Well, fingers crossed we haven’t accidentally broken the internet again and this is successfully posted. The radio is currently playing Wham, so the outlook is not particularly good. Do we really need to hear “Last Christmas” and Slade and Wizzard and have Christmas Vacation and The Grinch on TV every bloody December? Global warming doesn’t care about snow; I don’t care about recycled sentimental pap in the media. It’s a good system, you should all try it.
Anyway, keep the questions coming in. This is the address, this is the place, this is the time, this is here and here is this week’s batch:
The person fka dave keeps it short and sweet:
“What’s the history of the death match?”
In the good ol’ days it was little more than a catchy name for two guys fighting, without fear of count-out or disqualification, until only one of them was able to stand and beat the referee’s ten count. In the early ones in Texas the winner even had to pin his opponent before the referee could start the ten count. Nowadays that’s more commonly known as a Last Man Standing Match, since the term Death Match has been modified to fit the weapon-laden, excessively violent hardcore style made famous in the IWA King Of The Death Match Tournament in 1995, which took all of the popular garbage wrestling traits in Japan at the time and bundled them all together. Chairs, thumbtacks, barbed wire, nails, tables, explosives, glass”¦ general chaos. Thanks largely to ECW there was an increased focus on hardcore wrestling in the late ‘90s and the old-school WCCW style of Death Match became a thing of the past. Terry Funk became a master at both versions, since he’s a crazy f*cker, but I could certainly live without the Japanese version. It’s less about telling a compelling story of one man narrowly surviving an epic battle with his bitter enemy and more about showing who is willing to do the most stupid spots.
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And follows it up with the additional:
“whats the worst ppv in terms of buy rate (sticking to wwe/wwf/wwg/wcw/ecw in comparitive terms if thats possible, ecw was never as big as the other two) and whats the worst ppv of all time, can anything beat d2d?”
In terms of quality, or lack thereof, there are a fair few contenders. Check out WCW Great American Bash ’91, which had such wonderful sights as El Gigante vs. One Man Gang and a two-minute Cage Match main event pitting Rick Steiner & Missy Hyatt against Arn Anderson & Paul E. Dangerously. Oh, and it opened with a Scaffold Match”¦ and Kevin Nash as the wizard of Oz”¦ and the match they had been building to for a year, Ric Flair defending the belt against Lex Luger, was ruined by WCW head-honcho Jim Herd firing Flair. And in his place, for the Luger match for a now-vacant title, they put Barry Windham, tag-team nobody extraordinaire. And they never even got the damn title belt back”¦ and they threw in a random Luger heel turn”¦ and it had the audacity to drag itself out for three whole hours, unlike December to Dismember, which at least knew when to slink off into the history books”¦ and all the while the crowd crapped over everything except their boisterous “We Want Flair” chants.
Starrcade ’94 probably warrants a mention as well. It bumbled into being at a time when WCW was creatively destitute, before the nWo, before the cruiserweights and before Nitro. Instead the company’s biggest PPV event of the year was headlined by outdated babyface Hulk Hogan and the perennial hanger-on Brutus Beefcake, while Mr T turned up to fight Kevin Sullivan. That’s not to mention Uncensored ’96 and the Tower of DOOM, or King of the Ring ’95, which featured two Mabel matches and three Savio Vega bouts.
None of them, however, can possibly compare to the uninhibited disaster that was Heroes of Wrestling. It was the first in a planned series of PPVs promoted by Bill “Money > Sense” Stone, held in 1999 when the third wrestling boom was starting to peak. The idea was to bring together a bunch of ‘legends’ and put together some ‘dream matches’ on the cheap, since the show needed only 40,000 buys to break even. However, these ‘legends’ included the likes of Abdullah the Butcher, Cowboy Bob Orton and Jake Roberts, none of whom could possibly hope to put on a performance that could even scale to the giddy heights of ‘below average’ in 1999. The planned main event of King Kong Bundy vs. Yokozuna (yup, fun!) had to be meshed together with Roberts’ match with Jim Neidhart to avoid people coming to blows backstage over the results, as though anybody outside of the locker-room really gave a crap. Legendary announcer Gordon Solie was too ill to work the show and was replaced by some pant-stainer called Randy Rosenbloom, who made Todd Pettengill seem like an early ‘90s version of Jim Ross by comparison. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, Roberts was completely and utterly hammered on a chemical cocktail so diverse it was a miracle he could even breathe. Then he”¦ well, watch it for yourself, words can’t do it justice:
Tsk. The PPV wound up doing only 29,000 buys. None of the other planned events ever came to pass, which made everybody bar Roberts’ dealer very happy.
