______________________________________________________________________ Sigh. When it comes to my internet access, the transition period between jobs has been a little bumpy to say the least. My links to the University of Waterloo are finished, so my accounts there are now dead. Worse yet, my free dial-in access through the university is finished. I've been wrestling, ahem, with how to handle this. I can access the net through the new job, but the phone call is long distance and the access is not free. For the short bursts for which I need to get on the net, I think I've got a workaround in place. Posting this stuff from the office isn't really desirable, since I've got an ancient machine in my office that very slowly runs Windoze. Speaking of which, another big reason for my inability to get a report up last week is my newly-purchased laptop. It comes with Windoze 95 and/or 98, but that is like asking me if I want to die by lethal injection or by electric chair. With work and the baby at home, it took me just over a week to find the time needed to partition things and get OS/2 installed as my primary working environment. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Windoze 95 is still on the maching too, 'cause it is an unavoidable evil in the world of computing. Anyhow, the laptop is very close to being perfectly configured for me. Still another reason for the missed update is that it was my birthday last Thursday. That caused me to have a little less free time in the days surrounding it. Finally, I should be able to get back to a weekly Thursday update regime, beginning this week. I know I've got a tape update promised for several weeks now and I'll get to work on finishing that. I'll also be updating the e-mail graphic on my pages. Right now, you cannot e-mail me. E-mail to the linked account will bounce. ______________________________________________________________________ I do not offer subscriptions to a mailing list! I do not e-mail images! ______________________________________________________________________ - The WWF had In Your House: Breakdown last night, 09/27/98. Overall, I came away from the show feeling positive; I'd give it a thumbs up. Here's a quick run down: * Owen Hart beat Edge: Owen is the best worker of the established WWF stars, so this promised to be a chance for Edge to be carried to a strong longer match. To date, Edge's appearances have all been brief, with no real hint of what he can do. The Hamilton fans were merciless in booing Hart. In the end, the match was good, but it was missing something. I think Edge's lack of well-roundedness just gave an indy/amateur feel to the pace of the match, as his reactions, etc., just didn't have the right, um, edge. The finish saw an Edge-lookalike surface at ringside, Edge act shocked, and Owen score the pin because of the distraction. A good opener. * Al Snow & Too Cold Scorpio beat Brian Christopher & Scott Taylor: Al's head got a good reaction from the crowd, and the commentators delivered the requisite "giving head"-type lines, but the gimmick, even when it isn't over-the-top like it was last time around, is just a little stupid. This wasn't a bad match, but it also had an amateurish feel to it. Scorpio & Snow have each had good matches in the past, but nowadays they just seem to do spots with no rhyme or reason to them. Once again, then, it wasn't bad, but it was missing something. Near the finish, they tried to do loads of two counts with partners just making the save. Unfortunately, everybody was moving way too slowly and the referee would count to two and then have to obviously wait or look for the save to come. The first time around, I groaned. The second and third times, I laughed. Sloppy. Al got the pin with the Northern Lights Bomb. * Marc Mero beat Darren Drozdov: I took very few notes for this match. It was nothing special at all, just filler. Here's where I expected the WWF midcard curse to kick in. * Bradshaw beat Vader: This was a "no holds barred, falls