Hello Pulse Readership, I’m Pulse Glazer and I’m pretty sure I’m now the senior-most regular writer here at Pulse Wrestling. Hopefully some of you are longtime readers who remember my not so humble beginnings here at this great site, but here I welcome all readers, old and new to join me for a quick retrospective on my time and what it is I do here. There will be a good deal of reflection and, honestly, probably a bit of self-indulgent pap here, but, hell, some of you guys read Reneke, so you should be used to it by now.
As about half of our writers of note, I began here as a regular in Eric S’s column. For those of you who are new, Eric combined great writing, bitter sarcasm and political commentary to the best catch-all wrestling column on the ‘net. With time, his regular correspondents, who he featured in every column (of which there were often three a week), spun off into writing gigs of their own. So it was that I ended up hired as The ROH Reviewer. Ring of Honor was, at the time, coming off the wildly successful CZW Invasion and really seemed prime for a breakout with amazing booking, in ring talent and buzz all converging. I decided that while I couldn’t make a difference in WWE or TNA’s business, Ring of Honor was a way I could have an effect and so I proceeded to write about them for a short while.
Of course, I’m as opinionated as they come, so it quickly came to pass that I wasn’t content merely commenting on wrestling, but also had to weigh in on major wrestling debates. Taking a page from my erstwhile mentor Eric S, I began responding to my fellow columnists creating a new feature for doing so called “A Modest Response†and slowing down my ROH coverage. “A Modest Response†saw many a heated debate on the nature of wrestling and spawned often contentious, lasting friendships with many a writer from Andy Wheeler to Paul Marshall to Brad Curran to Andy Mac and everyone in between. For a time, I was the writer’s writer, not doing huge hits, but drawing huge praise from all corners of the IWC and even some people within the major American promotions. But my heart was still in Ring of Honor, which became a topic I’d harp on more and more in these columns.
Still growing with Pay Per View, I decided to take A Modest Response and turn it into ROH Weekly. This weekly column was meant to introduce new viewers to ROH, much the way my quickly abandoned reviews were the same. The format I utilized for this lead to This Week in ‘E, Pulse’s most successful weekly feature by the talented and ubiquitous Mark Allen. It turned out that ROH Weekly was a huge success and I turned (when I stopped counting) some 300 people who actually contacted me about it on to Ring of Honor, most notably our own missed Air Force Officer Vinny Truncellito. Eventually, however, the company shifted directions and by that point I had reached all the audience receptive to indy wrestling I felt I could and with my relationship with much of the existing ROH fanbase being somewhat contentious, I turned the ROH weekly coverage over to the excellent John Wiswell, who was, quite frankly, one of the best columnists I’ve ever read, as well as being a human being who serves as a constant source of inspiration to this day.
Replacing ROH Weekly was my, to date, most successful venture on this site “The Wrestling Analyst.†With my own take on Eric S’s “News, Opinions, Etc†and a highlight on what was occurring within the ring around the world and why, the massive venture ended up burning me out relatively quickly and I took a leave of absence.
The leave ended up not being quite too long, however. The aforementioned Mark Allen got me a gig at the Examiner, where I took much of my wrestling coverage. I could not ever, however, leave Pulse Wrestling behind and took to a more lighthearted take, “The Wrestling Guy.†During this time I began taking a more active administrative role, learning the economics behind sites like ours (and Examiner), as well as what does the best hits and why. The results were sobering and lead to the hiatus which sees me return as the News guy, which is apparently quite the controversial move.
I say this without any malice, but the majority of wrestling fans seem to not want insight or their opinions challenged, but instead prefer news, their opinions confirmed, and superficial commentary on only what is on the surface of what they enjoy. This is logical, as a deep critique of any genre, notably film, will only be heartily embraced by a small portion of the audience, while the rest just wants to know the celebrity gossip and comes out to watch big stars and big explosions. And, honestly… why not? To each their own.
The simple fact of the matter is that people love news. This is not the new direction of Pulse Wrestling, though. News is intended as a compliment to all the great reviews and columns you’ve come to expect from Pulse Wrestling. We intend to integrate the news to be the only site you need to follow absolutely everything contemporary in the American and International wrestling scenes. If the news is something you get elsewhere, well, then continue to do so with the option of checking here, but with the Recaps, News and Columns feature on the home page, there’s never a reason to be confused as to where to find the most recent content to fill all your desires for wrestling coverage.
As for me, I’ll be continuing on with the news, but I do miss being the writer’s writer, so it’s time for something new again besides. Check back with me here each and every Tuesday for a totally new column. What you will find is a unique take on the 10 Thoughts Format. It will be 10 Thoughts on Wrestling for the Week that was. This will include full match reviews from whatever I have recently seen, quick top 10 lists, A Modest Response style analysis of other columns, anecdotes, thoughts on major news, and pretty much anything else I can think of. Hopefully this satisfies both contingents of our fanbase, from the hardcore analysis driven fans to those who just enjoy the news and having each show covered. So, the Wrestling Guy is Dead, Long Live Pulse Wrestling.
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