Big Weirdo

**** you Cowboys we finally got one.  Go Eagles.

**** them high.  **** them low.  **** the Cowboys forever.

Grantland: Second Annual Pro Wrestling Draft Board

Ziggler and Rollins as 8's on the mic can't even be taken seriously.

He co-founded Resistance Pro in Chicago with some guys a few years ago. Don't know anything about it but he is a huge wrestling fan so I guess he's got that going for him.

I do find it funny he used the transgender idea as a socially conscious storyline since his past with the one transgendered guitar tech.

http://www.queerty.com/smashing-pumpkins-billy-corgan-calls-transwoman-a-heshe-and-an-ugly-pig-20110901

Steiner used to do this to people.

Brock is literally the best thing going on WWE in the last 12-13 years or so (from the moment Rock and Austin left until now). Everything he does is gold.

Sheamus looks like a douche now. I like it for a heel.

Why did they put Reigns in that situation? For someone they're trying to push they seem like they're really attempting to destroy any cred he may have gotten. Just a bad spot in a match with Show, Kane and Ryback in it.

The IC title and US title do feel much more relevant.

I like the way Rollins is booked. It's perfect. Though I wish they used the IC title to push guys up the card still. Him having the WWE title doesn't feel right, even though I like him and firmly believe he'll be a good champion. But guys like Rock, Austin, Trips, and HBK all held the IC title first, and Rollins reminds me of HBK in terms of his ascension.

The Lucha Dragons were more over than they ever were in NXT. Neville had a strong debut. How long until Balor debuts? I'd bet Owens stays for at least a bit longer... But Balor's main roster debut is imminent.

I didn't know the ball could be dropped SO badly on Sting, but they managed to do it. And not a single word about Taker and Wyatt.

I don't gauge anyone's overness on the after Mania RAW just because the crowd is so insanely hardcore. But the Lucha Dragons are definitely gonna get over with the Lucha chant and Hunico (as Sin Cara) and Kalisto are just sick in the ring.

Also what is with dropping people's first names? Neville? It sucks. I do love that they gave him a cape. There were reports Vince wanted him to be like Mighty Mouse so looks like they had to compromise.

By the way speaking of the crowd did anyone hear their "We are awesome" chant? That was so lame.

Nope Cuz Michael Cole sucks

My respect for Cole went way up with that F5. That was sick. I was also legitimately stunned when Lesnar pushed the announce table over because it came out of nowhere.

And Cole isn't that bad. He's way better when he can call the match and has the right teammate. He and Tazz were alright and he and JBL could be okay but they insist on the 3 man team and then they constantly plug everything but the match.

That just hurt my brain.

To be fair, to be that level of professional wrestler, I think you have to be an egomaniac to some extent. I don't know if there are a lot of humble wrestling hall of famers that will come out of the era we are talking about.

I don't fault him at all. He's a master of backstage politics. I like aspects of it because it's perfect for his character. But no one should believe he doesn't think he's up there with HBK, the Rock and SCSA. He definitely thinks that.

But anyways I really think all the backstage criticism of HHH should be directed at Vince.

From everything I've seen from HHH in real life, he seems like a smart, level headed guy. All those marathon booking decisions and burials probably came from above and he takes the heat for it

I'm sure HHH knows he's not on that Austin level but his family wants to make him that

HHH may not be a McMahon level ego maniac but he's definitely an ego maniac. He definitely wants to be viewed the way they portray and he believes he should be.

He knows how to pander to people. He's definitely a master of playing the crowd and people backstage.

Lucha Underground is actually bad ass as ****. Robert Rodriguez is involved in it. It's shot very well. I like it because it's something completely different.

Also Jim Ross will be calling WrestleKingdom as English commentary this year which I think will be pretty cool.

Raw sucked tonight. No Sting. Stupid matches. And now we got that ****ing stupid computer as anonymous general manager again. WTF WWE?

Of all the awesome directions you could have gone with this and you give us that?