count anywhere" match. They brawled around ringside, but it was half-hearted, particularly by Vader. Vader picked up the steel steps and delivered a gingerly blow to Bradshaw's back while the commentators tried to sell it as devastating. Vader, through age, injury, weight, and lack of motivation, is sort of sad to watch these days, like Terry Funk was before he left. Finish saw Bradshaw hit two stiff clotheslines and a neckbreaker for the pin. The commentators really laid into Vader's poor conditioning. * D'Lo Brown beat Gangrel: I'm glad to see D'Lo doing well for himself. He's really an underrated worker. The match wasn't bad, signalling an upturn after the two match rut. Mark Henry interfered at the end. D'Lo hit the lowdown powerbomb for the pin. Gangrel left the ring, drank some tomato juice, came back in, and cleaned house. They pushed Gangrel vs. Edge. * Rocky Maivia beat Mankind & Ken Shamrock in a triangle cage match: The best match on the show, due in part to work and in part to the gimmick of the cage. Shamrock was booed like mad. Rocky was cheered. I'm not the head of Rocky's fan club, but I do think he's better than a lot of guys that get pushed in the wrestling industry (Rock's still mediocre). They did a double abdominal stretch spot. You could win by leaving the cage through the door or over the side or by pinning somebody. Shamrock teased several escapes. Rocky did a double elbow drop, which looked stupid. I guess my problem with Rocky and Scott Hall, say, is that they only have three moves and I'm not a big fan of any of those moves, so I can't blindly overlook the lack of a repertoire of holds. Mankind tried to climb out, but Rocky held him by his hair, so he climbed back in. This was weird since Mankind routinely rips his own hair out; surely, he wouldn't mind letting go of the cage wall, dropping to the floor for the victory, and leaving Rocky with hand full of hair. I guess so. Mankind could have climbed out, but he had a Superfly flashback and tried to hit an elbow drop off the top of the cage. Shamrock was DDTed by Mankind, who then tried to climb out of the cage. While he was climbing out, Rocky pinned Shamrock to win. * Val Venis beat Dustin Runnels: Val came out with Terri Runnels, referred to as such, since Marlena is a dead character now. Terri wore thong underwear with a sheer robe of sorts. Dustin prayed. It's pretty easy to support the guy that steals another man's wife when that other man prays all the time. Not a particularly good match, which shows how good D'Lo Brown is (having a strong match, minus the last few minutes, against Val last time out). Val won with the money shot. * X-Pac & Billy Gunn & Road Dog beat Southern Justice & Jeff Jarrett: The Justice & Double J team just have nothing that warrants them being on this late in the show. In the old days, when Hulk Hogan ruled the WWF roost, house shows & PPVs & SNMEs routinely featured a dog match in the spot before the main event. That way, nobody stole Hogan's thunder and the fans erupted like crazy when they saw him because they were so bored by the preceding bout. That's the only role that Justice and JJ can fill, despite attempts to roughen up their images. In the pre-game show, which in my neck of the woods was a canned half-hour with Dok Hendriks, Dok hyped the JJ vs. Road Dog story based on the old "Who sang that country music hit?" deal from years back. Billy Gunn looked good here, except when he punched. Finally, Gunn used a rocker dropper to get the pin on a justice member. X-Pac met with JJ's guitar outside the ring, selling his eye afterwards, with the commentators speculating that some splinters might have caused some damage. It seemed like a work since X-Pac was covering that eye and looking around with the other one waiting for the camera to be on him before yelling about his eye being hurt. I guess this sets up X-Pac vs. JJ for the European title. * Undertaker & Kane beat Steve Austin in a triangle match: The explanations for this match