Oh, dear God…I literally have nothing to work with. I mean, nothing. Nothing in wrestling, nothing in the news, not even any deaths. When the only thing that tickles your fancy was the intense wank among sports columnists debating Kobe’s 81 and whether or not it’s the greatest individual performance in basketball history, you know you’re in trouble.
I really have no clue what to put in here. The Canadian elections are obviously important, but the results won’t be known until after my deadline. I just hope that the Conservatives don’t get a majority; otherwise our bretheren to the north will end up with politicians who say things like people fighting abortion are serving a noble cause and that warrantless wiretaps are a good thing, like the retard that I didn’t vote for twice. I can only chuckle when, NOW, people start talking about mine safety instead of focusing on the real problem there, which was the neutering of safety regulations for mines under GOP “governance”. Jack Abramoff hasn’t revealed anything important yet, and I have this feeling that what he reveals won’t be enough to change the minds of some people who just can’t see how morally bankrupt and repulsive the Junta has been. Well, f*ck, this country’s going right into the hands of Hitlary in 2008 anyway. Fleabag asked me last week if I was going to vote for her if she was the nominee. My answer was yes, and my conviction’s growing stronger by the moment. Yeah, Kerry’s Sunday morning news show appearance seems to be the kick-off for another try, but I think I’d prefer to back a winner this time.
And I’ve never owned a Blackberry or anything from RIM, and it’s not political, so I don’t give a shit about it.
Well, folks, it’s going to be another boring column with nothing other than the Pimp Section and Short Form. If you want to turn back, I can’t blame you. Widro already has the ad money from the hits anyway. I don’t see any of it, of course, but it’s still nice to have. Let’s just get this over with…
THE PIMP SECTION
Pomazak analyzes the football games on Sunday that no one gave a shit about.
Pandich talks about a Revolution. But not a good one, which features dead Republicans being raped and then eaten by wild dogs, and me lining the next group up against the wall and denying them prayers.
Gubitosi commits blasphemy by misspelling the name of God. Repent, sinner.
Eagle depresses me tremendously.
Yeah, that’s all the pimps. We’ve been doing some server upgrades, so submissions are pretty slim right now.
REALLY? YOU’RE NOT LYING? NO NEWS AT ALL?
No, there isn’t. Therefore, I’ll give you the current participants in the Royal Rumble match just for kicks:
Bobby Lashley, Rob Van Dam, Chavito, Trip, Shelton Benjamin, Kane, Viscera, Trevor Murdoch, Sylvain Grenier, TBS, Shawn Michaels, Gym Bunny, Carly Colon, Our Lord and Savior, Rey-Rey, Randy Orton, Matt Hardy, Orlando Jordan, Animal, Johnny Nitro, Joey Mercury, Simon Dean, Jonathan Coachman.
Now, wwe.com did have Super Crazy and Psicosis listed on Monday, but then pulled them off. Why, we don’t know, unless they’re going to have MNM work double duty and do a Smackdown tag title match, which wouldn’t be a bad idea.
According to my count, that’s 23 people, meaning seven slots available. At least one will be filled on Smackdown (right now, there’s 12 Raw, 11 Smackdown); this parallels the “final Royal Rumble Qualifying Match” they did on Raw that got Coachman in. I have a feeling that two of those slots will be filled by the losers of the world title matches, which will almost certainly take place prior to the Rumble match. Those two will be Cena and Henry. They might be making High-Quality Speaker Boy and Boogeyman pull double duty as well. If they do that, that leaves two slots from Raw to fill. Ric Flair is certainly going to be one of the Raw guys unless they come up with a last-minute IC title defense. The last Raw slot? Given the nature of the promo he cut on Raw and his standard MO, I believe it’ll be Vince.
It still doesn’t matter. If they go the way I think they are, Cena wins it. Period. And it’s not because I like the guy (as you all know, I don’t, not one damn bit), it’s because they’re stubborn in Stamford and will try anything to get him over again. See the Short Form for more of that.
And let’s just get right to the Short Form, shall we?
THE SHORT FORM
Match Results:
Kane over Carly Colon (DQ, Fun With Chairs): Yet again, I have to pull out a phrase: So, what was the point of this? Does it help pimp the Rumble in any way? No. Did it help Kane establish himself as one of the favorites for the Rumble match? No. Was it there to fill time with a couple of upper-mid-carders? Yes. What a noble gesture by WWE to present us, the audience, with something of this level of magnificence.
Trish Stratus and Ashley Massaro over Victoria and Candice Michelle (Pinfall, Massaro pins Victoria, top-rope cross-body): Ignore the fact that Ashley actually pulled off a credible top-rope cross-body. This match was extremely boring. We all know that they’re capable of doing more than they did here, yet all four women cranked it down to first gear and mailed it in. When Trish starts blowing spots, you know something’s wrong. Are they sick and tired of the prolongation of the MickieLexis LaJames angle too?
Shawn Michaels over Shelton Benjamin (Pinfall, rollup): Let’s get the damning with faint praise out of the way first. Yes, it was a good match; I’m now firmly convinced that when these two wrestle, there’s no way they can go below three and a half snowflakes. No, it wasn’t an MOTYC like their last match was. And there’s a simple reason why it wasn’t. It’s a matter of what was present in this match and absent from the last one. This match was servicing not one, but two different angles. The Vince/Shawn angle was extended by the pre-match. Mamma played a part in the ending. There’s a certain tipping point to where an angle can overwhelm a match. As the match’s expected quality goes up, the more fragile it is. The presence of those two angles was enough to throw the match quality down from where it really should have been. And, let’s face it, the two commercial breaks in the match didn’t help at all. A Michaels/Benjy match requires a certain continuity. The commercials chopped that continuity to bits. So it wasn’t any type of flaw in the match itself that created negatives, but what surrounded it. There’s a simple acid test for this. At Backlash, make this match again and give it thirty, then watch the snowflakes roll in.
