You’re up against quite a tradition here with American football, baseball and basketball. It’s not easy to overcome that, but there’s no reason why soccer can’t be a part of American sports. – Sir Alex Ferguson, celebrating his team’s 4-0 victory over Celtic
Apparently Sir Alex is unaware that all you have to do to get 66722 people to show up for something in Seattle is to advertise free coffee and a globalization protest.
I think I’ll keep this one short. For some reason, I can’t get a handle on stuff today. It’s either because of the complete torpor when you combine weather and lack of wrestling news (hell, even Nason’s taking a vacation), or because I’m all atwitter because it’s Rob T His Own Self’s birthday today. Take your pick; they’re both valid excuses.
Oh, hell, pimps first, then world news…
THE PIMP SECTION
Memo To Gamble: Yes, I know that the Patriot Act is an acronym, but I refuse to give it any credibility by giving its full name or capitalizing the letters. I’m sure there are particular passages in Revelation that deal with it.
Haley is always a reliable pimp for a Wednesday, God bless his rancid little heart.
Murphy shows that, yet again, I am ahead of the curve. This time, it’s my Jeff Hardy dislike that’s spread to the populace at large.
And I’d really like to know what Alex Lucard’s real name is (he’s over in the Games section). I’ve never seen such a transparent pseudonym in my life.
RETARDS, RETARDS, EVERYWHERE I TURN, RETARDS
There has to be some kind of Ultimate Darwin Award that could be presented to Qusay and Uday Hussein. These guys had more than three months to get the hell out of the country with as much of daddy’s gold reserves as they could carry. The moment that US troops entered Baghdad, the plan should have been dead simple: slip across the border into, oh, Syria (or anywhere officials can be bribed), hire a private plane, land in Geneva, and either find a good plastic surgeon or hold a press conference. But, no, they decided to make a stand and actually hide inside the country. And they’ve paid the price.
What did they get out of it? Martyrdom? Bodies for the resistance to rally around? Look, no matter how much people in Iraq loved Saddam, they thought his kids were a pair of psychos. Nobody liked them. Surely they must have had an inkling of this. But if they get out, they’re always a threat to the new government, both from a revolutionary and diplomatic standpoint. What kind of deprecated intelligence does it take to believe that dead martyr is a better position than live exiled opposition? And what kind of deprecated intelligence does it take to believe that they would actually get away with not having their position blown by a stoolie when an entire country is looking out for them, whether for the sake of revenge or the fact that they were bribed?
Even after centuries of study by poets, playwrights, and psychologists, the human ego can still astound us.
AND SPEAKING OF THE HUMAN EGO…
Aw, come on, Mistah Curtis. Please tell us why you withdrew from the Greater Hartford Open. It couldn’t be because the Shocking Winner Of The British Open would be overshadowed by Suzy Whaley, Soccer Mom/Club Pro, could it? Just say it’s because you don’t need the money right now and there’s this whole afterglow thing, and we golf fans could understand (not fully accept, because a tour pro should be out there every week no matter what happened the previous). But right now, it sure looks like you want to find a place to extend the ol’ fifteen minutes, and the GHO ain’t it.
Let me restate my assertion above: Even after centuries of study by poets, playwrights, and psychologists, the male human ego can still astound us.
THE ART OF THE SACRIFICE
Whichever Demo flack came up with this particular plan, bravo. Brilliant. Have Bill Clinton go on Larry King and tell everyone to get over the Sixteen Words and, oh, yeah, there might have been WMDs missing from Iraq when he left office. This allows every Demo candidate for 2004 to go into assault mode and be able to disassociate himself from Bubba at the same time. It embarasses the attack kittens of the GOP to find the man they attempted to impeach for getting a blowjob and lying about it on the same side as their precious Dubbaya on the defining issue of his illegal occupation of the White House. It also blunted any impact Stephen Hadley falling on his sword might have had (any that was left after the Late Los Bros Hussein material, that is). It’s a Triple Lindy of tsunami proportions on the part of the Demos, and subtle enough that you have to look into it to find the real moves going on. I thought they’d lost the ability to do something like this. Glad to see my party has its ability to be devious back.
