Hey people. It’s great to see you again, and thanks for reading my work.
I actually finished the general news portion of this column on Wednesday afternoon, leaving me plenty of time to do a very rare introductory bit. So, if you like fantasy football and music, then stick around and read what I’ve got to say; if not, skip down to The Top Story and read on.
Before we get started, let’s take a special look at what’s hot around the Pulse today.
— Will Cooling drops the knowledge on Pakistan at Moodspins. I love Moodspins and it might just be my second favorite zone here at IP, behind the wrestling zone, of course. Gotta pimp my zone, after all.
— Speaking of pimping my zone: Kevin Wilson reviews a historic New Japan show from 1998. David Ditch also brings you Issue 87 of The Puroresu Pulse. You know, I used to be a huge All Japan fan and was active in the tape trading scene; it was actually Zach Arnold who got me hooked on AJPW. I haven’t seen a single new puro match in, oh, four years or so, but I might have to start looking some stuff up on YouTube. David and Kevin make it sound interesting, and it’s at least gotta be better than North American wrestling (with the exception of Ring of Honor) right now.
— Eric uses a power outage as an excuse for missing his Tuesday column. Eric, you’re slipping; you used to come up with the most creative and entertaining excuses for missing columns, and now you’re relying on the old power outage story? I’m kidding, Eric, but here’s one thing I’m not kidding about: you should do an ECW Short Form with just pictures of Kelly. I’d bookmark that bad boy on Delicious and refer back to it whenever I need…inspiration. It’d be far more interesting than the shows (generally speaking) have been.
— And finally, Farah Syed recaps the season premiere of Veronica Mars, the best show on television. Farah, if you ever need someone to fill in on a recap for you, I’m the guy you turn to. I’m one of the biggest VM fans on the planet and would love to recap a show or two, although I can’t promise that the recap won’t end up with me simply professing my undying love for Veronica over and over again. I’m really upset that there’s no new episode next week, though. I need something to rely on after that junky Lost premiere last night. I’m just not feeling Lost this year, and that sucks, because I used to love it. I think the reason is because I truly do feel lost; I’ve invested three years into this show and I’m more confused than I’ve ever been. We need some resolve and we need some answers, or I’m going to stop watching.
THE SONIC DEATH MONKEYS
Let’s talk fantasy football. In fact, I’m going to do this every week from here on out, so if you’re interested in fantasy sports then it’ll be a special feature for you. If not, like I said, skip on down and get straight to the wrestling reporting.
I play in one Yahoo league (with custom scoring); as opposed to those of you who like to play five teams, I live and die by my one team. It’s also a money league, so there’s extra incentive for me to give it all of my attention. I subscribe to FantasyGuru.com’s excellent service, and thus far (when I’ve used the information) I’ve had a pretty good year. I ignored the data a few weeks ago and went with my gut instincts instead of playing the matchups, and lost by nearly fifty points. Of course, my opponent picked up and started Mark Brunell against the Texans, knowing full well that he’d be killing him…and kill them he did.
My team follows; actual draft picks have a * next to their names, and the rest are free agent pickups or trades.
QUARTERBACKS
Drew Bledsoe *
Chad Pennington *
RUNNING BACKS
Tiki Barber *
Joseph Addai *
Reggie Bush *
Larence Maroney
Dominic Rhodes
WIDE RECIEVERS
Donald Driver *
Terry Glenn *
Andre Johnson *
TIGHT ENDS
Ben Troupe *
KICKERS
John Hall
DEFENSE
San Diego Chargers
San Francisco 49ers
And here’s my starting lineup for this week
SONIC DEATH MONKEYS STARTING LINEUP
WEEK FIVE
QB: Drew Bledsoe
RB: Tiki Barber
RB: Joseph Addai
WR: Donald Driver
WR: Terry Glenn
FX: Laurence Maroney
TE: Ben Troupe
DEF: San Francisco
Explanations:
1. Yes, Dallas is playing Philly, but the Eagles have a very weak secondary and Dallas will be forced to pass a lot during this game. With TO trying to make a statement and drawing a lot of Eagle attention, most of the real looks will go to Terry Glenn and he’ll have another stellar game. That’s why I started Bledsoe over Pennington despite Philly being a better team.
