Newsgroups: rec.sport.pro-wrestling From: hekunze@jeeves.uwaterloo.ca (Herb Kunze) Subject: Wrestling TidBits - 09/08 Message-ID: Sender: news@watdragon.uwaterloo.ca (USENET News System) Nntp-Posting-Host: jeeves.uwaterloo.ca Organization: University of Waterloo Date: Fri, 9 Sep 1994 00:12:55 GMT Lines: 216 { First off, welcome to any new University or College students reading this. I post an article like this every Thursday. You can retrieve logs of posts from previous years, along with a lot of other stuff, from the ftp site 128.227.59.59. Before jumping into the newsgroup as an active poster, please read the "Frequently Asked Questions" (FAQ) post and read news for a bit to get a feel for the characters in the newsgroup. Thanks. Herb... } - As reported on the net a couple of times now, this past Clash of Champions with the Hulk Hogan knee-clubbing incident was the second most watched Clash of all-time (behind CoC XII on 09/05/90, strangely enough viewed as the worst Clash to that time, with one good match (Ric Flair vs. Lex Luger for the US Title) and a terrible Sting Sting vs. Black Scorpion (Al Perez) main event match), the highest rated wrestling show on cable since CoC XII, and the highest rated special on WTBS this year. Ric Flair vs. Hulk Hogan was the most watched cable wrestling match ever. Will any of that increased viewership stick around? It's funny that Dave Meltzer launched into a very similar diatribe to what I posted shortly after the show. On the company bringing in Hogan and making him superman: "WCW was dying, in fact, just about dead, before his arrival. The term life support systems used here frequently was an apt description. ... The direction the company was going in was one that had been failing for years. I'm not saying the Hogan direction will in the long-run be successful, but for those complaining that the company is sacrificing its future by going to the past, they are forgetting the company had no present and no future except as a money-bleeding organization before Hogan came along. With the amount of money the campaign invested in him, they can't afford to not build everything around him. It may not work, but it was a car that had to be played because it was the only game Eric Bischoff could take that had a chance of turning things around and to do that, they couldn't hold back on Hogan one bit. Now the company at least has a present, and it's because of Hogan." Of course, I said that that they still had some great workers on top (Vader, Sting, Steamboat, Austin, Flair) that still rarely have bad matches. If that goes, then I will be just as down on them as some people here already are. On the booking: "The other complaint was the lack of originality in booking. No doubt. However, booking originality is one of the most overrated aspects of this business. The job of a booker isn't to be original. It is to draw money and create interest. ... Copying old ideas, if they worked before and aren't outdated when it comes to a changing business and can work again, is something to be commended for, not criticized. ... The Meng angle, while not original, will be successful in getting the character over stronger, so it was a good angle. The Hogan angle, while it would have meant more over the long-run had it been sold stronger and thus left something to be desired when it was over, did work as far as the show itself since the ratings built tremendously from start-to-finish which means far more people were tuning in their sets than turning off as the show went on." Meltzer also confirmed that the "masked man" was Arn Anderson and that he will be revealed to be Curt Hennig at some time down the road. Talk has always been that Hennig's WWF contract runs until November. For the record, he rated Hogan vs. Flair at ***1/2. - Speaking of match ratings, Meltzer also raved about the SummerSlam cage match, giving it ***** and saying that it was "the best match humanly possible given the constrictions of WWF cage match rules." "Toronto Sun" columnist Frank Zicarrelli wrote "The Bret (Hitman) Hart - Owen (Rocket) Hart cage match will be remembered as a mat classic, joining the elite bouts of Steamboat vs. Savage, Flair vs. Piper, Hogan vs. Andre. It was that good ...." - A couple of weeks ago, there was an interview with Roddy Piper in the local paper basically plugging the movie he's working on. He said, "I don't want to fight anybody anymore. I've had over 6000 pro fights, been three-time world champion and had 21 titles." I suppose the "21 titles" number could be correct anyhow. The article went on: "Though he's retired from wrestling, he'll fight for charity organizations - but even that seems to be a bit much. `It hurt so much afterwards,' Piper says of his last charity fight two months ago. `I think I'm getting old. A man's got to know his limitations.' But does he really know? Piper has a six-album recording deal with A&M, with the first one due out later this year. He describes his music as rockabilly. When asked if he can sing, Piper smiles and says, `I can sing from my heart. But from technicalities and stuff - no, I'm not the greatest singer in the world.' Another big event? Later this year, Piper's wife is expecting their seventh child." - We had guests stay over in our apartment for the weekend and it turns out one of them knew Lance Evers (now Lance Storm in SMW) quite well years back. Lance was quite a muscular gymnast and always talked about becoming a pro-wrestler. - The Honky Tonk Man was absolutely horrid in his debut matches on TV last week. Jim Duggan looked better than I remembered him, but showed just as little ability as I remember. It's just hard to believe that this is the same guy who was great when he worked for Bill Watts. - Jim Ross is history with the WWF after he and Vince couldn't come to terms when Ross' short term contract (to cover Vince's trial absence) ran out. Ross will reportedly head to SMW as the regular commentator. I would really like to see that; Ross was a tremendous commentator for the big Knoxville show on 08/05 this year. He