juiced right away and was bleeding pretty heavy once it got going. Victory was in next. Sandman came in and did his several minute long entrance which was hilarious since Dreamer was being stomped on while he was standing there drinking beer. As silly as doing his whole entrance for a run-in usually looks. this was the silliest. Tajiri was in next. It turned into a lot of crazy things like Sandman taking a suplex on a ladder. Then New Jack came in with more weapons. A lot of brawling spots with various appliances and blood. It was a longer brawl than usual on TV and a lot bloodier, but not really much different. Tajiri did a double foot stomp on Dreamer off the top through a table. New Jack pinned Corino after hitting him with a chair off the top rope in 14:49. Rhino and Rhodes actually didn't do their respective run-ins until after the match was over. Corino KO'd ref H.C. Loc which set up Rhodes coming in and doing the elbow on everyone. They barely mentioned Tazz as champion on the show, and made no mention of the ECW champion appearing on the losing end of two WWF TV matches or even appearing on WWF TV. Tazz vs. Dreamer was mentioned in hyping Cyberslam but no interviews aired pushing the match which pretty much downgrades a title change when it's not even hyped as a big deal going in on TV. The idea that Tajiri was going to give the belt to the network was pushed just as heavy if not heavier as the main angle going into the show, but the show itself was pushed far harder than any house show in a long time
Angel Orsini, who wrestled South Florida indies as Riptide, usually against the late Liz Chase, is expected to debut here. She also did a shootfight on a major womens show in Japan a few years back against Yumiko Hotta and if she's used, would work with Jazz, who Heyman wants to put in a womens wrestling program.
WCW: Yes, the most prestigious title in our sport changed hands twice more this week, with DDP beating Jeff Jarrett at Nitro on 4/24 in Rochester, NY and then it being put up to the winner of the fall in a tag match on Thunder on 4/25 in Syracuse, NY, with David Arquette pinning Eric Bischoff. The idea, and since this just happened as we went to press time will tell if this is correct, is that WCW believes the publicity about Arquette winning the title will hit mainstream and lead to a ratings boost on 5/1 since WWF looks to be changing its world title to Rock and Austin will appear. They did a double pin finish with Jarrett pinning Page at the same time Arquette pinned Bischoff, but they announced Arquette as winner and new champion and had him parade around with the belt. Kimberly was the ref and kept counting slow whenever Page had Jarrett pinned and counting fast the other way. Somehow she was out of there and Mickey Jay ran in and counted the double pin and signalled that Arquette had won. Most likely on 5/1 it'll go back to Jarrett perhaps as an executive decision or perhaps in the ring
5/7 Slamboree from Kansas City line-up is Jarrett vs. Page for the title in the three decker match, Hogan vs. Kidman with Bischoff as ref, Scott Steiner vs. Booker for the U.S. title, Flair vs. Douglas, Sting vs. Vampiro, Luger vs. Bagwell, Candido defends the cruiserweight title against Artist, Awesome vs. Kanyon and Funk in a hardcore title defense in a handicap match against Smiley and TBA. As has been listed elsewhere, there was a Wall vs. Sid match on the original schedule, and that may happen, but it's dependent upon Sid's shoulder injury. They are also considering Stasiak vs. Hennig but that wasn't listed in any official line-ups as of yet. If they have Sting come from the ceiling in Kansas City they are very sick individuals
Early indications are that WCW Spring Stampede did an 0.24 buy rate, which would be considered terrible under normal circumstances, but all things considered including they basically had no show announced until Thunder three days before and they're coming off a year of bad PPVs and two even worse buy rates, I wouldn't call the number a negative
Nitro on 4/24 in Rochester, NY drew 7,713 in the building but only 2,697 paying $64,925. The show opened with Sting destroying Vampiro backstage and walking away. By this point he should know not to turn his back on a heel, because Vampiro got up and clobbered him with a pipe. Luckily Sting wasn't hurt in the least by this blow as he was fine during the next segment and never sold anything later in the show. Funk beat Bigelow in 1:49 to keep the hardcore title. Funk had a garbage can on his head and Miller kicked Bigelow knocking him down. Funk fell down, and the garbage can came off his head and he got the pin. At least he didn't have to take too much punishment. Kidman, who was smashed half to death by a hummer last week, was fine this week except for wrapping around his ribs. Luckily he learned the art of selling an injury from Hogan, as he didn't sell the bad ribs at all during his match later. Smiley wanted a title match with Funk on the PPV. Russo basically told him he sucked and could never beat Funk, but he'd give him a chance in a handicap match and told him to pick a partner. Jarrett & Bischoff & Kimberly came out. They showed the three-decker cage from the "Ready to Rumble" movie. Bischoff called out Page and Kimberly gave him divorce papers. I immediately thought of all the possibilities of how they could make this angle huge, but no, Page didn't even sell it like he was concerned. That guy is just so cool, he blew off a good angle. Luckily the announcers saw how Page botched it so they stopped selling the divorce like it was anything important either. Page went after Bischoff but Jarrett hit Page with a guitar. This brought out Arquette to jump on Bischoff. Jarrett pulled him off but before Jarrett could pound on him, Kanyon saved Arquette. Bischoff challenged Arquette to a match. The stips were if Arquette won, Page would get a cage match for the title on this show. Candido & Tammy beat Artist & Paisley in 1:53 when Candido clotheslined Paisley when Artist moved and Tammy pinned her. Unlike just about every woman WCW has on TV, Tammy actually has a clue and the crowd popped for everything she did, which included doing a plancha. She looked scared to death once she was up there, but she jumped. It was fine for what it was. Sting came out and gave Candido a scorpion death drop and challenged Vampiro to a first blood match. Adams & Clark beat Flair & Luger in 1:21 when Adams pinned Flair. Adams & Clark are horrible. I don't care what the circumstances are, there is