News From Cook's Corner 09.16.09

Posted by Steve Cook on 09.16.2009

Nothing is work unless you'd rather be doing something else.

Hi everybody! I am on vacation this week and had originally decided to take the week off from my duties here at 411 as well. However, it seems that nobody on the 411 staff can replace the Main Attraction. I suppose they feel they'll fall into the same trap as the poor sap that replaced Jay Leno on the Tonight Show. Speaking of which, why do people think Jay Leno is funny? I saw him trying to be funny on the Bears vs. Packers halftime show and I hadn't seen anybody bomb that badly since Stephen Randle's appearance on Canadian Idol. Poor Stephen should have known that nobody sings "My Heart Will Go On" like Celine Dion.

It's been a pretty good vacation so far, highlighted by victories for both of my fantasy football teams and the greatest comeback of all time by my fantasy baseball team. A-Roid's Madams were down 12-4 heading into play on Sunday, but somehow thanks to the play of such people as Nate McLouth, Pedro Martinez and others, they pulled ahead to win 9-6 after having trailed by no less than four runs the whole week. It was an amazing performance by the Madams that sends them into the league semi-finals. Of course, the identity of my opponent in the thrilling comeback made it all that much sweeter…



Awwwwwwwwww, poor Penguin. Oh well, at least he has his Southeast Missouri State football team to kee-oh, what's that? Yeah, I saw them lose 70-3 to Cincinnati a few days ago. Whoops. That would have been a complete waste of time if not for the college girls in attendance. Man, do I miss college. This is probably the part where I should antagonize the Kentucky fans that read my columns about how my Louisville Cardinals are gonna kick their football team's asses on Saturday, but…yeah, that's not gonna happen and I'm not even going to pretend like it could. So I'll just hang my hat on my fantasy successes and move on to the wrestling column…



This week's edition of News From Cook's Corner does not feature late-breaking Tuesday news because I spent most of Tuesday away from the computer. I am confident that the 411 Newswire will have any important news that you need to know about on it. It does feature a picture with Trish Stratus and rope, so hopefully you all will forgive me.



Ah…the Montreal Screwjob.

Is there a topic of conversation that hasn't been beaten further into the ground?

WWE wishes we would get over it…at least that's what the announcers always say whenever they hold a show north of the border. Honestly, I don't disagree with the announcers. It's been twelve years. I don't know about you, but I don't hold any grudges against people for things that they did to me in 1997. I guess my pain would have been stronger had it been captured on live PPV television in front of tens of thousands of people in an arena and millions watching around the world, but once a certain amount of time passes I tend to let things go.

Wrestling fans usually have short memories. This delights wrestling promoters because they can run the same angles and do the same gimmicks every few years or so since wrestling fans won't remember the last time. They either weren't watching or have consumed too much alcohol since the last time it happened to remember. But, they sure do remember what happened in Montreal.

You know why?

Because WWE won't let them forget about it. Every time they go to Canada you get Shawn Michaels and Triple H playing off of the heat they get up there, some authority figure screwing some babyface out of a victory, and wrestling announcers screaming at the Canadian fans about just letting the Montreal thing die already.

I think they'd be willing to…if WWE would let it die.

Personally, I could care less whether they keep wanting to reenact the Montreal Screwjob or not. My major qualm with it is that it's lazy booking. I suppose some were surprised with how it was used in the CM Punk/Undertaker match, but you knew they had to do something so Punk would retain the title and Undertaker wouldn't submit. I mean, God forbid Undertaker submits to somebody or CM Punk has yet another short title reign to fit in with his collection of them.

Of course, I would have had Bryan Danielson & Nigel McGuinness run down and beat up Undertaker, costing him the match. So what the hell do I know…

In actual wrestling news, longtime WWE employee Carl De Marco left the company last week. De Marco had been the president of WWE Canada and had pretty much been in charge of WWE's affairs in Canada for what seemed like forever, so his leaving apparently came as a surprise to a lot of people. I can pretty much guarantee his leaving had nothing to do with the Montreal Screwjob.

WWE has been cutting loose some developmental talent lately. Four wrestlers I've never heard of were released over the weekend…one presumes this is to make room for guys like Danielson & McGuinness. Perhaps they'll let Dragon use the name "Fletcher Chase" or "Aiden Frost", since those are now available.