Honourable mention goes to WOW Unleashed, though not even that or the WWA atrocities could possibly match Heroes of Wrestling. Hell, even Honky Tonk Man turned HOW down. How pathetic is that??
In terms of buyrate, well, we’ve already covered Heroes of Wrestling and there are various other indy wrestling shows that have done similarly pathetic buys. As far as the big promotions are concerned, the lowest the WWF ever did was In Your House 5, which got a 0.3 buyrate, while WCW fell as low as 0.1 for Superbrawl 2000 and Greed in March 2001. Greed was their last-ever PPV and it ended with Scott Steiner on top. Tragic.
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Rickey Mossou keeps the dream alive:
“Just wondering: Are there any plans beginning for WrestleMania matches this yaer that you know of? Also, do you think there is any truth to the Batista ending Undertaker’s undefeated streak rumor that has been on the net? If so, the Taker deserves better.”
The only ones that we know WWE has been considering are Hulk Hogan vs. Big Show, John Cena vs. Randy Orton and, yes, Batista vs. The Undertaker. Fortunately for WWE the WrestleMania name now sells itself and as long as they make the standard effort with production values, lighting effects, legend appearances and so on, the show will do just fine even without providing closure to a well-booked blood-feud in a money match. They could have had one of those in Cena/Edge had they gone the other direction at Unforgiven this year but, hey, who needs long-term plans in business? Other matches we’ll most likely get include Mick Foley vs. Vince McMahon, Bobby Lashley vs. Rob Van Dam and Money In The Bank III. As far as the streak is concerned, the rumour is that Vince has okayed Batista being the one to end it but I just can’t believe that will ever come to pass. For one thing, the streak is a genuinely unique accolade, one that will never be matched unless Stephanie decides to marry Edge and contains a new neck in the dowry, and by all accounts Taker himself is very proud of it. Yes, it’s entirely a worked achievement but wrestlers put immense pride in some very peculiar places. Also, if he was feeling generous enough to lose at Mania, it would need to be either to someone he is close friends with or who is going to be a major commodity for the company in the years to come. Given the reports of Batista’s not-altogether-friendly behaviour backstage at Smackdown, his age and the wear and tear of his body in the Age of Wellness, it’s highly unlikely that he fits the bill. Plus, the decision to end the streak will most likely lie with Taker, not Vince. He’s been with the company for some 17 years, made them a shitload of money, has immense value as a locker-room leader and, well, I can’t find contract details anywhere but I would imagine he has a significant degree of creative control given his reduced schedule. If they do go ahead with a Taker/Batista match, which would be a real spectacle for the general audience, then the lesser of two evils would be one last token title reign for him — perhaps with Batista turning heel to claim it back at Judgment Day.
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MRob calls my name, it’s like a little prayer:
“What if god was one of us? You know, just a stranger among all of us?”
Actually, it’s “just a stranger on the bus”. One of the biggest problems in the world is people who choose to believe in a god insisting that their god must be in a humanised form — and then not even having the decency to consider that this form might be that of The King Of The Mountain Jeff Jarrett.
God can’t wait to be alone with his baby tonight. Deal with it.
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Will Cooling survived the trauma of wearing a Girls Aloud hoodie long enough to send in a shitload of questions:
“1. Where’s my pwtorrents invitation thingy?
2. Who’s the greatest booker of all time ? Which wrestler/wrestling personality whose never had the chance to book would you most want to see book?
3. Which UFC fighter would make the best professional wrestler (i.e. ability to watch a work a worked match, charisma, promo skills, etc)