And speaking of devious…
SMACKDOWN SOMEWHAT SPOILED
Well, thank God the Observer had results up…
Wait a second, let’s go back to the Epilepsy taping…the Bashams got a win? Against guys we’ve heard of? Is that a first?
It’s the Bitch of the Baskervilles’ show, as she says that Vince is off taking care of Linda after she got Tombstoned by Kane on Raw. Hmmm, the last time Vince “took care” of Linda in a medical situation, didn’t it involve keeping her sedated and stupid, and making out with Trish Stratus in front of her hebephrenic face? Well, naturally, with that level of past care established, it’s obvious that Vince has to show up sometime on the show…
Given John Cena’s demonstrated taste in women during the opening promo, I wouldn’t be surprised if Billy Gunn wasn’t the only one to take it up the bucket. He does make some of the lost ground up with a good anti-UT promo later on, though, which Canada probably won’t end up seeing because it contains Satanic imagery.
Color me jaded, but, for some reason, the fact that the Ten-Buck Tramp is putting her ass on the line, promising to sleep with Noble if he can beat Gunn at Vengeance, isn’t prompting me to order the PPV.
Neither is the Barroom Brawl. No, not even with Doink the Clown and Brother Love involved.
Benoit/Eddie…oh, that’s another issue, but one great match isn’t going to make up for this disaster.
More comments in the Round Table, I guess.
MAILBAG!
I must open with an installment from Autobiography of a Fleabag, as he extends my gimmick (and he’s allowed to because he’s Flea, period; all the rest of you remoras require permission, which will NOT be forthcoming):
W. Bush is getting turned on by his own kind, thereby breaking Our Lord and Savior Reagan’s 11th Commandment – thou shalt not badmouth another Republican you f*cking carpetbagger. Not that I think this recent breed of “new conservative†is not well intentioned, but I saw the same damn thing in 1988, when I first reached voting age. Everyone jumped on the “Conservative Bandwagonâ€Â, led then by Rush Limbaugh and the newly taken seriously Oliver North. Liberalism is Dead, they screamed! as they led a braindead Centrist crowd along by the nose as Newt and his type ganged raped the country under (surprise) the false pretense of Patriotism. Low and behold they found the Redneck Republicans turned on them when the going got rough and all these kids who thought that “Right is Right and Left is wrong†bailed out to the higher grounds of “New Liberalism†i.e the eight years of a Hillbilly getting his dick sucked while technology paid them not to care. It was a pretty good ride until the Credit Cards came due and they ran back to their “new conservative†blanket just in time to ride W’s coattails into office.
I’m amazed that 15 years later it’s the same damn game. Only this time it’s a bunch of message board conservative wannabes who parrot O’ Reilly and Fox News. When the going gets rough they bail on what brought them to the dance – A Republican who is smart enough to play to the Center just in time for re-election. This time, The Bush cartel has enough smarts not to let a freak like Perot take the “disenfranchised Conservative†vote away, forcing the spineless to make the hard choice between Hillary and W. Bush the only problem with bandwagon conservatives is that they do not have, and never will, the blind faith of a Liberal. I can think of a thousand people who would vote for the Donkey before a Bush, but I can’t say I know one that would pull the lever for an Elephant. And that’s what will lose the election
This is truly an exciting time for Dubbaya-haters. In what should be his moment of triumph, he’s getting lambasted by every side. He actually thought he’d recovered a good portion of the Reagan Democrats and the neo-neo-cons. Now that the economy is STILL shit and he’s run out of BS excuses like September 11th, the knives are out. What’s needed right now is a challenge from the GOP side, and John McCain is the man for that. You think that he still isn’t pissed off about what happened in South Carolina in 2000? He’s not going to let a slimeball like Karl Rove get the better of him again. Weaken Dubbaya in the primary process to the extent that if the Demos offer up someone with a brain, an agenda, and an acceptable image (Kerry or Dean, mainly), he’s toast. I think that there’s enough factions in the GOP that would be willing to throw the 2004 election in order to get a shot in 2008 or 2012 for a long-term run. if only they can neuter the Bush Old Guard once and for all. They’re learning the lesson the Demos learned in ’92: time for new blood.