no explanation on why Flair should be jobbing for Brian Adams. At least JYD had charisma and drew big money at one point in his life, even if the Flair-JYD feud was a flop. Adams is washed up, bad interview, no history of ever drawing money. Flair is still out there wrestling every show rather than doing interviews and pushed to where he can mean something for ratings. Douglas hit Flair with a bat and Flair got pinned after a double choke slam. Russo, Douglas and Bagwell destroyed Flair and Luger with bats until Adams & Clark made the save turning on Douglas & Bagwell. Awesome & Kidman beat Stone Cold Hulk Hogan in a handicap match in 10:44. Awesome with his new haircut looks like he might as well be Emory Hale. Hogan wears a jacket that says FUNB. NB stands for new blood. FU stands for FU. Hogan cleaned their clocks and was working harder than usual. It was a brawl that lasted too long, but the idea was it had to keep going until 9 p.m. (the original idea was to put Bischoff vs. Arquette at 9 p.m. to keep people from switching but this audible seemed like the better call). Kidman hit Hogan with a chair and Hogan juiced again. Awesome power bombed Hogan through a table and then Kidman splashed Hogan through a table and pinned him after a legdrop. Hogan gets smarter by the week. Nash came out but Torrie Wilson gave him a low blow and Awesome destroyed him with a chair to the ankle. Arquette pinned Bischoff in 2:08. Arquette at least looks like he likes wrestling and is having fun out there, but boy did he make WCW look minor league when he used the worm as his big move, particularly since it got by far the biggest pop of anything on the show. It was bad enough that the crowd was filled with pro-WWF signs, many of which were on camera, and negative to WCW signs. Jarrett saved Bischoff. Jarrett hit Page with the title belt. Bischoff hit a low blow on Arquette but then Jarrett hit Bischoff with the guitar when Arquette moved and Arquette scored the pin. Kanyon saved DDP, the lights went out, and Sting was in the balcony. Tylene Buck, wearing a very skimpy bottom and even skimpier top was doing interviews to tease the beginning of a feud with Gene Okerlund. Steiner challenged Booker T to come out. Booker T made the tremendously brilliant babyface remark of telling Steiner's useless women that once you've had black you'll never go back. The lack of pop was staggering. They started brawling and went to a break. Russo told Bagwell & Douglas they had to work with Kronik. No wonder they wanted to leave early. They had a tag title match filled with boring chants. It was horrible. Bagwell threw the ref over the top. Kronik did the double choke slam on Bagwell but no ref. Russo then hit Adams with the belt and Douglas hit Clark with a bat to save him from the melt down. Russo hit Adams with the bat and counted as Bagwell pinned him in 3:54. Abbott came out and threw around Bob Ryder, Jeremy Borash and Bill Banks. DDP pinned Jarrett to win the title in a cage match in 4:59. Actually this was the closest thing to a good match on the show. Page never sold the divorce deal and if he doesn't care about it enough to have it get in the way of wrestling a match, why should anyone else care? Amazing how quickly a back can heal when given a push. The finish was beyond stupid. Diamond cutter. Then, for no reason except to take focus away from people popping for a title change, Awesome tears down the cage door, which makes the cage gimmick stupid two weeks before a cage match on PPV. Awesome stopped the count. Kanyon was in for the save. Even though the ref counted two, stopped and hit the mat once more, all of a sudden they announced Page as winner and new champ. There was no crowd pop because instead of putting the focus on Page and getting over a title change, the focus was on Awesome and Kanyon brawling trying to get their second match on the show feud over and killing the title change pop. Finally Sting vs. Vampiro in a first blood match went a few minutes before a bunch of red stuff came from the ceiling and Sting bathed in it. Sting came from the ceiling again. Fans hated this segment bad live. Eventually the New Blood guys beat up Sting and hooked him back up to his hook and he was lifted a few feet off the ground and hung there like he was an unconscious pinata (maybe they can use him the next time they have five Mexicans on the show). After TV went off the air, they lowered Sting back to the ground, he made a miraculous recovery and beat up all the NB members. Reports were that even though Sting made the save, fans left the building unhappy feeling the final segment was a major ripoff
Thunder on 4/25 in Syracuse, NY. Show opened with Jarrett, Bischoff and Kimberly having kidnapped Arquette because Jarrett blamed him for the title switch and said they'd hold him hostage unless DDP agreed to put the title up in a tag match. They did a big confrontation early. Miller beat Bigelow. Kanyon beat Stasiak when Hennig, doing color, hit Stasiak with a foreign object. They beat up Stasiak until Awesome came out and power bombed Kanyon through a table. DDP gave Stasiak a diamond cutter and accepted the main event challenge. Kidman beat Horace Hogan in what we're told was a great match, Horace's best bout since joining WCW. Bischoff interfered so Kidman won, and they played up Horace as Hulk's nephew going for revenge. Abbott came out next. What was supposed to happen was that Abbott was supposed to bully around Rick Rinaldi, a local boxing coach from Syracuse (who when he came out, nobody in the building knew), which would bring out Marc Mero to make the save. Somehow this got all screwed up and they never went after Rinaldi and Abbott and Mero just did a pull-apart that wasn't good. Mero was referred to under his real name, with a mention that he was formerly Johnny B. Badd. Mero, in his home city, got a nice reaction. Sting beat Wall in a table match. Wall & Vampiro doubled on Sting after but superman made his own save. Russo came out with Bagwell & Douglas. Flair & Luger & Elizabeth came out. Flair did what I was told was largely a tremendous interview talking about the history and tradition of St. Louis wrestling mentioning The Funks, Bruiser Brody, etc. Problem is the PPV is in Kansas City. They added a stip in Flair vs. Douglas that if Russo interferes, Flair gets 5:00 with him. Flair is for sure going to job for Russo. Somehow in all this Russo revealed that Elizabeth is under contract to WCW and now she's Russo's valet and he took her hostage. Paisley beat Tammy