was the best in the business in the past when his product was based on realism. - Brian Lee will probably be brought back to the WWF with a biker gimmick. Crush is supposedly history. - Eastern Championship Wrestling evokes strong emotions from a lot of people here, as evidenced in a recent thread. I remember the "Tank brothers" and ther clan from Smoky Mountain Wrestling Fanweek and how obnoxious they were. Some ECW regulars here say it's the best wrestling in the US. The 08/27 ECW card had the sanction of the NWA board of directors to create a new NWA World champion and has been much talked about in the newsgroup and in the sheets. According to fans that reported in to Meltzer, the show had one excellent match (2 Cold Scorpio vs. Chris Benoit, ****1/4). The winner of the tourney was to drop the title to whomever the board selected when Jim Crockett got his promotion off the ground. Instead, the back-stabbing that this business is famous for surfaced here, leading to the tourney winner, Shane Douglas, essentially discarding the NWA title, saying that the ECW title was far more important. Let's view this for what it is. The NWA exists pretty much in name only. There's a small board of directors (Jim Crockett, Steve Rickard, Dennis Coraluzzo) who want to get memberships from smaller promotions, like SMW, and re-establish some of the old territorial structure, presumably with Crockett once again ruling the nest (and hopefully not screwing himself and the territories by grandstanding this time around). That's a dream right now. Jim Crockett & Dennis Coraluzzo have both run shows under the NWA banner this past year, but no more than you can count on your hands. The talent has been stale for the most part or new and unskilled, with a few notable exceptions. ECW runs infrequent shows at best (1 or 2 a month) in Philadelphia and the surrounding area. They draw close to 1000 fans to their big monthly shows in Philly, but get far fewer when they stray away from their home arena. Meltzer labelled the "ECW arena core audience" as having an "in-your-face mindset." ECW guys that want to earn a living wrestling work all kinds of outside shows (from indies to Japan to SMW to WCW). There is talk that Terry Funk is history with ECW. There is talk that Sabu will eventually work out a deal with the WWF. They put on violent matches. A guy I met at Fanweek from New York went to the only show ECW has run there. He said the athletic commissioner took a couple of rolls worth of pictures and made many pages of notes. That's not a good sign for them returning to New York. The promotion will soon get national TV exposure and has changed the meaning of the "E" in their acronym from "Eastern" to "Extreme" to remove the stigma of being a regional league. The NWA double-cross was meant to feed the idea that ECW is an important promotion and boost the egos of those involved. What we have here are a bunch of fledgling promotions with dreams several sizes larger than anything realistic considering where they are now. In grade school, a class is filled with little kids and a few are bigger than the rest. The bigger kids squabble a bit and one kid comes out as the bully of the class. He's still in grade school though, and he's still a kid. I'd like to ask guys like Todd Gordon, Paul Heyman, and Jim Crockett where they see themselves and their promotions in five years time. When that question was asked of Jim Cornette in Smoky Mountain Wrestling (somebody beat me to asking it), he answered by saying he's gonna be pretty much where he is now, hopefully with a bit bigger houses on average and maybe running shows in a couple of new cities inside his current radius. Somehow, I don't expect I'd get that incredibly reasonable answer from any of the guys above. They're still in grade school. - The Ultimate Fighting Championship III takes place on 09/09/94 at 9pm EST. - WCW has Fall Brawl in 09/18/94. Tentative line-up includes: *- Terry Funk & Bunkhouse Buck & Arn Anderson & Meng vs. Dusty Rhodes & Dustin Rhodes & Nasty Boys in a War Games match - Sting vs. Guardian Angel vs. Vader in a triangular match - Rick Steamboat vs. Steve Austin for the US Title - Paul Orndorff & Paul Roma vs. Marcus Bagwell & The Patriot for the Tag Titles - Cactus Jack vs. Kevin Sullivan in a loser leaves WCW match - Steve Regal vs. Johnny B. Badd for the TV Title - WCW has Halloween Havoc on 10/23/94. Tentative line-up includes: - Hulk Hogan vs. Ric Flair for the Unified World Title in a cage with Mr. T as special referee and Hogan retiring if he loses - AAA will broadcast a show on live PPV on 11/06/94. WCW will be helping the group break into PPV by running promos on the WCW WTBS shows and plugging the show. Tony Schiavone will do the English commentary for the PPV. - New Japan will run yet another Jr. Heavyweight tournament this year from 11/15 to 11/20, working with AAA wrestlers Art Barr, El Hijo del Santo, Psicosis, Mascara Sagrada, and Blue Panther. - WCW has Clash of Champions XXIX on 11/16/94. - WWF has Survivor Series on 11/23/94 from San Antonio. The Hart family feud is expected to generate the main event. - WCW has Starrcade '94 on 12/27/94. - Awards: The first call for nominations was posted earlier today. I'll compile the nominations and make a second call in a couple of weeks. - Videos: I have posted something about the availability of videos. If you missed it, I'll send it to you in e-mail upon request. Basically, all of the tapes in my video collection are available. My tape list is on the r.s.p-w ftp site (128.227.59.59) in the file herbtape.zip. I have made a total of five compilation tapes for the net: R.s.p-w 1, Japan 1981-1983, Japan 1984-1987, VideoMarinepiad I, and VideoMarinepiad II. If you are interested in details on any of these, just send some e-mail or browse the ftp site. I've finally caught up with all of the tape requests from people in the newsgroup. That holiday in SMW really caused a backlog. If you are interested in getting any tapes from me, the turnaround time should now return to its usual shortness. Herb...