The date of the Royal Rumble has been changed to avoid conflict with the NFL league championship games, Super Bowl and preseason. It's a smart move on WWE's part, because the NFL eats into the ratings of anything in its path. Ask TNA, whose ratings for Impact took quite the tumble last week due to being up against the NFL's opening game. Or ROH, whose ratings for their show on HDNet took quite the tumble when they went up against the NFL Schedule Release show.

The Make-A-Wish Foundation will honor John Cena at the 20th annual Chris Greicus Celebrity Awards. I remember reading somewhere that Cena had granted more wishes than almost anybody, which I wouldn't dare crack a joke about. I gotta say though, my Make-A-Wish request probably wouldn't involve John Cena. In fact, it'd probably involve something I can't talk about in a family column with one of the Divas. Perhaps my perspective would change if I was terminally ill.

Batista is headed to Smackdown because the brand needs some star power. Well, I suppose it's a good idea in theory, but I don't know what they'll do in a month when he's hurt again.

The next three-hour edition of Raw will be taking place on November 23 in Hershey, PA. The Titans & Texans go at it on Monday Night Football…if Houston's performance against the Jets is any indication that shouldn't be much of a game.

Linda McMahon should make her US Senate intentions known sometime today. With Linda's speaking style that means we'll know whether she's running or not on Friday.

There has been no new Jeff Hardy news since Sunday, and I have nothing to say on the issue that other people haven't already said. There was one thing Hardy said in response to all of his problems that kind of made me wonder though…

"The media is the media, I wish they would at least report the story correctly & accurately. I will make a statement later."

Yup, Hardy went with the old "blame the media" card to avoid taking responsibility for his actions (and by the way, that statement he promised later hasn't been made as of this writing). Listen, I am a 100% believer in "innocent until proven guilty" and have neither the time nor the patience to delve into Jeff Hardy's issues. Honestly, I don't care. What bothers me is his attempt to blame everybody except himself, who is the person who got him into this mess.

He chose to be a professional wrestler. One assumes he knew that there would be a lot of pain involved, especially with the style he likes to use in his matches. If he had to turn to painkillers and ended up getting addicted to them…that's his fault. Nobody put a gun to his head and told him he had to do the crazy stuff he did in most of his matches. He didn't have to do swantons off of ladders, didn't have to fly off balconies, and he didn't have to take other stupid bumps if he didn't want to. He could have easily made a living in wrestling without these things…or he could have made a living doing something else.

I know Jeff Hardy loves his fans and wanted to do anything he could to entertain them. There comes a point in time where you have to put your own personal welfare ahead of everybody else's. If they're really your fans, they'll understand.

All the media did in this case was repeat what the police told them. Unless Hardy wants to claim that the police is wrong, I think he might want to calm down on the "blame everybody else" front. Maybe he has and that's why we haven't heard much from him in the last few days. Smart move on his part.



Christopher Daniels was reportedly not punished for his recent DUI, which this observer expected due to Kurt Angle not getting punished for all of his recent legal problems. Of course, this sets a horrible precedent. Expect more arrests in the TNA locker room and Jeff Hardy to show up in a few months.

Fortunately for Angle & TNA, he was found not guilty of the charges surrounding Rhaka Khan a couple of months ago. The charges surrounding the HGH found in his car and driving with a suspended license were dropped, which basically means that the Pittsburgh PD didn't feel like investigating the matter. With football season starting, their time will likely be tied up throwing drunken Steeler fans in jail anyway.

Taz is reportedly gaining power backstage, as he's helped with agent/producer duties and is also having some input into TNA Creative. If he's the one who suggested Styles vs. Sabin & Styles vs. Williams two weeks ago, I highly approve of more Taz involvement.

Traci Brooks' Playboy Cyber Club pictures debut on their website tomorrow. She seems pretty excited about it, and I would be too if somebody would pay me to take my clothes off.

Jenna Morasca is not happy with the way TNA let her go. I wasn't happy with the way they hired her. Seriously though, I can't really defend TNA on this if what she told The Sun about them firing her while she was with her boyfriend who's getting treatment for cancer is true. That's not a good way to do business.