in a match described as brutal. Tammy did another plancha. If she does enough of them, she'll be in the hospital soon enough. Awesome beat Booker T when Steiner hit Booker T with the U.S. title belt. After the match, Jerry Flynn, Hugh Morrus, Chavo Guerrero Jr. and Van Hammer ran Awesome and Steiner out. Hart did an interview taped on 4/21 in Calgary with Scott Hudson. The basic gist of the interview is Hart said he hit Hogan with the chair because he's friends with Bischoff and Hogan has been dodging him for a match going back forever and claimed he was the one guy who could have beaten Hogan when he was in his prime. He said he sees the finish of his career as holding Hogan in the sharpshooter and Hogan tapping out. It was suggested for Hart to do a retirement tour, which is a brilliant idea since everyone now will believe any wrestler when they say they're going to retire. DDP & Arquette in the final match beat Jarrett & Bischoff. The crowd reaction live to Arquette winning was said to be a big disappointment
There will be no Nitro pre-emptions for the NBA playoffs which is good news for WCW as it was a traditional momentum killer
WCW Saturday Night officially will no longer have separate tapings done. That in and of itself will increase the average attendance at WCW house shows since very little promotional money was spent on the Saturday shows, and with no major stars advertised, the crowds have been very poor, often 1,000 or less paid. The show will now be a review of the Nitro and Thunder shows, hosted by Terry Taylor and Larry Zbyszko
The latest in WCW's misleading numbers. In the recent New York Times article on wrestling which was written after the 4/10 show in Denver, it claimed that Russo and Bischoff's first show drew a rating "up about 20 percent from the season average." Since the TV season begins in September, the average rating for Nitro from the first week of September through the end of March (not including 4/3 because that was a highlight show and even throwing that number into the mix doesn't change the average more than a few one-hundredths of a point and not including the record low on 4/17 because the Times article was written before that show took place), the show averages a 3.01 rating. The 4/10 show drew a 3.06, so that's actually a 1.7% increase, a far cry from the claim. Even if we are going to take the season as starting in January, Nitro so far this year averages a 2.88 rating so the 3.06 would represent a 6.3% increase over the 2000 average. Including the 4/17 show, the season average for Nitro at this point is now a 2.99
It is largely speculated that the reason Curt Hennig throw the water at Mark Madden, which wasn't a planned spot, is because Hennig's wrestling hero growing up was Bobby Heenan, and you can put one and one together on that. The general feeling also is that Hennig went limp body because he didn't like the idea of Stasiak being the one to be the new Mr. Perfect, which is why Stasiak's debut on 4/10 was considered modern day Shock Master like
Bret Hart was asked by Sting before the stunt on 4/17 if he had a problem with Sting coming down from the ceiling. Hart said he didn't have a problem with it if Sting didn't have a problem and felt safe doing so and had a safety line. There were people in the company who felt it was in poor taste but Russo was insistent it was important to do it
Chuck Zito of the TV series "Oz," who has done a few cameos on Nitro since he's friends with Hogan, both as himself (remember the angle where they were stalking David Flair? Oh yeah, that sure went nowhere) and also once as Tony Maranera's father and the guy who the Mamalukes worked for, is shooting a TV pilot called "Street Court," where Zito as a judge settles disputes among parties by sending them into a boxing ring.
WWF: The USA Network lawsuit against the WWFE and CBS is scheduled to go to court on 6/12. This puts everyone in a bad situation, which may lead to a settlement, since the pre-ad sales for the fall season begin on 4/27. Basically everything on the wrestling front is on hold as far as ECW is concerned because they can't make a move until the situation with WWF is settled
4/24 Raw from Raleigh, NC drew a sellout 13,464 paying $366,410. Rikishi beat Angle via DQ in 1:25. For the 90 seconds they were out there they had great heat and Angle looked tremendous including doing a belly-to-belly suplex on the 400 pounder. Show gave Angle a sidewalk slam after and teased going after Rikishi, but instead gave him his dancing glasses and left the ring leaving the stage for him to dance. Trish Stratus throughout the show wore various skimpy negligees making sexual references to hard tables to tease Buh Buh. HHH, Shane and Stephanie came out to boost the ratings 1.4 points in one segment. Shane apologized to HHH saying he realized he'd never really pedigree Mom. Jericho interrupted and challenged HHH to ta title match. Shane issued a challenge for a tag match. Jericho stole the belt, hit HHH with it and dropped the belt on him and left. This angle did more to move Jericho up the ladder than everything he's done combined. They did several segments regarding Eddy Guerrero and Chyna trying on clothes to go to the prom. I know that when you get a GED there is no prom but I guess it was the best they could do to do a prom angle on PPV. Guerrero's character is the most offensive racial stereotype in wrestling in a long time. Benoit beat Road Dogg in an IC title match in 3:13 when Edge speared Dogg and Benoit pinned him after a diving head-butt. Edge & Christian came out and said they were going to do a run-in on the match if Dogg had the advantage and then explained what a run-in was. Pretty funny. Christian dropped Tori after the match with a reverse DDT. In wrestling terms, that means Tori will be sleeping with him in two weeks. In two of the funniest segments in a long time, Angle first tried to get the Acolytes to beat up Show. They said they'd give protection but weren't going to beat him up. Angle then warned them about smoking, drinking and gambling. Angle then went to Bossman & Buchanan and asked them. Bossman did this promo about how he dragged Show's daddy's cast and Angle looked like him like he was a weirdo. Hollys beat Hardys in 2:37 when Bob pinned Jeff after Crash hit Jeff with a garbage can lid and Bob pinned him after a dropkick. They had a big brawl after the match involving Tazz and Saturn and in the melee, Matt pinned Crash after Jeff gave him a swanton, so Matt is the new hardcore champion since it's up 