2. Addai against Tennessee is a no-brainer, and he’ll be one of the surprises of the week. This guy is another Edgerrin James and he’s paying off for me in a big way, especially since I got him very, very late in the draft. I’m still torn on whether or not I should start Reggie Bush in the flex instead of Maroney, but Maroney is playing against Miami this week and that should mean another huge game for him. Bush will get a lot of action this week, but I don’t think he’ll be nearly as productive as Maroney will.
3. The San Francisco DEF pickup was actually just done this week, and I’ll tell you why: they are playing fracking Oakland this week, that’s why. Oakland is the worst offense in football, and they’re averaging 6.3 sacks allowed per game for weeks 1 through 4. Even though it’s San Francisco, they have a history of playing above average at home, and since they’re playing Oakland the team will be fired up. This is my sleeper start of the week, by far, and I’m counting on them to pull at least 5 sacks and score me some points, since I’m playing the only undefeated team left in our league.
IN OTHER NEWS
I’ve got a new blog, and I think you’ll like it. It’s called Soundgruve, and it’s a combination mp3/music blog where I do album reviews and spotlight cool new artists (with free mp3 downloads). Go bookmark it and keep visiting, because I put out free mp3 downloads several times a week and it’s worth a visit. Reviews of new albums from The Killers and The Decemberists are in the can and will be published shortly. You should also register for an account and start discussing music with me; the link for the registration page is on the sidebar.
I have retired from blogging about technology. I know a few of you were active readers, and I sincerely appreciate that, but keeping up with the tech industry was severely cutting into my songwriting, and since that’s how I’ll very shortly be making my living, I decided to just go ahead and leave it in the past. My current domain name will stay up for a few weeks, but then will be replaced with my official artist page.
THE TOP STORY: MAJOR WWE NAMES LEAVING SOON
The Kurt Angle story has dominated wrestling headlines (and this report) for the past month, but he’s not the only WWE star that will be gone from the company soon.
The current announcing contract of Jim Ross expires at the end of October, and there’s no interest from either WWE or Ross in signing a new deal. The story is that Ross is tired of being humiliated and knows that Vince McMahon doesn’t really want him on Raw, but doesn’t have anyone to replace him for the flagship show. Ross will likely work on a week-to-week basis, at least until they decide they want to embarrass him again, at which point he’ll probably leave and never return. He’s been devoting 90% of his time to his BBQ project, which will include both the sauce and a chain of BBQ joints that will likely originate in Oklahoma City. You can bet that Vince McMahon will continue to try and replace Ross with Mike Goldberg from UFC, so don’t count on seeing Ross as a Raw mainstay for much longer.
Ross has given the attitude that he doesn’t care about getting in trouble with McMahon or WWE, because he’s started to post some truly revealing potshots on his blog at jrsbarbq.com. The site isn’t affiliated in any way with World Wrestling Entertainment, and he’s been using the forum to reveal the truth about his feelings on WWE programming.
A few select snippets:
“Did you know that the Spirit Squad are the World Tag Team Champions? (Hey, it’s only a joke. Or is it???)”
“I still don’t know who won or lost the Gauntlet Match that DX competed in on RAW.”
“The big Monday night RAW Homecoming on October 9 will be a three hour affair, sounds like an old Lawler relationship”.
“Masters may be too one dimensional offensively as it relates to his ‘Masterlock’ and the use thereof. Masters might benefit from being in a tag team with a veteran wrestler and I am not referring to Orton.”
“This matter is really getting a great deal of feedback and may be borderline over analyzed. Kurt needed time off to deal issues he has thoroughly discussed on his own website. As I understand it the WWE and Kurt mutually agreed to release Kurt so he could heal physically and mentally and then pursue other options including coming back to the WWE if he was healthy and chose to. No one betrayed anyone here. Kurt needed to step away from the WWE and heal. It was that simple. For anyone to say Kurt was ‘held back’ is a little far fetched to me. Kurt made a ton of money in the WWE and earned a worldwide reputation. What else was he supposed to do while in the WWE? This business is about making cash, plain and simple. Kurt made big money and got famous in the WWE. He deserved all his accolades and the rewards that went with them. TNA is not going to become an overnight sensation with or without Kurt Angle. One man does not a company make. I perceive and am told that there are conflicts of interest issues in TNA but that’s hearsay because I am not there. I hope everyone in TNA are all successful and finally reach profitability.”
“I wish him the best. I have no ax to grind with Russo. We have not always agreed philosophically but that doesn’t necessarily make either of us wrong. Russo has had some excellent concepts in the past. Perhaps he can re-generate those types of ideas in TNA. Time will tell. The question is can Russo comfortably write reality based story lines and stay creatively stimulated. I think the trend is going back to in ring drama and physicality but that may just be my wishful thinking”.