were all screwed up, IMO. Firstly, Undertaker & Kane can't pin each other and everybody pushes this as being unfair to Austin. Huh? If they could pin each other, then Austin could lose the title without being beaten. Isn't that the outcome that is unfair? At least now he has to be beaten to lose. They needed to push that McMahon wanted Austin to be humiliated. Secondly, interference by Austin's friends would lead to a a DQ. Well, Austin has no friends, right? During the match, the commentators said this match was allowed to have "no interference whatsoever," which isn't what the stipulation said. They added a no countout stipulation without announcing it; the commentators suggested that the referee was being lenient. Here's the thing: one year later, the WWF storytellers return to the story that began their upswing...it's all about Bret Hart again. Okay, not quite, but it is the Bret Hart story with Austin in Bret's role, this time another actor in the story. Vince says "Austin screwed Steve Austin." The referee in this title match is Earl Hebner again, and he's clearly ignoring rules that would help Austin (count out). The three musketeers (Brisco, Patterson, Slaughter) surface and monitor the match. Austin knows that the fix is in and attacks Brisco. The referee counts an illegal two-man pin. Vince runs of the with title, saying "It's mine!" From the perspective of seeing history be reenacted, this was sort of interesting. As a match, it was weak. Undertaker & Kane had the two-on-one advantage for a lot of the match and didn't do anything with it. There was way too much standing around. Too much stuff came off as cooperative/sloppy/contrived because of the overbooking. Kane & Undertaker disagreed about who should get the pin on Austin before the double choke slam and double pin. Even so, the PPV ended ten minutes early. RAW RAW on 09/11/98 was a taped show. Billy Gunn beat Jeff Jarrett with a neckbreaker after the referee stopped a guitar shot. Head Bangers were to face Golga & Kurrgan, but the Bangers showed a heelish side, destroying the Oddities before the match by spraying their eyes and ripping up Golga's South Park doll. Really bad. Sable lost to Jackie in a match to determine the holder of the vacant WWF Women's Title. Mero interfered, holding Sable's leg so Jackie could get the pin. Terri Power was at ringside again. The commentators had the nerve to say, "This is a great match!" Kane & Undertaker beat Steve Austin & Billy Gunn when Gunn was tombstoned at the end. Austin chaired both Kane & Undertaker. In a horrible match of death, Southern Justice faced Disciples of Apocalypse, with Jeff Jarrett guitar-shotting Paul Ellering. Al Snow beat Sgt. Slaughter. The stipulation was that Snow, who lost a lower must leave the WWF match, would have to leave the WWF if he lost. Absolutely terrible match in every way. Scorpio made the save when the three musketeers tried to attack Snow. Owen Hart faced off with Val Venis, but Dustin Runnels ran in. X-Pac beat D'Lo Brown to win the European title in a short match. Mankin & Ken Shamrock & Rocky Maivia were having a good triangle match when Kane & Undertaker ran in to ruin it. Nitro Nitro on 09/21/98 aired in full in Canada. It was a pretty nondescript show. The show opened with the Disciple surfacing as the first member of the OWN. Oh, who cares? No positive reaction for the Warrior. Dave Finlay beat Barry Darsow. The Ric Flqair interview from the week before aired again. If Eric Bischoff doesn't want Flair in his company why would he agree to have this taped segment air on his show? Wrath beat Nick Dinsmore. Ric Steiner beat Rick Fuller. The Steiners should never do interviews. Raven & Kanyon beat the Villanos. Villano IV took a bad bump on the trap door in the cage, hurting his neck. Diamond Dallas Page beat Alex Wright, who insulted the American fans for only knowing one language. Saturn beat Jerry Flynn. Ernest Miller beat Lenny Lane in a miscarriage of justice. Billy Kidman beat Disco Inferno