24/7. I know that Crash specifically said before Wrestlemania that the 24/7 was over, but that was on the secret part of the show where the angles don't count. It was the same part as when Christian & Edge did their heel turn. Chyna did this hilarious deal where Guerrero said how great she looked in her dress, so she didn't believe him and wanted to try another dress on. Show beat Bossman & Buchanan in a handicap match in 1:22 of a short terrible match. Angle gave Show a low blow for the DQ. Angle did his slam on Show after the match. Acolytes chased after Bossman & Buchanan after. Vince did an interview that really was great. He told HHH that he didn't believe him when he said he wasn't going to pedigree Linda and threatened HHH if he ever touched his wife again. He then pulled Shane from the tag match. He was doing a face interview and kept talking about how it was going to be Austin who turns on the Rock, showing old clips from when they were feuding, and basically saying how Rock was the one who benefitted the most from Austin's injury, saying that Rock hired the guy who ran Austin over. Blackman & Brown beat Godfather & Snow in 2:30 when Brown pinned Snow after the power bomb. Snow tried to dance with the ho's but Godfather beat him up after the match. Snow has head back now that he and Blackman are history. This was bad. Venis pinned Guerrero clean with the money shot in 3:42. Guerrero looked really good. Rios and Lita came out and Lita nailed Chyna with a plancha. She looked to nearly kill her with the move. Rios and Lita left Guerrero laying after the match. Edge & Christian beat Dudleys to keep Continued on page 17.
THE READERS PAGES
WCW
I'm mad and disgusted. Nitro on 4/10 was a disgrace. There are so many negatives I can't even begin. The angles were boring and the show was Vince Russo and Eric Bischoff strutting around thinking they're hot shit. My real problem and disappointment with your review of the show were the amount of problems waiting to happen in the company. Look at the roster of people they are bringing in:
Sean Stasiak - Records conversations behind people's back, then nearly kills Curt Hennig executing his first move in the promotion.
Mike Awesome - Walked out of an existing contract without dropping the belt, proves he has no loyalty to a company worth a damn.
Chris Candido & Tammy Sytch - Enough said.
Scott Steiner - A guy who goes against the script on the air.
Scott Hall - Alluded to being brought back with a super push.
There should be no place in wrestling for Scott Hall or Scott Steiner.
They are begging for another Zahorian trial and for the DEA to search their locker rooms. The fact so many fans can't see through the smoke screen makes me very sad. It's no wonder fans are called marks.
Tim Davis
If WCW wants to use Billy Kidman as a main eventer, they really blew it on 4/10. I thought it started great with Kidman calling out Hogan, jumping him and beating on him. Then Hogan pulverized him until Bischoff made the save hitting Hogan with a chair and laying him out and Kidman got a cheap three count. Kidman should have continued to beat up Hogan, knock him out of the ring and then Bischoff should have hit him with a chair. This would have given Kidman some credibility with a main eventer and still accomplished the same thing with Bischoff.
Michael Rosenberg
Forest Hills, New York
I've spent 30 years in the wrestling business. Granted, times have changed but wrestling is still wrestling. In all my years in the business, I've never seen it so exposed and treated like such a joke. I ask only two questions. Do you care about or want to see a company run by two wrestling fans putting themselves over or do you want to see good wrestling? I refer to the current WCW situation. I've been a booker and a matchmaker and guarantee with the talent they have, I could turn the product around very quickly and they wouldn't even have to pay me. The reason Vince McMahon is doing well is because he loves the business and the same goes for me. That's the difference.
Jeff Walton
Los Angeles, California
While probably not necessary, I obviously agree with your comments regarding Eric Bischoff's comments about Bruce Mitchell. Like yourself, I consider Bruce one of my closest friends. Over the last 12 years, whenever I had to make a decision to make with an uncertain outcome, I've always called him. In the same way he comments on the pro wrestling business, he sees through all the b.s. in the world and more often than not, his advice has been right on.
My only concern is that by printing your comments, you may have brought more attention to the ridiculous accusations that Bischoff made. I understand that to ignore his comments in your position would be irresponsible. It's always been a fine line that you walk and I don't know how I would have reacted. But I want to thank you for defending my friend, who I repeatedly see bashed, yet rarely see proven wrong.
K.C. O'Connor
I just don't understand the purpose of Sting coming down from the ceiling. It used to be mysterious and cool, but what purpose does it serve now? I was watching the TV show with a friend who works for the Phoenix Suns and he told me that the NBA doesn't even allow such stunts because of the death of Owen Hart. What does that say about WCW?
Arash Markazi
Tempe, Arizona
I've been a theatrical rigging technician for 15 years and found the Sting drop to not only be in poor taste because of Owen Hart, but also the particular drop on Monday, as Bryan Alvarez noted on Tuesday's show, was seemingly poorly executed. Sting came down at what appeared to be an alarming rate, which was emphasized by his silhouette in the dark arena. In my opinion, on a cost analysis basis, it doesn't enhance the show enough to justify the risk. Until someone tells me that Sting has been certified in the use of repelling and use of harness gear, it is unnecessary to say the least.
John Goodlad
There had been criticism and praise for Vince Russo all over the place for the past few weeks. One criticism I feel is being ignored is that I had when Russo was writing for the WWF. There is something about him that screams that he is not a wrestling fan. The number of clean finishes, not to mention the quality of the wrestling in the WWF, noticeably increased when he left the company. If Russo doesn't have someone who actually knows the difference between a chinlock and a plancha helping him, I don't see crash TV doing anything for WCW other than turning more people to the better produced and better wrestled WWF.