In addition to Ross, Glen Jacobs (Kane) will be taking a very long hiatus from pro wrestling, so there’s your finish for the Umaga match next week. Of course, the ending of that match was never really in question to begin with, but this confirms what we already knew. He’s been talking about retiring since Wrestlemania but stuck around for the See No Evil release and also because they convinced him they had no top guys with longevity for viewers to depend on.
There’s a feeling that Jacobs will leave with the intentions of coming back, but that he’ll eventually decide to retire and not come back at all, unless it’s for special WrestleMania appearances. There’s a pretty good chance that he’ll be inducted into the Hall Of Fame simply because he’s been a model company employee. There’s zero chance that he’ll go to TNA.
Amy Dumas (Lita) will be leaving the company before the end of the year as well. Nobody’s really sure what the real reason for her departure is, but she’s telling people that she’s just tired of the road and wants to live a normal life as a normal girl. She’s saved up most of her money from her WWE tenure, so she’ll be able to live comfortably. She won’t get the Trish Stratus sendoff because of her standing as a heel, and they’ll probably do an angle similar to the one with Chris Jericho where Edge turns on her and she never gets seen or mentioned again. Nobody is assuming that she’s done for good, but she’ll be out for quite some time at a minimum.
This has already been reported, but Smackdown head writer Alex Greenfield turned in his two weeks notice last week because one of his movie projects finally received a green light in Hollywood. Greenfield joined the company in 2005 and took Dave Lagana’s place as the head writer for the show when Lagana was moved to ECW to keep an eye and snitch on Paul Heyman for Stephanie McMahon. No, I am not making this up. Greenfield actually has two movies in pre-production at this point; one is a cheesy horror flick with the most unfortunate title of Midnight Movie, and the other script has yet to be specified. Midnight Movie has actually been in production since May of 2005 and has yet to move beyond pre-production, which means they haven’t even started casting calls or hired a director or anything of that nature. In all likelihood, both of these Greenfield projects will be relegated to the Hollywood dust bin and you’ll never see them, unless someone picks them up for straight-to-DVD distribution.
Greenfield was originally hired because Stephanie liked his Hollywood background and thought he’d make for a good long-term writing team member. Greenfield and Vince McMahon were often at odds because Greenfield was not a yes-man and often fought and screamed with Vince, but in the end, Vince respected him for standing up for what he believed in and not kissing up to the boss like so many are capable of doing in WWE, and the door will be open for him to return when his two Hollywood projects flame out and die.
Greenfield was replaced by Michael Hayes, which was a surprise internally. People in the company thought that Dusty Rhodes would get the booking job because he’s been on the Smackdown team for over a year, and the fact that he wasn’t promoted has some people thinking that he’ll be gone from the company sooner rather than later.
>> WWE NOTEBOOK <<
— Talks concerning a potential nWo/DX angle are heating up within the top levels of the company. There’s a belief that DX could have a much longer shelf life if programmed against the right people, and the planned Edge/Orton vs. DX angle has been scrapped for now because Orton can’t seem to stay out of trouble. Although nobody has been contacted (and Scott Hall confirmed this in a recent interview with Wade Keller), there are people pushing hard for the Outsiders to be brought in as a new “corporate” nWo by Vince McMahon and possibly using Eric Bischoff in a management role. Nobody denies that if executed correctly, this angle could do huge money, but there are so many questions concerning the health of both Hall and Nash that it gives Vince McMahon lots of reasons not to pull the trigger. For what it’s worth, the company renewed the nWo trademark filing on September 27th, so that’s a sign that the angle is at least being considered.
— Mickie James was hurt during her match with Victoria on Monday night. The huracanrana spot was botched and she landed on her head hard enough to cause a minor neck injury, but after a few days of rest she is fine. James is being counted on to carry the Women’s division now that Stratus is gone, so there’s a pretty good chance she’ll be winning the tournament for the belt and then likely feuding with a returning Beth Phoenix.
— As far as other prospects for actual women’s wrestlers, it’s still believed in the company that Nattie Neidhart has a contract and potential huge push waiting for her whenever she’s ready to sign it. Neidhart is obviously the daughter of Jim Neidhart and is said to be the most fantastic female worker in North America today.