4. What was the last legit (as in non-worked) major North American Wrestling promotion?
5. Who was the main booker(s) for the WWF during its eighties expansion?
6. Which comic book character would make for the best wrestling gimmick?
7. Who’s more likely to win a World Title in the next six months; Test or Samoa Joe?
8. Which wrestler has got the most benefit out of (allegedly) using copious amounts of steriods?
9. What if Vince Russo had never left the WWE?”
1. If I remembered to send it then it’s in your e-mail. If it’s not then I forgot.
2. King Booker. I’m not sure about the second part of the question since most of the wrestlers creative enough to merit such a position have already booked a fair bit (Raven, Finlay, Foley) although they have yet to be left in charge of an entire booking team. Although it might be sacrilege in some people’s eyes I maintain that the best chance (within the bounds of realism) WWE has of putting out a quality product in the future is if Triple H winds up running the creative side of things once Vince is done and dusted. We all know that Stephanie is nothing more than a vacuous soap opera fan and that Shane is simply a fanboy in the right place at the right time, with little interest in booking shows. Triple H knows and respects the history of the business and models himself after old-school icons like Flair and Race. He doesn’t put any stock in flimsy, flippy-floppy showcases or mindless garbage fights; he likes the same solid mixture of quality pro-wrestling and entertaining characters that proved so successful for WCW and the WWF in the latter half of the ‘90s. It would be great if someone could give Lance Storm a shot at handling the creative direction of a promotion too. Check out his very insightful critique of TNA to get a feel for what he could bring to the product. In this day and age what we need is an Anti-Russo. He could be it.
3. Fuck knows. Never watched any UFC. I’ll say Tito Ortiz based simply on name value, since he would at least pop the buyrate for a PPV if he turned up to fight someone in WWE or TNA. Shamrock’s too old, so I’m basically out of names. If any of you MMA fans have further suggestions, send ‘em in.
4. There’s a new group in Tennessee called RPW, which very imaginatively stands for Real Pro Wrestling, that claims to be a non-worked wrestling promotion. However, they use a more Olympic style than a regular pro-wrestling group would, with points, periods and bonuses, and they are certainly not ‘major’ considering their TV show was pulling in 160,000 viewers by the end of its run in 2005. To be honest, I’m not sure any non-worked promotion could ever claim that it was anything more than a minor league operation. Even as far back as 1885 there are records of wrestlers using shards of glass in order to bleed during their matches, while ‘legitimate’ wrestling would be little more than a carnival performer beating local drunks. There have of course been countless instances of wrestlers shooting on one another during their matches but the truth is that there isn’t anywhere near as much interest in watching genuine wrestling as there is in watching staged wrestling. The fans want to see the stars and experience a story, while the promoters want to maintain control of the product so they can maintain control of the profits. Even the Japanese ‘shoot’ promotion Pancrase has had numerous allegations of booking determined outcomes.
5. Vince McMahon, with numerous assists from Gorilla Monsoon and Pat Patterson.
6. ULLLLLLTIMATE WOYAH! Or The Crow! Or”¦ hmm, I’m not sure. Perhaps they could give Eugene a Green Lantern ring so that he turns into a suave, sophisticated, superlative son-of-a-gun as long as he wears it. Actually, that would more or less be the same idea as the proposed Jack Black Green Lanter movie. Oh, how about revamping the other four Spirit Squad guys into the Teenage Mutant Ninja Jobbers?
7. Samoa Joe. Nobody could possibly consider the ECW Championship to be a World Title, not even during the peak of the original ECW. However, Test certainly has a better chance of winning some sort of panty-related award.
8. Easily, obviously and accurately Hulk Hogan, brah.
9. Well, WCW would still have imploded. A lot of people seem to attribute its collapse to nothing more than Russo’s booking but, while that certainly didn’t help, it was far from the biggest factor affecting the company at the time. The older and lazier guys like Hogan and Nash were contractually obligated to do whatever the hell they wanted and get paid far too much regardless of its effect, while none of the younger stars had been allowed to develop at the business end of the card and either jumped ship or drowned. Management became a metaphor for miscommunication as the inmates took charge of the asylum. Nobody who could have potentially steered the ship in the right direction would have been able to get anywhere near the wheel. Going up against an Austin and Rock powered WWE meant that business suffered accordingly and as soon as Turner was muscled out of power his rasslin’ venture was dead. The same goes for ECW and Paul Heyman’s perpetual emotion machine. Russo’s presence wouldn’t have affected any of the other major developments mentioned last week, such as The Rock’s movie career, Austin’s injuries or Triple H’s relationship with Stephanie, so any differences would have been marginal at best. Hell, by 2001, with Stephanie’s increased attachment to the pen and Heyman’s involvement in the creative process, Russo would probably have just been quietly shuffled out of power anyway. We wouldn’t have had him or David Arquette as former WCW World Champions though, which would have been just lovely.
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