Jonathan Coachman over Jerry Lawler, Royal Rumble Qualifying Match (Pinfall, rollup): Okay, they’ve pulled the trigger on the Spirit Squad angle. I’ve refrained from commenting on this until now, hoping against hope that they wouldn’t do it. But, no, they never met a stupid idea they didn’t like. I don’t mind young wrestlers being given a break, but in this way? What’s the appeal here? Am I missing something because I went to college for an academic experience? Yes, I went to an all-male high school, but we had an all-female high school next door and thus had female cheerleaders. Could someone please explain to me who they’re trying to appeal to and why? On second thought, forget the last one. Asking why “creative” does anything is futile.
The Proud Graduate of Dartmouth His Own Self, who’d have a better perspective on this than I would, gives a little prediction for their future: I figure about three weeks until Kane or Big Show destroys them all in about three minutes.
The Big Show over Lance Cade, Rob Conway, and Novocaine Helms, Over-The-Top-Rope Elimination Handicap Match: Can you think of a clearer way to communicate to the audience that this show doesn’t matter one f*cking bit? Especially when the match is just an excuse for a Trip promo? Man, this show’s so atrocious that Slick Rick said that he didn’t have any material to work with either.
Ric Flair and the Useless John Cena over Edge and Chris Masters (Submission, Masters submits to Cena, STFU): I think we’ve just reached critical mass of cynicism with this one, folks. They want a little bit of crowd cheering for Cena? Team him up with Flair in Charlotte. Can they be more blatant? I’m also pissed off because I was, at the very least, hoping for this show to be Masters-free, but I can’t even get that. I’m just about ready to make a deal here. I’ll cut my balls off with toenail clippers if they’d give me one show, just one, that I can’t find major fault with. Given my level of use for them, it’s not really that much of a sacrifice on my part, but they don’t know that.
KC Evers (no relation) points out a sin of omission:
What’s sad is that during the entire entrance of Ric Flair, not once was it mentioned that he was Intercontinental Champion. In a way, I think that pretty much sums up the IC Title at this point. Okay, they finally mention it when he was tagged in, but almost in passing.
Not even Lesbian Garcia mentioned it. And I don’t think he came to the ring with the belt either. Of course, KC, being from Charlotte, realizes that the importance of the entrance wasn’t the fact that it was the Intercontinental Champion who was teaming up with Cena, but Ric Fucking Flair. So, considering where it happened, I can write this one off.
Andrew Rosin, who, the last time he wrote to me, bitched about me going after the Idiot Bill Simmons, put out another possibility for this match than was worse than what we got: there could have been a little cross-show promotion and Cena could have brought in Matt Hardy. If that had happened, I would have broken my television, then gone to Wal-Mart, grabbed a sand wedge out of the sports department, gone over to Electronics, and broken all their televisions. I need to go to Wal-Mart for some soda right now anyway, so I may end up doing that regardless.
Angle Developments:
What An Encouraging Opener: So, not only did we have to put up with Cena’s typical asinine blather in the opening promo, but we also had to deal, surprisingly, with Lita as well. My God, was she ‘luded out or what? She sounded like she had no clue as to what planet she was on. It’s weird to think of Edge as the saving grace for a promo segment, but we got that shoved into our faces. Maybe “creative” thinks that this angle’s on auto-pilot and nothing more needs to be done. Hopefully they were disabused of that notion by the lack of reception that Cena got.
Steve Murray begs to differ:
I know you hate him, and so do I: but you have to admit, Cena’s promo at the top of the hour was the most effective babyface promo in at least 9 months. The crowd didn’t know what to do with him at the beginning, but they were *firmly* behind him by the end of that speech. And it was damn funny too: the various “ho” pronouncements were good, and the final “Hacksaw Jim Duggan” call served the concept of calling in old-school fans *and* yanking in new-school.
No, Steve, it wasn’t. It was extremely tedious. The constant repetition of “ho” was from the retarded child school of promo writing. That kind of put-down is more effective if you leave it at one use. You can expand it with adjectives ala Jericho, but only do it once. It has more of an impact that way. And when he name-called Duggan, the only feeling I had was dread at the thought that the only reason his name was brought up was that he’s going to be in the Rumble match. KC Evers (no relation) admitted to me shamefully that the Duggan stuff made him laugh. No, you can’t laugh when chills are traversing up and down your spine.
The Fuck?: Did TBS actually use the phrase “pimps up, hos down”? Who the hell is writing these promos?
Temptation: File the Shawn/Vince promo as another entry into the “Shawn Michaels has turned into a damn good actor” file. I’ve never seen him look as haggard and, well, old as he did during that promo. Although you have to ask yourself one thing: if you wanted to go out and party, would you do it with Vince? Hell, Shawn, if you want to do it, you’re going to be in Orlando next week. Flea’s down there, and he can show you a lot better time that you can have with Vince.
As I said, that’s it for this one. Maybe, just maybe, next week, we’ll have something interesting here.