Gerry Stumbaugh
Santa Rosa, California
WCW wants to rebuild its company, so they return Hulk Hogan and Kevin Nash to top babyface positions, and then take the first step toward restoring credibility of the world title by putting it on Jeff Jarrett.
I saw "Beyond the Mat" which just completed a whopping two-week run in Birmingham. It was fascinating that, just like in "Wrestling with Shadows," the women are the real stars of the movie, Terry Funk's wife and Jake Roberts' estranged daughter. The best line of the movie was when Collette Foley told her husband "You've got to stop doing this to us."
A few issues ago, a reader stated that Barry Blaustein painted a negative picture of the business. You responded saying it was simply a reflection of the business itself. I know that pathetic cases like Roberts aren't uncommon, but do you really think they make up the majority?
Jim Ward
Birmingham, Alabama
DM: Roberts is hardly representative of the majority of wrestlers, but nor are Funk or Foley who to me didn't come out negatively at all, but as very charming people with some notable flaws just like everyone else, except not like anyone else. But Roberts is a somewhat exaggerated representative of an aspect of wrestling.
ECW TITLE
I think the thinking behind putting the title on Tazz is to get publicity for the next ECW PPV. ECW will get a little exposure on WWF TV, which can't hurt. I understand your concern about the ECW champion being a second match guy in the WWF, but I think that's a little overstated. I think below HHH, The Rock, Undertaker and Steve Austin, the hierarchy is far less clear than you seem to assert. Tazz's jobs haven't been clear cut and he continues to get, as you've mentioned, a better pop than he should be getting given the way he's been booked. I don't think Paul Heyman should be concerned about the perception with this making his promotion being seen as second-rate to the WWF. Of course they are, in a sense. While the spin on ECW TV has always been they are equal or better than WWF and certainly better than WCW, they don't really fool anybody with that stubborn spin of theirs. I think their perception is as a smaller, scrappy, revolutionary company. It's that image, not the one they pretend that they are equal to the other companies, that sells ECW.
Kelly Lucas
I don't agree with Tazz being ECW world champion. I think it degrades the title. Although ECW got publicity, it also made it look like an average mid-card wrestler with the top company can simply take the ECW title at any time.
Mike Bruce
Ottawa, Ontario
When will you get it through your head that 90 percent of the crowd at the Erich Kulas incident didn't understand how bad the situation was? Wonderland Race Track has the worst site lines of any wrestling venue I've ever been to. I was about ten rows back, and even standing on my chair, had no clue what was unfolding. Fans responded to New Jack's promo because that's his character. Most had no idea what was really unfolding. Were there some sick people doing tasteless chants? Yes. Although I've heard more than one person say Kulas played to the crowd the whole time. I can't say for sure because I couldn't see, like almost everyone there. Yes, there are people who only want to see stunts. Yes, the business is headed in a dangerous direction. But in this specific case, you've been way too quick to paint the majority of people there with the same brush and it couldn't be farther from the truth.
David Doyle
Tacoma, Washington
DM: I can't speak for the majority of fans in the building. But the videotape also showed many in the front row with a perfect view of what was happening and panicking EMT's trying to stop blood flow that clearly wasn't the result of a normal pro wrestling blade job reacting as was described.
I wanted to respond to Liam Kelly's letter in the 4/17 Observer as well as your response to him. I was also at the Wonderland show and I think you're both right and wrong on different issues.
What happened that night was probably the single most bizarre instance of chaotic mass hysteria I will ever see in my life. Not only was I at the show, but I've seen the elusive footage. I can tell you there are vast differences between watching the tape and actually being there and there are several facets to be considered.
Wonderland Greyhound Park in Revere, MA is not in the best part of Boston. It's also accessible to the subway which allowed many, and I use this term loosely, wrestling fans from other sketchy parts of the city to get to the show. I went to every Revere show ECW put on and can tell you the fans were people who wanted blood, blood and more blood. The crowd was especially rowdy and intoxicated the night of the Kulas incident.
It was stated in the 4/17 letter that fans didn't know the severity of the injury. This is both true and false. I was in the fourth row and Kulas was practically looking right at me when the first cut was made. I remember looking at my friend and saying, "He's really cutting him." New Jack's slash happened so quickly that all I could tell was the gash was dangerous, but at the time, nothing that I hadn't seen before.
Here is where the tape and being there live differs in what could and couldn't be seen. Kulas fell down, belly up, with his head closest to a wall where there was no crowd. Wonderland was many things, but a good venue to hold a wrestling show isn't one of them. While the fan cam zoomed in on the deluge of blood coming from Kulas' head, from the vantage point of the crowd on only three sides of the ring, coupled with all the debris, security, police and wrestlers running around the area, it was hard to see how bad Kulas' condition really was. Even as New Jack was on the mic doing his shtick and Kulas was motionless, I was wondering whether it was a shoot or a work. There is where I conceded your point about having the pro wrestling fan callousness is not believing things I see no matter how real they look to be. This is the dynamics of kayfabe intermingled with the dangers of 1990s hardcore style.
I can tell you, however, that by the time the ECW nurse and the real-life EMT's, obviously not there to get bumped or participate in an angle, hit the ring, that as much as most of the crowd was still wired on the match, after a few minutes, they calmed down, especially after seeing all the blood soaked towels. A man to the left of me actually fainted at this point. And there were fans singing the "Hey Hey Hey Hey Goodbye song" and hurling insults at Kulas, but that was the minority of the audience. By the time the music went off and Kulas was moved onto the stretcher and the pool of blood was visible on the mat, the audience was relatively somber and most were wondering what the hell had just happened.