I think it's a one off thing. They did a countdown show where they referenced the anonymous GM being horrible. Who knows though. The ending was hilarious with the spamming of the anonymous email sound. Couldn't tell if it was intentional or not but Cole was corpsing.

Yet you'll always come crawling back to your homoerotic master.

I do love Goldust and I'll never be ashamed to admit that.

I don't think that moment last night needed to make sense.

I think that moment last night needs to make sense over the coming weeks/months, but it didn't need to last night at Survivor Series.

If they don't weave a story to fit it, though, then we can say last night made no sense.

I get the sense that the story will be something along the lines of: "I saw a guy come in and create a powerful faction and run WCW right into the ground. I wasn't going to let that happen again."

And he'll represent Vince (although he doesn't necessarily want to, but knows he's a lesser of the evils) in the Vince vs. Triple H/Steph storyline.

I think Triple H is going to be an active wrestler again. The stipulation for the match wasn't that Trips couldn't wrestle anymore. It's that he'd have no control over WWE superstars and he'd be removed as COO. Trips is too good of a heel to just flat dump, so I get the sense that Triple H is going to return to a TV active wrestling role and Steph will be his manager.

And WWE needs a dominant heel.

If you were writing WWE I'd be behind this idea. But you aren't. Vince is. You've always had fantastic ideas KDawg and this would be great. But you know that they won't build it enough to be coherent like that.

Just look at the Lesnar storyline. They have completely ****ed it up by never mentioning him. He doesn't have to be there but you need to bring it up once in a while to keep it in people's minds. There's rumors they have soured on it and are gonna drop the belt at Rumble maybe even TLC. They have no one to blame but themselves for that. It could have been so great and it started off so well then completely faded away for no reason.

That moment didn't make any sense. Is he gonna wrestle now? Dude is 60

But it was still a cool nerd moment

That's mostly how WWE is written today. No concrete writing so people sour on the product and when they need to suck people back in they pull a trump card like having Sting come out and take out HHH. It made no sense and it loses a lot of its impact because of that.

I'll give Vince credit though he knows his audience well enough to know though that no matter what he can always fall back on the nostalgia card regardless if it makes sense or not.

Oh did you also see that they're gonna have Stone Cold do his podcast live on the network with Vince?

Brock not being there has nothing to do with the shown sucking. It sucks because of the writing. They don't know how to write anything cohesive and coherent and you can tell a lot of the stuff is rehashed or just plain boring like Ambrose doing a lot of really vanilla Austin-esque stuff and virtually no build for the intercontinental title. I don't even know who has the US title? Sheamus? And the tag belts have been **** for awhile.

Brock not being there could and should be a big deal but they don't know what they're doing so they just throw **** against the wall and hope it sticks.

Zayn is the only one with a chance it feels like. He connects with the fans on a Daniel Bryan like level and plays the underdog very well.

KENTA... Does anyone really trust WWE to use him properly? Also can't talk. Promos are way more important here than they are in Japan. Neville is a mid carder. Terrible mic skills and a cool finisher. A slightly better Evan Bourne. Devitt can't talk either and Steen is only less overrated than the Young Bucks (thank god they aren't in WWE they are the worst thing in tag team pro wrestling)

Only smarks think these guys are the future. The future is already on the main roster in Ambrose, Reigns and Rollins.

This incarnation of the Miz is the best version of him yet.  He's really starting to buy into the fact that no one likes him and that makes him a better heel.  Which in turn makes me like him a little more than I ever have.  So congrats to him.

The Lesnar/Cena match was awesome story telling.  I was hoping whoever they threw at Brock would get the **** kicked out of them.  It was really the only story that made sense.  Now the big question is where do they go from here?  Brock should only defend every so often ala UFC and maybe bring some prestige back to the midcard.  Thats my hope anyway.

I think they should give Brock the title and have him defend at the 4 majors and use the time he's not there to actually build the mid card titles back up.