Speaking of New Blood, Aussie Bureau Chief Brett Wortham (and God bless him for being back) contributed a too-long-for-inclusion screed about John Howard, the Aussie PM, that certainly makes a case that the US isn’t the only English-speaking country in need of a change at the top. Yeesh.
The Pride of Dartmouth, Elliot Olshansky, checks in with the following:
Are you REALLY complaining about Rikishi taking time off? He’s just one of those guys who doesn’t matter, and isn’t going to anytime soon. He hasn’t changed a thing in three years, save for his brief run as the guy who ran Austin ov…oh, that’s why you’re so sorry to see him go…well, if he didn’t get the job done the first time, you expect him to improve on things just after the eye surgery?
No, I was just getting on his case for missing a month due to laser eye surgery in comparison to my experience. Hey, I see a good cheap shot, I take a good cheap shot. And that being said, sometimes a little laser eye surgery could have drawbacks to a wrestler’s career. Imagine if LASIK had been cheap and common in the late 80s and early 90s. How less exciting would your average Stan Hansen match have been if you weren’t wondering in the back of your mind about whether he could actually see his opponent when trying to hit the Lariat?
On the one hand, I understand why people are bitching about the segment that surrounded the Orton/Venis match on RAW, but then again, I don’t. Randy got a clean victory (doesn’t hurt for a heel to get one of those every now and then), and Hunter’s commentary actually helped further the cause of getting Orton over (wow, Trip still remembers something about getting other people over). As for Goldberg and Hunter, I don’t see any problem with them going at it in the RAW main at Summerslam, because:
– who the hell ELSE is Trip gonna wrestle? Sure, Shawn has gotten a good match out of him most recently, but that was last year, and they don’t really have time to bring that feud back, although I suspect the Evol-ference in the HBK/Jericho match could lead to something. Kane’s almost there, and I think he should come back to Hunter eventually, as it’s really all HIS fault that Kane had to unmask, but they need to kinda slow burn that…Goldberg hasn’t done much to deserve the shot (although, he did beat Rock and Jericho, so that’s something), but he’s just about the only guy left who Trip hasn’t buried.
– these are the matches they got Goldberg for…if they do this right (but that probably doesn’t involve Goldberg cutting promos), they can bring all kinds of history out for this: Goldberg has beaten Hogan and HHH hasn’t (and Goldberg hasn’t even returned the job); the thing at the Toy Fair a couple of years back (anyone get that on tape?). Also, Goldberg has a clean win over Nash, and come to think of it, was screwed out of that belt that Hunter wears (“I had it stolen from me; you had it handed to you”). There are all kinds of things you can do with them to build interest, and the match? Well, WWE has certainly done worse. They’ve also done BETTER, but there’s no denying that they’ve done worse.
Absolutely in agreement with all issues, Elliot. If the interference in the Jericho/Michaels match leads to a Michaels/Flair program, then you can say that it was well-executed. If it leads to Jericho becoming a member of Evolution, then there’s a problem. If it leads to nothing, we shouldn’t be surprised.
As for the upcoming Trip/Goldie match at SS, this is Trip’s last, best shot at dropping the belt to someone with mark credibility. Even he must realize how irrelevant the world title has become with him soldering it to his waist like he has. The problem here is that he must not do to Goldie what he’s done to other people (and what Flex has made a living out of doing): make Goldie irrelevant. That’s why I said that he should have shown a bit of fear in his eyes when SuperJew told him that he was next, instead of being his normal cocky self. It’s on his shoulders to make this match mark-relevant, not Goldberg’s.