Later that night, after a particularly bloody chain match with Sandman and Raven, Sandman invited a young kid who had a beer into the ring for a post-match celebration. When the kid exited the ring, ECW security was going to put him back in the crowd, but the Revere police, obviously very tense and wound up from the previous incident, dragged him out to a waiting squad car and threw him in the back. Outside, Tommy Dreamer and Anthony Durante tried to reason with the police, but by that point they simply weren't listening. Fans surrounded the cars, pounded on it, and chanted "let him go." Meanwhile more squad cars and a paddy wagon showed up. I didn't stick around much longer after that.
ECW is lucky there wasn't a riot, and even more lucky that the Kulas family totally fumbled their legal case. Regardless of your thoughts of Erich Kulas, New Jack, or hardcore wrestling in general, Kulas nearly became an unlikely martyr to a trend in wrestling that will most certainly result in an accident with far graver consequences.
Sean Gorman
Boston, Massachusetts
HASHIMOTO-OGAWA
The booking for the Hashimoto vs. Ogawa feud is ridiculous as you've pointed out. It's like if the WWF signed Bill Goldberg, and then he was put over The Rock clean on three straight PPV shows. It's ludicrous to think what they've done with Hashimoto. But their match to me was everything that is great about pro wrestling. The heat, drama and intensity was out of this world. The crowd was 100% behind Hashimoto and desperately wanted Ogawa to lose.
The recent ladder match at Wrestlemania showcased everything wrong about the business at this moment. It was a tremendous stunt show without question, but it couldn't compare to this match. Hashimoto dominated the match and it was the most exciting match I've seen in a long, long time. The fans were jumping up and down throughout the match and even the celebrities were totally marking out for Hashimoto. If it wasn't for the fact the ending was him doing yet another job for Ogawa, I'd say the finish was excellent. He banged his head from the STO and couldn't get up by the count of ten and the ref reluctantly called for the bell. The whole arena went into stunned silence at the finish and reacted as if they thought there was no way he could lose. Both Antonio Inoki and Tatsumi Fujinami were looking concerned. Hashimoto left to a great reception, which is just going to make the whole fake retirement angle hurt him even more in the long run the same way it ultimate will for Foley. They showed his wife in tears backstage as he left the arena. This was almost McMahonesque. To show how much emotion there was, my girlfriend's parents, who taped the show for me and were huge wrestling fans in the days of Billy Robinson but haven't watched wrestling in a long time, both said they loved the show. Her mother actually told me she was in tears after the main event. As far as how the Japanese will react to American style lying, we'll just have to wait and see.
Chris Hodgson
DM: In comparing the Hashimoto match to the match at Wrestlemania, pro wrestling is and has always been whatever works at the time billed as pro wrestling. The fact that the ladder match was missing many elements, in fact, most elements, of what by past standards would be considered a great match, it was a great match today. To the current audience it made an impact, they didn't botch up their spots or look like they didn't know what they were doing and it was innovative and most importantly, memorable and action filled. Even though it could be criticized for having zero believability even though it was far more dangerous than matches with great believability, and didn't have the intensity both as a match or from the crowd's reaction to it and the psychology associated with a classic wrestling match of the past, within the current style of wrestling, for better or worse and it's really neither better or worse, just different and the main negative to it is it was a lot more dangerous and raised the bar and expectations for the future, it was a great match as well. Just as a fan not weaned on a different style if they don't like the Hashimoto-Ogawa match for not having insane bumps or table breaks would or because it actually looked like a real sports event with great believability, if they ignored the incredible emotional reaction, would miss the point of what a different form of pro wrestling also is today, because, quite frankly, you can't do a match like Hashimoto vs. Ogawa due to the physical toll it took, 200 nights a year either.
NEWARK STAR-LEDGER
I find it amazing that the Newark Star-Ledger would find it newsworthy enough to put an article about a pro wrestler breaking her neck on its front page. This is tabloid-like behavior, a level the Ledger had previously stayed comfortably above. What was the purpose of featuring this injury that took place at a small show, in light of the fact that identical injuries regularly occur to the allegedly better trained superstar wrestlers at sold-out major arenas? What difference did it make whether or not the injury was scripted? It was irresponsible journalism by author Brad Park to say that scripted injuries are usually announced to the fans. That sometimes happens on television, which is meticulously scripted, but almost never at a live show, and it's an irrelevant point anyway.
There have been numerous serious injuries to the highly trained performers of the WWF that took place at the Continental Airlines Arena. Those revenue producing sold out shows have regularly featured wrestlers going through tables, in addition to the same hardcore antics that go on at the independent little shows in question. Curiously, none of that is deemed worthy of being printed on any page of the Star-Ledger, let alone the front page.
Jeff Bukantz
Livingston, New Jersey
BEST BOOK
The releases of Mick Foley's "Have a Nice Day" and Tom Billington's "Pure Dynamite" has prompted an ongoing debate over which is the best wrestling book ever published. In my opinion, while both books are excellent, neither can claim to be the best. That honor must go to Lou Thesz's autobiography, "Hooker." This book really does a great job of covering wrestling in the 1950s and in conjunction with Marcus Griffin's "Fall Guys," does a much better job of presenting the history of pro wrestling than the mediocre A&E special from last year. Another book that has slipped through the cracks is Ted Lewin's "I was a teenage wrestler." Billed as a kids book, this is actually an entertaining look inside the business and I'd highly recommend it.
Several years ago you mentioned a manuscript containing the memoirs of legendary promoter Paul Boesch. Will this book ever be made available to the public? Also, are you familiar with the forthcoming: "From Carnivals to Cable TV" by Keith Greenburg that will be published in September. Any idea whether this will be one worth watching?
