It's been over two weeks since the last News & Views. All I can say to those frustrated by my lack of updates is get used to it because my schedule from now on is going to be pretty damn hectic. The combination of school starting up again (I'm in my last year of getting my MBA), Lost coming out on DVD (God, I love that show so damn much and the DVDs are just as outstanding as the show itself), the NFL season starting (my favorite sport by a lot) and just life being busier than it was two months ago means these updates will be random. I'm still going to aim for once a week, but I think once every other week or once every ten days is more likely. No guarantees or promises.
For this one, I'll be reviewing the first Friday Smackdown, then go through the regular assortments of news, opinions and answering of your questions. The first question of the Q&A is an especially great one about Hulk Hogan, so make sure you check that one out. Off we go.
Smackdown Recap for 09/09/05
I watched this on Thursday thanks to being Canadian and getting the show in full. Still, I don't have the time to do some sort of long writeup, so what you'll get are condensed thoughts on the show. Better than nothing, right?
You'd think they would do something to change the intro of the new Smackdown. Nope. Same thing.
Heidenreich & Animal beat MNM to retain the tag belts. Why? Because MNM actually had a great shot of getting over as a hot new act, but WWE had to kill all of their momentum because Johnny Ace's brother, Animal, wants to wrestle again. The one chance they had of revitalizing the tag division was to put the belts on MNM, keep them on MNM and see if they can have feuds with babyface teams. Instead, they job them out to the cheap knockoff of one of wrestling's greatest teams. You want to know what's wrong with WWE? Watch the booking of matches like this one.
Orton and his dad talk about Orton. Will this feud ever end? Apparently not. Why would the Undertaker retire? He doesn't work house shows, he shows up to TV once in a while. He gets paid more money than anybody else on the show not to work. He's got a dream job!
Kennedy beat Paul London in squash like fashion because Paul London doesn't know how to work, according to Vince McMahon. Kennedy's act is fun, fresh and interesting. I just want to see him in something more than squash matches. I dig the ring announcing gimmick. A lot.
Paul Burchill beat Scotty 2 Hotty in another squash like match. Burchill is impressive and is a phenomenal athlete. A friend of me sent me this file that shows Burchill doing a Rock Bottom and turning it into a moonsault. He's got the guy in the Rock Bottom position, then he flips back with the guy moonsault style and puts him down hard to the mat. Of course you'll never see that in WWE because they have to protect the likes of JBL with his 400 clotheslines in a match. God forbid they let the athletes show their athleticism.
Kennedy introduces himself to Sharmell. Tries to piss her off by taking cracks at Booker, who he beat a week ago. Ended it beautifully with the Kennedy…Kennedy bit. This guy is ruling.
Undertaker slowly comes out, thank god for fast forward. He talks, I fast forward, Ortons bring out a giant check. I fast forward some more. Undertaker makes the check light on fire. What's he going to do next week? Make ink run down his face like Papa Shango did to Ultimate Warrior? What year are we in? I thought it was 2005. I guess it's still 1991.
Eddie vs. Rey in the cage was next. I'll be honest, by this point I was fast forwarding a bit because I had to go somewhere, so I zipped through the match. I didn't FF through ALL of it, just parts. The psychology of the match was good, but not great. I think their match on SD a couple months back was the best in their series. I did like the end of this one, though, with Rey missing the crossbody, Eddie being able to walk out and then changing his mind in order to beat him with the frog splash. Great psychology with that, showing how much Eddie wanted to beat the guy. I'll probably re-watch it, but right now I have it ***1/2.
Benoit beat Jordan again, this time in 22.5 seconds. Three times now in under 25.5 seconds. This has been fun, but it should end now. Move Benoit onto something better and put Jordan in tags or something. He's too boring to work in singles.
Next week it's Undertaker vs. Randy Orton. The rumor right now is they're doing Undertaker vs. Randy & Bob Orton at No Mercy. Please don't. I hate handicap matches on PPVs.