Really when you go back over TNA's history there is no defense of them. They have shot themselves in the foot over and over again for a decade. People so badly want them to be competition for WWE but they're barely better (and that's really debatable, too) than Ring of Honor (who you could argue WWE has a lot more respect for based on the dealings and praise they've given them on their website in the past) They deserve this. They earned this.

Btw I won tickets to see TNA in Hagerstown next month so I'm really curious to see how it's gonna be.

This is what pisses me off? WWE fans act as if it's not WWE produced, it doesn't deserve to exist.  

 

It wasn't cancelled because of bad ratings. IMPACT is probably one of their highest rated shows.

I'd love for there to be more wrestling companies but TNA has had so many opportunities over the years and squandered them my point is why should they be given another chance? I feel for the guys there like Aries and Joe who probably won't be hired by WWE but TNA wasted them. Sad. They have no one to blame but themselves.

I wonder how much that Russo revelation fed into this?

 

And how many wrestlers has Russo put out of work over the years?

Meltzer said on his podcast this was all because of Russo. Spike hates Russo.

There's better networks out there than SpikeTV. Heck, MTV would even be better.

Why would MTV pick up a wrestling show that was cancelled? And moreover why does anyone think TNA deserves anymore chances?

Yeah there's zero chance of it ever being in Baltimore. I'm not even sure why that and some of these cities are even on this list. Orlando? Jacksonville?

WWE put out a survey to some people who attended Wrestlemania 30 asking them to rank potential cities for future Wrestlemanias. Here are the cities they listed:

Minneapolis

Dallas-Arlington-Fort Worth

Orlando

Tampa Bay

San Diego

Jacksonville

St. Louis

Detroit

Philadelphia

London (UK)

Pittsburgh

New York-New Jersey

Boston

Los Angeles

Washington DC

Chicago

Houston

Seattle

Baltimore

Miami

San Francisco

Phoenix-Glendale

Denver

I don't know I like Punk but he's definitely not someone I'm upset over leaving. Then again I don't take wrestling all that seriously so I guess it doesn't hit me like others.

Signing "big" names doesn't help TNA. Hogan was there and he was bigger than the promotion. All you can think is "What is he doing with these small-timers?"

 

TNA is not WCW. Punk is not going to show up and be standing in a ring with Flair and Vader - guys that had legitimately sold out arenas on mulitiple continents.. Punk will make everyone look small instead of elevating them. MVP is actually the proper level of star to hire. (Of course, they made it seem like he made enough in the mid-card to buy the entire promotion and - once again - make themselves look small).

 

I stole some of these from another site largely, but a few interesting things happened on Raw last night.

 

Dolph and Miz had a legitimate old school face/heel match. And the crowd liked it. Amazing how easy that is.

 

Paige pulled a legit old-fashioned heel move. And it worked. Even with the divas, basic stuff is good.

 

Heyman set up the main event at Summer Slam in logical fashion. HHH wants the belt off Cena (though, to be honest, I'm not sure why). Brock wants the belt. Paul's job is to get Brock what he wants. So....let's have the match. Again, simple and cool, and it worked.

 

Three hours is ridiculous though.

Heyman is one of the last remaining people in the business who can sell you on a match with his mic skills. He almost always delivers on his promos. I enjoyed that last night.

Paige is finally interesting. They booked her so horribly while AJ was gone.

CM Punk hates TNA. He has stated before he would never work there again. They're done anyway. Rumor is that Vince Russo working with them in secret has pissed Spike off. They don't want him around and now they're on the fence about renewing their TV deal with TNA.

Punk can find stuff. I could see him hosting shows on MTV or Fuse or something. He has a decent media presence.

I wish Daniel Bryan would consider hanging it up too. I dread him coming back and looking like **** and having to keep wrestling to cover his expenses

Punk is gonna be fine. He saved his cash. He never has to come back again. I suspect he will though at some point.

I just realized I saw his last match live this year at the Royal Rumble. Kinda cool. Though he spent half of it lying in the corner haha

Please no. No Taker vs Sting. The entrances would be longer than the match itself.