Jonathan Snowden
DM: I really have a hard time picking between the Thesz, Foley and Billington books. I learned more from the Thesz book so to me it was the most valuable. I can't say I learned much at all from the Foley book as his opinions on the last 15 years of wrestling and of his career are in many ways similar to my own, and in a few ways different, but it was the most fun to read and probably the most accurate of the three. The Billington book was brutally honest at points and I'd think it was probably the most important for a modern wrestling fan to read because without actually addressing issues, it brought up numerous important issues about the business as it is both good and bad. I don't think the Boesch book will ever come out as it was largely about the history of Houston wrestling, and no such animal even exists anymore. I spoke with Greenburg at one point when he was doing the book. Hopefully it'll be a lot more accurate than the A&E thing. Personally I felt calling the A&E special mediocre is being very generous. While the history of wrestling has been described as a mine field, the version they presented had far too many major inaccuracies, as mentioned it would be like doing a history of the NBA and failing to mention Bill Russell of Wilt Chamberlain and saying the work was mediocre when it fell far short of that. I really didn't think much of Lewin's book. This is going to come out bad, but I think my own book "Tributes" has to at the very least be in the pack with the Thesz, Foley and Billington books.
ALBRIGHT SHOW
It was amazing how over Chris Jericho was at the Gary Albright Memorial show. He received the biggest pop and Y2J chants throughout his match with Eddy Guerrero. He is the closest to Rock when it comes to holding a crowd in the palm of his hand when working the mike. The contrast to when Crowbar came out was stunning. Many of Afa's local boys got bigger pops. Very few people knew who he was. For someone who has been featured so prominently on WCW for the past few months, it was sad to see for such a great worker. It certainly demonstrates again just how far WCW has fallen and he deserves better. Also interesting was the lack of response for Jimmy Snuka and Bob Backlund. It was striking hearing the middle-age people in the crowd around us explaining to their children who these people were.
The show had virtually no swearing. One match had brawling outside the ring which also went into the bleachers. The crowd pretty much enjoyed the whole show.
The low point, and it wasn't all that low, but it was another demonstration of how the American audience has been educated, was the match between Maunukea Mossman and Johnny Smith. While very stiff and technically excellent, with good psychology as well, the crowd was constantly breaking into boring chants. Give Mossman and Smith credit. They did very little resting in the match. Every time the crowd chanted boring, they came back with a move that stunned the crowd and drew applause from the segment that appreciated what they were seeing.
The ending of the show with Road Dogg, Jericho, Too Cool and Rikishi dancing in the ring and paying tribute to Albright was one of those rare moments in the business that leave you feeling that you just saw something unique. It left my wife and I genuinely grateful to have been fortunate enough to witness it. Afa, the family and everyone involved deserve recognition for putting on a show that was a credit to the business and did justice to the memory of Gary Albright.
Ed Zohn
Continued from page 14. the tag titles in 4:35. Good match. Test, Albert and Stratus all came out. Buh Buh was mesmerized by Stratus so screwed up the 3-D finisher and Edge speared D-Von for the win. Rock did an interview. When Rock teased the idea of not trusting Austin, the fans booed Rock. Who would have ever believed it? Finally Benoit & HHH beat Rock & Jericho in a **** match in 7:22. Shane was ref and Vince was at ringside. All four were tremendous. Rock used the rock bottom but Shane wouldn't count. Rock punched Shane. Rock went after Vince but Benoit attacked Rock from behind. Vince gave Rock a low blow and HHH hit the pedigree on him and Shane counted the pin. Of course after the show went off the air, Rock cleaned house
It certainly seems like if Shane refs the main event, that Earl Hebner will run in to count the fall if Rock gets the pin
4/25 tapings in Charlotte rundown. In a dark match, Joey Abs pinned Ricky McDaniel, billed as Wahoo's son doing an Indian gimmick. Dupps beat Scott Vick & ?. Judging from what was described, it may have been K.Krush from Memphis because he was rapping to the ring. For Heat, Brown beat Snow via DQ. Snow is the latest wrestler doing imitations of other wrestlers taking the gimmick Richards had a few weeks ago and Show had in recent weeks. He was dressed as Blackman and was DQ'd for using nunchakus. Rikishi pinned Viscera. Blackman beat Venis when Snow interfered hitting Venis with the nunchakus. Godfather & Michinoku & Funaki beat Headbangers & Richards. After the match, the Japanese started dancing with the ho's and the crowd booed them. For Smackdown, Venis & Rios beat Guerrero & Chyna. Said to be great because it was Guerrero vs. Rios most of the way and Rios pinned Guerrero after a moonsault. Lita moonsaulted him after. Rock did a long interview until the McMahons & DX came out. Vince announced Shane as ref at Backlash. rock then guaranteed Austin would appear on the show live to a huge pop. Malenko beat 2 Hotty to regain the lightheavyweight title. Another good match with Malenko winning using the ropes. This title switch was originally scheduled for Raw the night before but moved back due to time constraints. Test & Albert beat Hollys when Test pinned Crash after the elbow off the top. Dudleys laid out Test & Albert after. Buh Buh was about to power bomb Stratus threw a table but she stuck her gigantic silicon bags in his face and he must have orgasmed or something and was so spaced Albert gave him the neck hanging tree slam through a table. Crowd did not like that they missed seeing a women go through a table. Jericho & Tazz beat Benoit & Saturn in a great match when Jericho pinned Benoit after a quebrada. Christian beat Dogg via DQ. Dogg won clean, but kept beating on him after and the decision was reversed. HHH got a 3:16 message on his beeper. Show & Rikishi won 2-on-3 over Angle & Bossman & Buchanan in a bad match. They danced together after. The heels tried to attack them but Acolytes made save. Matt wrestled Jeff Hardy for the hardcore title. Jeff did a legdrop over the ladder. Saturn, Tazz and Hollys all wind up in