Main event saw Batista beat JBL in a bullrope match. I'm not a huge fan of the gimmick, but I have to give credit to both guys for working a decent, **1/4 match. The problems were because of the rope they couldn't do a whole lot of moves, so it seemed like there was a clothesline every ten seconds. I was actually counting them, but then lost track and stopped caring. JBL basically got beat up the whole time, which is the third time that's happened against Batista, and ended up losing after Batista spinebuster when each man had touched three corners. If this is the last of JBL as top Smackdown heel I'll be ecstatic.
Overall, this was a pretty good show. I like the long matches in the cases of the cage match and the bullrope match. Kennedy continues to impress, Benoit has been fun lately and there were less pointless segments this week. Not a great show, but still slightly above average.
6.75 out of 10.
The News
- First, we'll start with this "press release" from WWE.com:
RAW is coming home to USA
A “Night of Champions” is scheduled for Monday Night RAW’s special three-hour homecoming to the USA Network on Oct. 3, starting at 8 p.m. ET.
Many former WWE Champions will be making their return to RAW on Oct. 3, including Hall of Famer Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Mick Foley and Triple H. Even Mr. McMahon himself will make an appearance.
All of this is in addition to current WWE Champion John Cena and former WWE Champions Shawn Michaels, Big Show, Kurt Angle and Ric Flair being a part of the historic, star-studded evening.
RAW flourished during its seven-year run on USA network, establishing cable rating records as WWE fans flocked to the television each and every Monday night. And it’s happening all over again, so don’t miss RAW on Oct. 3 for this televised homecoming.
No mention of The Rock there. I hope to be pleasantly surprised and that he shows up in some capacity. It's in Dallas, Texas, so it is a big enough city and there is enough notice that maybe he can take a day off from filming to make the show.
The other interesting thing is that it's a three hour show. I sure hope that isn't some test for them to do and see if they get a good rating in order to make Raw three hours regularly because I don't want to see that. Two hours every week is good enough. They barely know how to book solid TV shows with that. Three hours regularly is not needed. I'll assume that it's a thing they'll only do once, though. Living in Canada, I get Raw on TSN and don't even have USA Network, but I've heard they have aired a lot of commercials for it already. It'll be interesting to see how they book the three hour show. It'll be amazing. They'll have maybe three matches over 15 minutes! Ah, who am I kidding, they'll just find room for squashes for the likes of Tomko, Snitsky and Big Vis. Or better yet, Big Show vs. Snitsky in an Ironman. Match of the year!
I like how no mention of Kane is mentioned with the former champions. Sure, he only had a one day reign, but shouldn't he be mentioned at all? I guess he's a criminal, though. He's in "jail," right? I love Kane storylines. They are so ridiculously bad that they are funny.
Anyway, I'm sorta looking forward to this show. Will be fun to see Austin, Foley and HHH again. Hogan? Not so much. I just hope Rock comes back. That's who I miss the most out of all these guys.
- More on Hogan and Austin. Right now rumors are flying around about Austin's likely return to the ring (given a push by Jim Ross in the last Ross Report) and Hogan's involvement at WrestleMania, which is most likely a singles match with somebody. Now, the options for that would be Steve Austin or John Cena. The Austin/Hogan match would pit the two biggest draws in WWE history against eachother in a singles match for the first time while the Cena match would be a chance for the top star of the past to put over the top star of today.
The pro of Austin/Hogan obviously is that it'll bring in a lot of fans who may otherwise not see the show. The con is both men are well past their prime, both will demand a lot of money and it may be difficult to come up with a finish to the match.
The pro of Hogan/Cena is it would be a major rub to have Cena go over Hogan. The con is that while it's a big match, it's not as epic as Hogan/Austin would be.
All of these things, from Hogan's role at WM to Austin's return match to Cena's WM opponent, are going to be interesting stories to follow as we come closer to the end of the year and into the early new year when the top WM matches are usually flushed out.