to retain the title. During the show, they aired clips of Disco trying to cut weight so that he could wrestle for the Cruiserweight title. Konnan beat Chavo Guerrero Jr. Thunder Thunder on 09/24/98 was a weak show. Ernest Miller pinned Nick Dinsmore. Saturn pinned Psicosis, with a screwed up finish. Barbarian faced Dave Finlay. Raven beat Villano V. Chavo Guerrero Jr. beat Disco Inferno in a good match; the finish was a reverse decision because Disco lied about his weight in the paperwork a wrestler must fill out before each match. Uh-huh. Juventud Guerrera blew the whistle on Disco and ended up getting pasted for his trouble. Alex Wright beat Norman Smiley in an okay match. Goldberg beat Kanyon. - The Jim Carrey vs. Jerry Lawler worked confrontation generated a lot of press for the WWF this past week. It's really pretty incredible that the legitimate media always report negatively on "fake" pro-wrestling and then get fooled by transparently worked angles. It really can make one wonder about the quality of the investigation that goes into other reports. On Extra last week, they aired a two-minute segment talking about the story. They reported that Carrey suffered minor neck damage and was considering suing over it. They tried to get a comment from Jerry Lawler, who waved them off. Jim Ross commented that Carrey's lawyer was misrepresenting the facts of the incident. The end of the segment was most interesting: they aired a clip of the old incident where Hulk Hogan put Richard Belzer in a front headlock, with Belzer fainting and crashing to the floor. Belzer was interviewed and went nuts about how wrestlers can hurt normal people and need to be held accountable. On the commute to work this morning, I flipped the radio over to Howard Stern just to see what he was talking about. Courtney Love was on the show. She has a part in the above movie and was on the set the day of the incident. She said that Carrey was really into his Andy Kaufman character, constantly taunting Lawler. She said he taped a "Hulk Hogan wannabe" sign on Lawler that really incensed him and that things just finally broke down when Lawler snapped and kicked Carrey's ass, in her words. Afterwards, though, the director and Carrey's agent made everybody stand back away from Carrey. The next day Carrey was back on the set looking okay. - On 09/27, King Kong Bundy hosted oil wrestling at the Manor strip club that I pass on my way to work. On 10/04, Jimmy Snuka hosts. - The WWF has In Your House on 10/18/98. - WCW has Halloween Havoc on 10/25/98. Tentative line-up has * Hulk Hogan vs. Ultimate Warrior * Goldberg vs. Diamond Dallas Page for the WCW Title * Rick Steiner vs. Scott Steiner - Nitro beat RAW on 09/14 with a 4.5 rating versus a 4.0 rating. The detailed ratings are a click away. I still haven't managed to update them; but, hey, I've updated the PPV figures. - Preliminary figures for SummerSlam have it at a 1.48 buy rate, which is a huge success. Bash at the Beach's buy rate finally settled down to 0.93. - PPV buy rates, revenue (in millions), and match statistics for the WWF, WCW, and ECW are presented in the following 1998 summary sheet (the PPV draw(s) are listed, as well as the quality matches): Show Data Match Rating Data Show Details Buy Rate Gross Mean Median Peak % >= * * * * WWF 98/07/26: Fully Loaded Steve Austin & Undertaker vs. Kane & Mankind 0.5 (WWF claims 0.95; WCW claims 0.34; 0.5 independent figure) $2.23 1.81 * 1/4 * * * 1/4 Rocky Maivia vs. Hunter Hearst Helmsley 0% (0 of 8) 98/06/28: King of the Ring Steve Austin vs. Kane Undertaker vs. Mankind 1.1 $4.99 1.72 * 1/2* * * * * 1/2 Undertaker vs. Mankind 11.1% (1 of 9) 98/05/31: IYH Over the Edge Steve Austin vs. Dude Love 0.65 $2.90 1.06 1/2* * * * * 1/2 Steve Austin vs. Dude Love 12.5% (1 of 8) 98/04/26: IYH Unforgiven Steve Austin vs. Dude Love Kane vs. Undertaker 0.85 $3.78 1.75 * * * * * Steve Austin vs. Dude Love 14.3% (1 of 7) 98/03/29: WrestleMania Shawn Michaels vs. Steve Austin Kane vs. Undertaker 2.20 $9.52 1.81 * * * * * * 1/4 Michaels vs. Austin Cactus & Funk vs. NAO 0.0% (0 of 8) 98/02/15: IYH No Way Out HHH & NAO & Vega vs. Austin & Owen & Funk & Cactus Kane vs. Vader 0.45 $1.67 1.43 * 1/2 * * * 1/2 HHH & NAO & Vega vs. Austin & Owen & Funk & Cactus 0.0% (0 of 7) 98/01/18: Royal Rumble Shawn Michaels vs. Vader Royal Rumble 0.97 $3.62 2.38 * * 1/2 * * * 1/2 Royal Rumble Max Mini & Nova & Mosaic vs. Battalion & Torio & Tarantula 0.0% (0 of 6) Last 6 0.96 $4.18 1.60 1.46 3.79 6.4% (3 of 47) 1998 0.96 $4.1 1.69 1.61 3.75 5.7% (3 of 53) 1997 0.61 $1.84 2.18 1.81 3.792 27.9% (6 of 21) Show Data Match Rating Data Show Details Buy Rate Gross Mean Median Peak % >= * * * * WCW 98/08/08: Road Wild Hulk Hogan & Eric Bischoff vs. Diamond Dallas Page & Jay Leno 1.14 $5.15 0.61 * * * * 1/2 Juventud Guerrera vs. Chris Jericho 0% (0 of 9) 98/07/06: Bash at the Beach Hulk Hogan & Dennis Rodman vs. Diamond Dallas Page & Karl Malone 1.6 $7.21 1.81 * * 1/4 * * * * Juventud Guerrera vs. Billy Kidman 11.1% (1 of 9) 98/06/14: Great American Bash Hulk Hogan & Bret Hart vs. Roddy Piper & Randy Savage Sting vs. Giant 0.8 $3.52 1.67 * * 1/4 * * * 1/2 Chris Benoit vs. Booker T 0.0% (0 of 9) 98/05/17: Slamboree Kevin Nash & Scott Hall vs. Sting & Giant 0.72 $3.20 1.92 * * 1/2 * * * 1/4 Chris Benoit vs. Dave Finley Chris Jericho vs. Dean Malenko Eddie Guerrero vs. Ultimo Dragon 0.0% (0 of 9) 98/04/19: Spring Stampede Sting vs. Randy Savage Hulk Hogan & Kevin Nash vs. Giant & Roddy Piper 0.72 $3.20 2.40 * * 1/2 * * * * Ultimo Dragon vs. Chavo Guerrero Jr. DDP vs. Raven 20.0% (2 of 10) 98/03/15: Uncensored Hulk Hogan vs. Randy Savage Sting vs. Scott Hall 1.10 $4.12 1.69 * * 1/2 * * * 3/4 Raven vs. DDP vs. Chris Benoit 0.0% (0 of 9) 98/02/22: SuperBrawl Hulk Hogan vs. Sting Outsiders vs. Steiners 1.10 $4.12 1.67 * 1/4 * * * 3/4 Juventud Guerrera vs. Chris Jericho 0.0% (0 of 10) 98/01/25: Souled Out Bret Hart vs. Ric Flair Giant vs. Kevin Nash Lex Luger vs. Randy Savage 1.02 $3.81 1.92 * * * * * Chavo Guerrero Jr. & Super Calo & Lizmark Jr. vs. Juventud Guerrera & La Parka & El Dandy 11.1% (1 of 9) Last 6 1.01 $4.4 1.70 2.17 3.67 5.5% (3 of 55) 1998 1.03 $4.29 1.72 1.91 3.72 5.4% (4 of 74) 1997 0.77 $2.45 1.96 1.98 3.813 5.9% (6 of 102) Show Data Match Rating Data Show Details Buy Rate Gross Mean Median Peak % >= * * * * ECW 98/08/02: Heatwave Taz vs. Bam Bam Bigelow 0.23 $0.42 3.08 * * 1/4 * * * * Mike Awesome vs. Masato Tanaka 16.7% (1 of 6) 98/05/03: WrestlePalooza Shane Douglas vs. Al Snow Sabu vs. Rob van Dam 0.24 $0.45 0.64 1/2* * * Mikey Whippreck vs. Justin Credible 0.0% (0 of 7) 98/03/01: Living Dangerously Shane Douglas & Chris Candido vs. Al Snow & Lance Storm 0.23 $0.42 1.56 * * * * * 1/4 Buh Buh Ray Dudley & D-Von Dudley vs. Spike Dudley & New Jack vs. Axl Rotten & Balls Mahoney 0.0% (0 of 8) Last 6 0.23 $0.43 1.69 1.58 3.08 4.8% (1 of 21) 1998 0.23 $0.43 1.69 1.58 3.08 4.8% (1 of 21) 1997 0.22 $0.38 2.10 2.50 3.583 10.0% (2 of 20) Longer-term data is available. The data now runs back to 1991. A table of wrestlers who have delivered quality matches is also online. - The WWF has Survivor Series on 11/15/98. - WCW has World War III on 11/22/98. - The WWF has In Your House on 12/13/98. - WCW has Starrcade on 12/27/98. - The WWF has Royal Rumble on 01/24/99. - The WWF has In Your House on 02/14/99. - The WWF has WrestleMania XV on 03/28/99. - The WWF has In Your House on 04/25/99. - The WWF has In Your House on 05/23/99. - The WWF has King of the Ring on 06/27/99. - The WWF has In Your House on 07/25/99. - 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. ______________________________________________________________________ Thanks to: Masaki Aso. ______________________________________________________________________ If you have any feedback regarding my web pages, please send me e-mail. Don't forget to delete the leading "x" from my e-mail address; that "x" is my web spider spam guard. ______________________________________________________________________