Montel Vontavious Porter and Rey Mysterio have been trying to get Norman Smiley hired as a wrestler or road agent. Smiley was one of the people who helped MVP get started early in his career.
The Boogeyman is now being used sparingly as WWE feels the act is getting tired. Being on ECW also limits his uses, since his main supporters on the creative team are Brian Gerwitz and Ed Koskey. ECW is under the thumb of Dusty Rhodes, who favours more wrestling and less comedy skits.
According to the Record newspaper from Mexico City, WWE are back in discussions with Mistico as they continue to prepare for their expansion into Central and South America. A Smackdown/ECW tour headlined by Rey Mysterio is booked for Mexico on the 8th, 9th and 10th February.
WWE also has two shows booked for Japan in February and Bob Sapp is currently planned to appear on them. Sapp has still not signed a permanent deal with WWE and this is little more than using a local attraction to help stir up interest in the shows, similar to how Akebono has been booked by them in Japan on previous tours.
Given all the travel plans for February, the TV tapings will be changed somewhat to avoid the costs of taping overseas. Raw on 4th February, from Austin, TX, will be taped a few hours ahead of time for broadcast at the usual time, with the following week’s show taped immediately afterwards. Smackdown and ECW will tape on the 5th February as usual but will then tape the following week’s shows on the 6th in Houston.
Lacey Von Erich, Kerry’s daughter, has had her name removed from the Florida Championship Wrestling website. Rumours had been circulating that she had been released because she was not picking the business up quickly enough.
Ashley Massaro is cleared to return to WWE TV following the end of Survivor, with the last episode of the season having aired on the 16th December.
Jeff Lewis was given an OVW tryout last week. He was the Shawn Michaels impersonator from the 3rd December episode of Raw.
Glen Gilberti and D-Lo Brown are now working as road agents for TNA.
Some details on the upcoming movie The Wrestler, starring Mickey Rourke. His character is a former major wrestling star from the ’70s and ’80s who is now working in a supermarket and doing weekend indie gigs. He suffers a heart attack whilst competing in a hardcore match and doctors say he should never wrestle again. However, he gets a chance to wrestle his biggest opponent from his glory days, an Iron Sheik knock-off called The Ayatollah, at a reunion show and goes for it. Other wrestlers in the script include Lex Lethal, Booker D and Shawn McPride.
Credit: Wrestling Observer Newsletter, 24 December 2007 (subscribe here)