I'd personally rather see Hogan vs. Austin with Austin going over. I just think it's the bigger match with more money. That would probably bring back a lot of fans who stopped watching over the years. If it's Hogan vs. Cena, you know Cena's going over and the excitement of that ends there.
- Trish Stratus was loaded into an ambulance last night after a match at a house show in Texarkana, Arkansas. People at the show said she was visibly hurt during the match, spending parts of it on the apron and her status for the future at this point is unknown. It sure seemed like she was due to come back for Raw tonight to set up a Torrie/Victoria vs. Trish/Ashley match at Unforgiven, but I guess now that's a question we'll find the answer to later tonight.
- Just to touch on the Jericho thing that was a big deal when I wrote my last N&V about two weeks ago, it looks like he's going to come back to WWE eventually. The TNA thing appeared to be some sort of joke on his part to work the net. I guess. I hope he enjoys his time off. We'll miss him. I wouldn't be shocked if he comes back in early 2006.
The Three Count
1. I hate handicap matches. Despise them. Last month on Raw during the build to Summerslam, they did Jericho & Carlito vs. Cena. This week on Raw they're doing Angle & Tomko vs. Cena. Not only do I hate handicap matches, I hate redundancy too. I hate doing the same damn match one month after you just did the thing. Especially when they're the same old boring handicap matches.
2. Paul London is in the doghouse with Vince McMahon. This is both sad and funny. The story goes that several weeks back, McMahon told people to stop doing top rope moves because of injuries that have happened based on botched top rope moves like Kidman last year on Chavo and Juvi on London recently. Apparently London said something to Vince about how if you take top rope moves away from cruisers then they're just the same as everybody else, they don't stand out (which is true). Vince shot back with some line about "learn how to work," which is hilarious if you've seen London work not just in WWE, but elsewhere. The guy could have a great 10-15 minute match with ANYBODY if given a chance. Next thing you know, London's on TV losing every match and then crying about it after. The genius that is Vince McMahon (that's sarcasm) gave him a crybaby gimmick because Vince felt London was whining to him too much. Don't be shocked if London ends up quitting over this. Can you blame him? McMahon signs these cruisers, barely uses them and then takes away the moves that are supposed to showcase them. Furthermore, when you tell somebody as skilled as Paul London to "learn how to work" while you've got the likes of Snitsky, Masters and Heidenreich in big matches shows just how moronic your line of thinking is. If Vince WAS a genius he'd wake up, see the talent of his wrestlers not based on their size, but based on their actual in ring ability. Instead, he loves the steroid wrestlers. What genius!
Well, I'm sure the likes of Jose Canseco, Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro would think that is genius. Hey, I just thought up a new stable for McMahon. They can be called the Sluggers too. Perfect.
3. You know why a guy like Ken Kennedy is standing out right now? Because he's different. Way too often do we see heels who are muscle-bound guys in love with themselves. Look at Masters, Conway, Dupree, Sylvan and some of the other "new" heels they've had on TV lately. All of them have the same gimmick, basically. Kennedy has the look, the microphone skills and the charisma to really charge up the ladder fast on a show like Smackdown that is in desperate need for new stars. I like the guy. It's going to be fun to watch him grow as a performer once he starts having some feuds.
Reader Questions & Comments
As always, reader comments in yellow and mine in regular font.
This is the question about Hogan that I mentioned in the opening part.
Prior to Bret Hart's involvement in his upcoming DVD, it has been circulated that Hulk Hogan, Vinnie Mac, HBK, etc were going to bury Bret in the DVD. I understand Vinnie Mac's position because at the time, his company was at risk and his justifications (right or wrong) were plenty. Second, HBK is HBK and his motives will always be questioned.