As for Orton, if Evolution can get him over enough so that he becomes the obvious Number One Contender for Booker, it’s all good. If the Raw contribution to SS is Orton/Booker, Michaels/Flair, and Trip/Goldberg, that’s close to a must-buy for marks and smarks alike.
Regular HBK826 comments about the Tombstone:
There are certain things that we really just have to use suspension of disbelief for. Plot holes and nonsensical characters aren’t some of them, but I think Linda’s shitty Tombstone was. It was a well done angle and Linda, not being a trained wrestler and being the supposed “voice of reason” getting a tombstone (the finisher not regularly done anymore because it is “too dangerous”) seemed special, and set up some potentially interesting consequences for a feud. If Kane loses to anyone anytime soon I take that back, but this character is really working as something different. Wrestling is fake, we all know that, but isn’t it kind of obvious that Kane would protect his boss’s wife in a dangerous move, and isn’t it kind of silly for us to complain about it? By the way, I realize this is really 2 different points combined, but atleast they’re both about the angle.
Well, I think most of us have the practical sense to suspend disbelief, since this move was absolutely critical to underscore Kane’s gimmick right now. We’d be perfectly wiling to buy it. The problem that everyone’s having, I think, is based completely on the way it was presented. The camera angle they used was absolutely wrong. It showed everything. You can’t suspend disbelief if they’re exposing the business. Great idea, but the execution undercut it to the extent where it couldn’t be taken seriously. If they can finesse around this, like they did with Trip not getting locked into the car trunk a while back, they can recover. But right now, they’ve dealt a body blow to Kane’s angle by not paying attention to detail (right, Derrek?).
Okay, as I suspected, everyone seemed to concentrate on my “eight championships” statement viz. Scottie Pippen instead of on the main thrust of what I was saying, namely that it’s a good thing for audiences to be reminded of the negative things a performer has done. I am simply going to say the following:
1) I’m a Chicagoan. We think with our hearts regarding the Bulls of the 90s. It is an article of faith that it would have been eight in a row, and f*ck the Pacers and Hakeem. Christ died, Christ was risen, Christ came again, and Simon Peter was still on the court.
2) Hubert Davis was and is irrelevant. Hue Hollins is still incredibly irrelevant. He gets the “Vince In Canada” treatment every time he is assigned a game at the UC.
3) Jerry Krause was a major f*ckstick, the only reason Pip’s coming back is that his buddy Pax is now GM, but Pip generalized his comments and insulted Chicago. If he’d stuck to Krause, we would have given him a f*cking parade.
4) As to whether Pippen is relevant as a player, no, he isn’t. As a figure who can provide some major influence to the younger players, yes, he is. He will definitely show respect to both the coach and the GM as a guy who used to play with them on those championship teams. Some of that should rub off. You also know that he’d be on his best behavior because he wants to eliminate the bad impressions that he made on people over the past few years and cement his HoF credentials, in the place where he earned them. So while he’s not the 20/10 guarantee he once was, he’s the ideal person to make Curry, Chandler, etc., into those guarantees.
Toncap1inpk75 asks an incoherent question:
dude tony schivoni sucks tell me one thing that is entertaining about him. hes more bland then coach.
Okay, if I have my translation matrix from Imbecile to English working properly, you’re asking about the entertainment value of one Mister Tony Schiavone. Obviously, you weren’t around for the pre-Bischoff-in-his-ear Schiavone, when he actually called moves, concentrated on the match in front of him, and was, generally, an overweight Joey Styles. That’s the real Fat Tony, not the caricature that WCW gave us on a weekly basis. If he could execute a return to form, and play along with a work-shoot with Lawler, it would add an element to Raw that it hasn’t had since Heyman was in the booth with Ross: tension within the announce team. It would increase the entertainment value of Raw immensely. No other announcer could get as much out of that situation as Schiavone. That’s why I’ve been in favor of him coming in for a long time now.