— Paul Wight (Big Show) had last weekend off. His knees have been giving him problems and he’s covering more miles as ECW Champion than any other WWE superstar at the moment, so they felt like he needed some rest. There are no plans to move the ECW belt from Show before December To Dismember, and even then it might not be moved. Paul Heyman has been pushing for extremely long title reigns and the story is that he wants to build up CM Punk to beat Show for the belt next year. Of course, Hulk Hogan is already talking about doing a Big Show/Hogan match at Wrestlemania to commemorate the Andre match from Wrestlemania 3, so that might throw a wrench into those plans. The thing with the Hogan/Show match is that it’s been seen a thousand times already, and there’s nothing Hogan can do that would in any way be momentous enough to promote this match. Not only is Hogan horribly disabled, but bodyslamming Show isn’t really a big event when guys like John Cena and Brock Lesnar have done much more impressive moves with him.
— Brooke Hogan’s single “About Us”, originally thought to be dead in the water, has actually started to catch on radio in some major markets.
— The company had actually been trying to fire Justin Credible for two weeks, but haven’t been able to get in contact with him in any form or fashion. Some believe Credible was ducking phone calls and emails in order to keep a paycheck coming in, so they finally faxed him a termination letter. Vince McMahon was a big Credible fan at the beginning of the ECW launch, but things went downhill very quickly from there and it was only a matter of time before they fired him.
— Bob Holly will likely sit out of in-ring action for a few more weeks to let that nasty cut that required 24 stitches on his back fully heal. Holly recently recovered from a horrible staph infection and the company isn’t taking chances with him bleeding on anyone and causing an epidemic. For what it’s worth, Rob Van Dam hasn’t gotten sick and he’s been checked up by a doctor on a regular basis, so all signs point to everything being okay, but they still aren’t taking chances.
— Byte This returns on Saturday with a special interview with Vince McMahon. No one is sure if they’re going to keep the show going, but Michael Cole is pushing for it to become a weekly “shoot” show that he would host. Cole has a reputation for being a hothead when not on Smackdown, and the feeling is that he wants to do this show to toughen up, at least to the hardcore fans, the image he has on Smackdown.
— Lance Storm will be featuring The Death of WCW (by Bryan Alvarez) as his latest entry in his Book Marks club. Storm was also scheduled to begin training Dallas Hart (Bret’s son), but Dallas had some scheduling conflicts and so will begin training in January. Everyone who has seen Dallas says he’s got “the look” and “it”, both of which means he’ll get hired by Vince as soon as he graduates from Lance’s school.
>> TNA NOTEBOOK <<
— The current plan being discussed for the main event picture after Bound For Glory would have Kurt Angle beating Jeff Jarrett for the NWA Title, and then likely turning heel for a long program with Samoa Joe. TNA realizes that Angle vs. Joe is probably the biggest money program they have, and while they won’t rush directly into it, they will definitely be building towards that match for sometime in mid 2007. Jarrett and others realize that Joe has been damaged, and that a program with him chasing a heel Angle for the belt could both draw new viewers and more PPV buys than the company has ever been able to pull. Sting will also transition into a program with Christian; they believe that Christian is simply lacking a big win over an established legend to help him get over the dry spell he’s going through.
— UFC was in the final stages of putting together a Kurt Angle vs. Daniel Puder fight when TNA signed Angle. It had gotten to the point where Dana White had sent contracts to both Angle’s camp and Puder for a February fight, but then Angle signed with TNA. In fairness, Kurt did personally call Dana White to tell him he was signing with TNA, but there’s still a very strong possibility of that fight happening in 2007. Angle seems determined to do at least one big money UFC fight and nobody has been able to convince him that it would be a very, very bad idea for him to do pro wrestling and attempt to train for UFC at the same time.
— Also in post-Bound For Glory plans is a huge push for Eric Young, who will likely enter into a program with Jarrett. Young has been one of the few huge surprises TNA has in that he’s home-grown and the fans absolutely love him, and they didn’t really even do anything to make things that way. Jarrett is extremely high on Young and wants to make him a main event player, or at the very least someone who is both entertaining as a character and a threat in the ring. They’re starting to subtly hint in this direction, and there’s a pretty good chance that the Jarrett/Young program will start once Jarrett loses the belt to Kurt Angle.