But Hogan's willing participation to bury Hart is perplexing. It is hard to pinpoint exactly why its perplexing but Hogan is the godfather of wrestling. Bret was screwed plain and simple. All of his loyalty in the past, hard work, blue collar work ethic were wiped away by the screw job. Bret (ultimately) did the job for Hogan at Wrestlemania 9 against Yokozuna. What did Bret ever do to Hogan? What did Bret ever do to the WWE to deserve the push out the door he got? I remember Bret Hart respectfully carrying the torch for the WWE when it came time, put on matches that we will forever remember and played the part when asked to. From where I sit, if it is true that Hogan was willing to bury Bret in the DVD it speaks volumes about Terry Bollea. Bollea’s participation, again if true, evokes disgust, anger, and frustration. Just wanted to get your opinion on Hogan willing to bury Bret Hart (if true). I applaud Chris Benoit and J.R. for standing up and not burying such a hardworking, dedicated, loyal and damn good worker such as Bret "The Hitman" Hart.
Neil Desai
Basically, the thing with Hogan is he's a selfish guy that has buried more people in his career than any wrestler of the last 20 years. The worst thing is he'll never admit to doing anything bad or wrong in his life. Hogan basically lives in his own world. He has no sense of right or wrong as long as it puts money in his pocket. In many ways I understand looking out for yourself, but at some point you have to think of others, right?
You'll see wrestlers compliment Hogan for being a good guy and all that stuff. He might be a good guy, but he's also very selfish. You know why? Because they made money because of him. It's like Tiger Woods. I doubt every player likes Tiger personally, but they like him in the sense that because of him more people pay attention to golf, there's more money by sponsors and prize winnings. Basically, the top guy if he's really successful in any form of sport and entertainment will make everybody else money. That's why you'll see Hogan loyalists.
The thing with Bret Hart is basically this. When Hogan was losing fans and WWE was losing interest in him in '92/'93 they parted ways with Bret Hart basically being the top guy. I'm pretty sure at some point that McMahon wanted Hogan to put over Hart. That never happened, as Hogan simply walked away. In Hogan's mind, Hart was either too small to be put over by the likes of him or Hogan still viewed him as the tag wrestler he was when Hogan was on top. Hogan's ego is so out of control that nobody can really ever guess what he's thinking. I mean, did you read the radio recap of his interview after Summerslam when he said he carried Shawn Michaels? Bullshit.
People like Hart or Michaels have every right to complain about the likes of Hogan. He made a career out of holding down talented "smaller" wrestlers just because they posed a threat to him. Just ask Ricky Steamboat after WrestleMania 3 or Steve Austin in WCW, right around the time Hogan came on board. There's more stories, but in both cases he got those guys fired, basically.
To summarize all this, Hogan is about money. Vince is paying him lots of money to barely work. Because of that, Hogan is loyal to McMahon and if Vince wanted him to bury Hart then he'll do it. Hogan never seems to have his own opinion on things. He only has the opinion of those that are putting money in his pocket. I don't think Hogan is a "bad" person. In doing business in wrestling, though, he's cold and heartless. He cares about Hogan, not about the business.
Next question is about the Undertaker.
Hey John just wanted to say I dig your column. It's pretty chill. Just a quick question though: Knowing that the Undertaker doesn't wrestle all the time which doesn't really put him in a title picture, one thing that I wanted to ask is I just wanted you to overview my personal dream WrestleMania. The 2006 Royal Rumble, no one has really predicted who might win it because it's still a long time from now. It seems unlikely but just what if, what if the Undertaker ended up wining it. With the way they've been booking Batista as being the animal and being unstoppable, imagine Batista fighting high card talent such as Randy Orton, JBL, Guerrero, maybe even Benoit and retaining against all. It could be Undertaker against Batista at WrestleMania 22 with Undertaker's streak on the line against Batista's one year title reign. Besides that match and the whole angle going around imagine HBK vs. Rock, Austin vs. Hogan and maybe Cena vs. HHH sounds like a pretty good card what do you think?