Todd Walker goes magnificent about Raw’s broadcast outlet:
If not for wrestling and Star Trek I would have no reason to watch. Have you seen any of their new programs for men? If you were ever able to enjoy Ren & Stimpy, this new incarnation should send you into seizures. How they can take a show from my rebellious teen years and give them a Rico gimmick is beyond me. I watched one episode and nearly cried. Then there is Stripperella. Apparently this show is intended for overweight, acne infested fourteen year olds who are to pathetic to even masturbate to real pornography. Possibly it is intended as a way to give the once attractive Pam Anderson a venue that cannot, due to animated form, expose her deteriorating physical appearance any more than has already been done. I believe I made it through ten minutes. Then there is Gary the Rat. No comment or time wasted on watching. Now we come to a future program which may be of interest to you. As reported by Ashish today, on 16 August 2003, SpikeTv will debut a series entitled “Ride with Funkmaster Flex”. Since no description was given I can only assume this series will be a behind the scenes look at your favorite entertainer and mine as he travels the country and teaches the joys of clean living and working out to his favorite funk classics. That should help them gain the respect a new network such as theirs deserves.
I have attempted to avoid any of the soon-to-be SpikeTV’s “programming for men”, since the demographic they seem to be targeting is the slightly younger variety of man than I myself am. Ren and Stimpy I avoid as a matter of course, not because it isn’t great or important (in 1999 on Usenet, I stated that R&S was the second-most-influential cartoon of the 90s, only behind The Simpsons), but because of a background situation regarding Kricfalusi and his suck-ups at Spumco. Imagine the worst puro purist and multiply by 100. No R&S post-John K. had any merit, according to them, and if you were a fan, you obviously peed on the electric fence at some point. I got sick of their elitism, especially since this was during a time when Spumco wasn’t doing jack shit.
As for Stripperella…it’s just too sad. I never liked Pam Anderson to begin with (in fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen an episode of Baywatch that I wasn’t forced to view), and seeing Stan Lee whore his name out even worse than he has been lately…I prefer to think of Stan the Man, not Stan the Shill.
And in regard to Funkmaster Flex…hey, someone up there at Viacom reads me. Now hire me for the f*cking programming department at any of your networks, and maybe you’d be in a better situation.
Memo to Jesse Baker: The line-up of the Looney Tunes DVD collection is, well, a case of The Usual Suspects. There are problems I have with the collection, though:
1) Too little Tex Avery.
2) A little too much Robert McKimson.
3) Too many Freleng Bugs cartoons; you couldn’t drop one of those for “What’s Opera, Doc”?
4) No black-and-white material. This is especially aggravating in the case of substituting the inferior “Dough For The Do-Do” for “Porky In Wackyland”.
It’s a package designed for popular consumption rather than for cartoon smarks like me, but that’s what’s going to sell. God bless them for putting the shit out on DVD, though. Maybe they can get Jerry Beck to compile a Rarities collection or two.
Memo to John Barnett: I’ll concentrate on the Barrett Robbins issue when it gets closer to football season. It’s just about the only thing outside the Bears and Packers I think of vis-a-vis the NFL these days. I definitely want to see how the Raiders will treat him, and what the public thinks about that.
Jaysus810 asks an interesting question:
Hey Eric, if the UN reports in September that there are no WMD in Iraq, could Saddam Hussein legally hold power in Iraq again? His forced exile from the country would have been under false pretenses, and he really didn’t do anything else except defend his country.
I think it’s a “once you’re out, you’re out” thing. The UN could try to pass a resolution regarding the fact that Hussein is the legit ruler of Iraq, but the US and UK would use their Security Council vetos on that so fast it’ll make everyone’s head spin. So I don’t see it happening.
Ah, that’ll be it for me this week. I’ll be here for the Round Table for Vengeance, but otherwise it’s Grut and the gang until I come back next Tuesday. Enjoy whatever life throws at you.
About Eric Szulczewski