the ring and Crash pinned Matt and ran off winning the belt again. Throughout the show Shane & HHH kept being teased with false Austin sightings, and were beating up people they thought were Austin but wasn't. Godfather beat Blackman via DQ when Snow interfered. At this point the crowd was distracted from the show because some women in the crowd were flashing so the wrestlers couldn't get any reaction. Lawler got in the ring and was the master and getting the crowd back saying that he knew Austin wouldn't be there but if he was, HHH would beat him up. Finally the show ended with the McMahons and DX in the ring calling out Austin. He didn't come out. Rock showed up and introduced Austin on the TV screen. Austin then got a crane and went to destroy the DX bus with a cinder block. However, the crane didn't do any damage to the bus as the guy running the crane couldn't get it to work. Luckily for WWF, this wasn't live TV. They tried to make it work for 3-4 minutes before finally turning off the camera. Vince started ad libbing. When they finally dropped the cinder block on the bus, instead of it making the big dent, it tapped the roof and didn't even make a dent. Finally the bus exploded since they had pyro in the bus to blow it up when the cement block was dropped on it even though it landed far too weekly to make it look decent. It'll obviously be edited to look a lot better on TV but it was terrible live and the crowd was laughing hysterically at all of this. Fire fighters put out the fire. After the show went off, Austin came to the ring and drank a million beers to a gigantic pop, but he looked really mad
The way the WWF is claiming that the Wrestlemania at the Astrodome will beat out the Pontiac Silverdome claimed 93,000 number is that they are going to count the number of people who attend the WWF Axxess (which they claim drew 28,471 this year) and add it to the Astrodome attendance. Depending upon the source, the Astrodome for pro wrestling should hold somewhere in the neighborhood of 64-68,000
A correction from the Smackdown report from last week. It was the Mean Street Posse dressed as clowns that did the hardcore angle with Crash Holly in Philadelphia and not ICP, who are also a posse who dress as clowns. The Hardys vs. Rios & Guerrero match on that show ended via pinfall as they did the 3-D to Rios before putting Lita through the table, not a non-finish. It was one of the best Smackdowns ever. They pushed the idea of champion vs. champion in the non-title HHH vs. Tazz match, but it was clearly positioned as ECW being subservient to WWF since HHH basically destroyed both Tazz and Dreamer. They had a good match, although X-Pac vs. Christian that followed was better, and Angle vs. Benoit after that was the best wrestling match on the show even though it was short and had a bad finish. HHH did a great job in a sense against Tazz in that he sold to make him sort of credible, but not all the way main event credible. The size difference looked worse than I'd have expected. HHH actually only took one suplex, but they teased it to make it count, similar to All Japan psychology. Rock vs. Jericho was also a very good match as was Dudleys vs. Guerrero & Rios. There was an interview on the show live where Benoit mentioned the WCW title belt, but it was edited off the TV show
Rock is scheduled at this point to only miss the 5/8 and 5/9 TV tapings while being in England to film "Mummy 2.
Mark Henry is being sent to Ohio Valley Wrestling. I think it's pretty clear they're trying to get him to quit. Come to think of it, if you think of the angles they've done with him, from the b.j. from the transvestite to the relationship with Mae Young, they've probably been trying for some time. Henry signed a ten-year contract for a reported $2.5 million long before he ever had a first match, when he was training for the 1996 Olympics in weightlifting
Playboy is scheduled to do an interview for a story on Vince McMahon in June
Jim Ross will be headed to Memphis on 4/26 to scout the Memphis Championship Wrestling crew at their TV taping in Robinsonville, MS
WWF contacted Michigan indies the Cold Brothers (Brian and Chuck Colding) to wrestle a try-out dark match at the 5/16 TV tapings at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit
WWF Armageddon was No. 23 on the charts this past week selling 53,951 units. It's topped the 300,000 mark in total sales
Stock closed on 4/25 at $16 per share, which is up over the past week.
. . Smackdown tapings 4/18 in Philadelphia drew a sellout 14,364 to the First Union (we had mistakenly called it Core States but the name changed more than a year ago) Center paying $440,427. 4/22 in Columbia, SC drew 7,537 paying $223,102. 4/23 in Greensboro, NC drew 9,100 paying $246,974. Merchandise for the two TV's and two house shows ended up at $338,078 which is $7.60 per head
Kurt Angle's nephew Mark placed third at 141 pounds in the recent NCAA tournament. Angle won the NCAA tournament before winning the gold medal in the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta (and you'd be surprised how many people think that gimmick is a work)
The Greensboro show was originally set to give the Hardys a main event since it's near their home town of Cameron, NC teaming with Rock in a six-man. However, due to a death in the family of X-Pac, they re-arranged the show. Instead they went with Rock & Jericho beating HHH & Benoit when Rock pinned Benoit as the main event (with the exception of the finish, this was move-for-move their match on Raw, so this may have been booked this way not so much due to the injury as much as getting the match ready for TV), but put it in the middle of the show. They went with the same three-way they're doing everywhere with Dudleys, Hardys and Edge & Christian for the tag titles as the final match, which they also did in Columbia (Rock had Columbia off so HHH beat Show for the title in the main event). Because it was a title match, Edge & Christian had to go over, but the Hardys, who were eliminated first by the Dudleys, came back after the match and Jeff did a senton bomb putting D-Von one night and Buh Buh the other through a table to end the show. Bob and Crash do a comedy routine where they keep trying fire extinguisher spots but the fire extinguisher seemingly isn't working until Bob points it as his own face and turns it on and you get the drift. Even though Perry Saturn was not on the advertised line-up, they decided against sending him to ECW for the title change, and instead did a run-in on the Hollys hardcore title match in Columbia and Greensboro.
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