Matt Dees
I think what you've laid out there is pretty interesting. While I'm not a HUGE Undertaker fan (I don't hate the guy, yet I don't love him either), I think a match against Batista could be really huge if built up right and it's the first time they are against the eachother. The thing is they have to be able to hold off on doing the match before WrestleMania in order to make it special. It could be a really good story of what ends, the streak or the year long title run. Good idea.
If you add that to Hogan/Austin, Michaels/Rock and HHH/Cena as you said then you've got four really good matches at the very top of WM. No doubt.
Hey John,
I've written before and I love the website. Anyways, I can't stand how nobody pays attention to the women's division anymore. What's more, when they do, horrible segments such as diva searches come up and are unwatchable. Has anyone noticed except me that the women's champion, Trish, has been out for what seems like Months, and Bischoff or anyone else ignores that by not making her fork up the belt for someone else. The last time Edge was intercontinental, he was injured and out for 2 weeks and bam, immediately Bischoff makes him give up the belt for a tournament. I think that the WWE should bring back the Right To Censor, so that way, whenever one of the horrible segments start, siren sounds, Steven Richards and everyone just clears the ring, no more torture with Ashley and the leftovers with the diva division.
Another quick question: What do you think about Rob Conway's new gimmick? Should we just be thankful for no more la resistance? Thanks for the time.
Milo
The state of the women's division is sad as you said. At least Trish is supposed to be back soon, probably this Monday since she's been doing the Raw house shows, so maybe there'll be some salvation for the crappy division. Of course that back injury could always come back and hurt her some more, so you never know. I do think it's been very stupid to simply not mention the division for over four months now.
I think Conway's gimmick is pretty old school in that it's a lot like a guy like Rick Rude 15 years ago. It's the basic, egotistical heel act where the guy is in love with himself. I think he's got a lot of talent in the ring and he's good enough on the microphone. The problem is they always seem to have too many heels on the show, especially young "new" ones and they never seem to be able to push them all at the same time. I'd much rather have Conway vs. Michaels instead of Michaels vs. Masters, but we all know Vince loves his steroid wrestlers, so it's Masters we get. I think Conway is IC champ within six months or so. He'd be good for that division.
Also, hell no to the RTC and I'm very happy La Rez is done. Talk about gimmicks that went on way too long. Both of those were victims of that.
Why are the Mexicools being used mostly to interrupt stuff instead of actually having matches?
Scott
Not sure about the Mexicools. They should have matches on Smackdown rather than interrupting things or being relegated to Velocity. Bottom line is Vince McMahon is always going to love the untalented big guy over the talented smaller guy because he's a mark for size. Always has been and always will be. If I had to answer, I'd just go with the "Vince thinks they're too small" thing because usually that's the right answer.
I think with Kurt Angle being number one contender the next step would be having a great feud for a couple of months which ends in Angle taking the title and having Cena chase it a bit. What do you think of that idea? Angle is great with the strap around him and he has that edge that he did a couple of years ago when he was champ. Smackdown did not use Angle properly, I.E. against Booker and I cannot imagine another superstar who is as good if not better at being a quality heel then Angle. HHH is great but I love watching Angle in the ring, last Monday night I could not help but keep saying to myself how awesome it would be to see Angle as Champion on Raw. Not only does it make Cena look better but it gives Cena that drive to regain his "champ" status once again, throw in Bischoff trying to screw him and you have the building of an Austin like superstar who wants to debunk the system. What do you think?
PJ in Phoenix
I'm with ya. I think it's time for Cena to lose the title. I think Cena's a good champion, but face champions get boring. Plus, it's been over two years since Angle has been champion (the Ironman loss to Lesnar was two years ago this month) and I think he's due for another shot with the belt now that he's relatively healthy. The face champion chasing the heel champion is a lot more fun than the face defending against heel after heel after heel.
How do you feel about Ol' Bob Holly. He's starting to show on TV more, and surprising enough.... to me, still gets an impressive pop when he comes out, and was that a chant I heard Thursday?!? Personally I don't mind the guy getting in on the action a bit.