— TNA has booked two matches for the October 25th 18,000 seat Arena Monterrey show. Jeff Jarrett will be facing Eric Young for the NWA title and Kurt Angle will make his in-ring debut for the company in facing Christian. Angle wasn’t going to be booked, but the Monterrey promoters desperately wanted Angle and Angle agreed because he’s probably going to sell an extra 5,000 or more tickets for the show. There’s been no mention of the Arena Monterrey show on TNA’s website OR the Arena Monterrey site, so we’ll see if the show actually happens or not. TNA traditionally has horrible luck when it comes to anything related to Mexico, so it’ll be a stroke of luck if it goes off as planned.
— Kevin Nash is done with the company. There had been a lot of interest in re-signing him before the X-Division angle debacle, but Nash was directly blamed for the failure of the angle and thus Jeff Jarrett lost all interest in maintaining a working relationship with him. Nash has told others within the company that he really wanted the angle to work, but injuries kept it from playing out the way they originally intended. In the beginning, Nash was playing a huge part in designing the storyline, and the plan in the end was for Nash to put over Chris Sabin at Bound For Glory and elevate Sabin to a main event position. The catch was that Nash’s contract was set to expire before Bound For Glory actually happened, but he kept reassuring Jarrett and others that he was in the company for the long haul and wanted the angle to work, and they believed him. Most now believe it’s complete hogwash and that Nash intentionally sabotaged the angle in order to keep himself looking good when he realized there might be a chance for one last WWE run. Jarrett and others do not believe that there’s any interest from WWE in Nash and that he has essentially ended his career as a mainstream worker, but there’s no sources stating either way from WWE’s side.
— Vince Russo began writing television at the Impact tapings. He’s not really in charge of the writing team until they finish up the storylines leading into Bound For Glory, but after that he’s going to act as the main booker. It’s a three man team with Jeff Jarrett and Dutch Mantell, and Jarrett and Mantell are pretty much one and the same, so if Russo comes up with an idea that Jeff doesn’t like, it’s believed that Mantell will concur and kill the idea. They’re going to let Russo script the shows and then meet with Jarrett and Mantell to go over specifics and cancel any bad ideas he has, but the feeling within the company is that Russo is actually going to book a more traditional style of pro wrestling focusing on treating the matches as athletic competitions, mostly because he knows that the Crash TV style he invented in the 1990’s isn’t revolutionary anymore and won’t work with TNA because they have neither the talent or the production to pull it off. It remains to be seen whether or not any of this will actually happen, of course, but Russo has been getting nothing but praise from TNA workers and office folks.
— Sting’s deal expires next week, but they are confident he’ll sign a new contract. In fact, the deal might already be done by the time you read this, but we don’t know when they’ll announce it. He’ll be making the same money but will work less dates, which seems impossible when you consider how little TNA works as it is. TNA is also starting to offer bonuses (much like WWE and UFC) based on the buyrates, match position and gate for each show. The first contract to feature this was Kurt Angle’s deal, but Sting will likely have the same thing, as will anybody else who signs a new contract with the company. This gives younger guys more of an incentive to work harder to get themselves over and move up the card, because there’s a feeling right now that nobody really cares about moving up beyond where they’re at because it’s not going to help them compete with WWE.
— Dixie Carter is still trying to bring in both Chris Jericho and Bill Goldberg. With Jericho, they’re trying really hard to get him to sign, but he’s going to be a tough sell because he has a relationship with WWE where he could come back to be full time at any moment, or he could just show up for special matches like Mick Foley. For his part, Jericho is interested in TNA because it’s a new challenge and the schedule is so much easier. Goldberg was considered to be a done deal, but the hiring of Vince Russo pretty much nixed any interest Goldberg had in coming to the company. The feeling is that Goldberg will wait it out for a few months and see how Russo handles Angle and the writing for television and then make a decision.
— Dixie Carter actually pulled Jeff Jarrett aside and asked him to rank Kurt Angle, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Bill Goldberg, Chris Jericho and Chris Benoit in order of who would be the most beneficial to the company at this point in time.
>> THE CLOSER <<
As always, I’d like to say thank you (again) for reading my report each week. It’s always a real pleasure to correspond with those of you who have been nice enough to email me with comments about the report, and I encourage any of you with questions, comments or concerns to drop me a line. I appreciate each and every one of you who takes a little time out of your day to read my writing, and I hope you’ve found it to be both enlightening and enjoyable.
See you next week.
Sources for this report include Bryan Alvarez’s Figure Four Weekly Newsletter. For $6.95 a month, you get access to the weekly newsletter, plus excellent audio shows featuring Bryan, his buddy Vince, and others. It’s worth every penny. My own sources are also used.