I've never been a huge fan of his, but I admire how he's been able to stay healthy all these years and contribute to the company. He's not going to get pushed or anything, which is how it should be. You need vets. What pissed me off several months back was when he teamed with Haas against MNM. The crowds were into them a lot. Then all of a sudden the team isn't together and Haas is fired. Why? Because WWE never intended for those guys to get over. Fact is, they did. They worked. WWE is notorious for saying they listen to the fans, then proving that they don't. This is another example of it. Back to Holly, I know he's got a rep as a bully to some wrestlers and he's been known to teach "lessons" to wrestlers in ring (ask Rene Dupree), but I think he has value as a veteran wrestler in the locker room.
Lastly, the questions I've been asked so many times:
Hi John, I am Saumit Newalkar from India. Got a question for you-
What is/was the infamous 'Montreal Screwjob'? Was it a work or was it for real? Was it Bret Hart's last wrestling match?
Regards,
Saumit Newalkar
It was real. It was Bret's last match in the WWE. He did wrestle in WCW after that for another two years.
Here are some links for ya:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Screwjob - Everything you want to know about it is in writing here. This is a shortened version of what happened. On another note, the Wikipedia encyclopedia is a remarkable tool for anybody looking for info on anything. I use it a lot. Love it.
http://www.brethart.com/facts.asp - Probably the best, most detailed account of the whole thing that I've ever read, written by Dave Meltzer. The fact that Hart has it on his official website shows how much he probably likes it too.
I get asked about the Survivor Series '97 incident more than any single thing in all of wrestling. Even after these links I put up here, it won't stop. It's right there with Andre/Hogan at WM3 and Austin/Rock at WMX7 as the most famous matches in the history of WWE. Maybe it's above them and everything else too. I don't know.
How You Can Be Here
Email me a question with regards to anything WWE related. Ask me what I think about a wrestler, something from the past that you were wondering about, what I think about a match from the past (I can give you a star rating and thoughts on it, for example), a storyline going on or anything else. My only request is no fantasy booking. I know people like to do that. I just don't want to do that in this column. Another option is write me a commentary that's around 500 words at the most and I'll consider posting it.
Send all comments and/or questions to me at oratoryjohn@gmail.com and throw in a name for me to reference to as well. I won't post your email address, but a name would be nice. A location is fine too. That's up to you. Remember this too: The better your grammar, the more likely it is that you'll be in the feedback section.
I really enjoy answering your questions and hearing your ideas for stuff. It's a lot of fun, so please keep them coming.
Column Flashbacks
In this section from now on I'm going to link you to a column from my archives. Over the six years I've been writing online there's been plenty of things to write about, so I thought it would be a good idea to mention a column in this section during the News & Views that's available for you to peruse if you are so inclined.
Time to flash back to something I touched on earlier. The last time Kurt Angle was WWE champion was two years ago this month. If you'll recall, Angle lost the title to Brock Lesnar in a fantastic Ironman match on Smackdown. It was their third major match together (the first two at WrestleMania and Summerslam that year), and it was the best one. After that match was over, I wrote a column about the series, about the men and about what I thought they could do in the future. Sadly, Lesnar was gone by March and we'll never know how good he can be unless he comes back. Still, those matches are ones that I'll never forget and if you've forgot or you want to remember then please check out my column called Two of a Kind because I think you'll like it.
In Closing…
That's it for this week. I will try my best to do a condensed version of the News & Views on Friday or Saturday of this week because I want to get in a quickie preview of Unforgiven this week. If I don't make it for that then I should be back on Monday to do a recap of Unforgiven of some sort.
Lastly, check out TheWrestlingBlog because myself and other writers from the internet are posting daily short commentaries there. I took a break from blogging over the summer, but am back now and enjoying it.
Enjoy Raw tonight.
Smell ya later,
John C. - oratoryjohn@gmail.com
Links to check out:
The Oratory - The Best Wrestling Columns on the Net!
The John Report Archives - Missed something that I wrote? That's the place to go.