Hulk Hogan has been all over the news lately. He'll be touring Australia in late November with the "Hulkamania: Let the Battle Begin" tour, which will reportedly feature all sorts of big wrestling names not signed with WWE or TNA. Names mentioned include Diamond Dallas Page, Ken Anderson, Umaga, Val Venis….and Ric Flair. Well, if anybody would need the money, it'd certainly be Flair. No word yet on if the future Mrs. Cook, Trishelle Cannatella will be on the tour or not.

Apparently Hogan & Eric Bischoff have had this idea for an international touring company for years, but it was easier for Hogan to commit to it once he got divorced and needed the money. Flair, of course, has had bad blood with Bischoff for years, but money talks.

Hogan's also in the news because he's suing some lawyers that overcharged for their services. Yeah, that's never happened before.

ROH is flip-flopping a bunch of stuff due to Tyler Black not being able to compete this weekend in Dayton & Chicago. So far all the changes seem to make the Chicago show better and the Dayton show worse. This is about as surprising as lawyers overcharging for services.

Roster Talk!

In this brand new feature to News From Cook's Corner, I will go through the roster of a wrestling promotion/WWE brand and tell you what I think about each wrestler. Pretty self-explanatory, right? We'll start with the brand watched by the most people…



Alicia Fox – Alicia falls into the category of people I have absolutely no opinion on. She's had no major feuds, no promo time and has done little in the ring that looks like she'll be better than your typical WWE Diva. Maybe if they do something with her I'll have an opinion, but until then I've got nothing. I like her new finishing move.

Batista – The man is over, I'll give him that. People love him. But I am not "people", so I'll say that he doesn't really have anything going for him other than his physique. He has a certain amount of charisma, but that's pretty much cancelled out by the fact that I can't remember the last good Batista match I watched. I don't complain about him too much because he always gets hurt and is never on television very long.

Beth Phoenix – She's as good as it gets on the Diva side of things…which means she might crack the bottom of my top 10 current women wrestlers list. She doesn't have a lot to work with on the babyface side of things, so you gotta give her credit for getting something out of Kelly Kelly occasionally.

Big Dick Johnson – One of the reasons I'm not mad about WWE going PG.

Big Show – I like Show when he's in good shape and motivated. Unfortunately the former doesn't happen very often. His matches with Mark Henry lately have been Must-Miss TV.

Carlito – Worlds of ability, no desire to use any of it. When he starts caring, so will I.

Chavo Guerrero – I'm honestly surprised he still has a job. People love to complain about Chavo jobbing to midgets and getting beat up by senior citizens, but that sort of thing is usually what older luchadors end up doing. Besides, did you see the look on his face when he got beat up by Bob Barker? He was having fun. So don't cry for Chavo.

Chris Masters – I like Masters. He seems like a nice kid and wants to improve his game, but he's going to need to show me something or I'll wonder why they brought him back.

Cody Rhodes – Cody has shown flashes of charisma, but his in-ring work is nothing special and he hasn't established himself as more than a Randy Orton flunky yet. I'm glad that DX wants to put somebody over, but both Rhodes & Dibiase need to show that they're more than sons of favorite wrestlers if they're going to be the stars that WWE wants them to be.

Evan Bourne – My Evan Bourne fandom is well documented, as I've been pimping the guy since he was in ROH wrestling at the Montgomery County Fairgrounds. While I feel that Raw probably isn't the best place for him to showcase what he can do, it's cool that WWE wants to have him on their most important show.

Festus - …Is he still around? He's listed on the roster page. I never saw anything in Festus or Fake Kane (his previous persona), so I'm not exactly counting the days until he returns.

Gail Kim – I loved Gail in TNA, but she really hasn't done anything since her return to WWE and has looked downright awful in some of her recent outings (Not appearance-wise…you know what I mean). I guess this just shows how good Awesome Kong is.

Hacksaw Jim Duggan – I like Hacksaw. I don't want to see him on my television in 2009, but he was good fun back in the early 90s.

Hornswoggle – I have no use for Hornswoggle and his midget comedy. I'm sure the kids love him and there are plenty of Internet people who like his antics, but I don't have time for them.

Jack Swagger – As I've said in my contribution to the Rs column, I think Swagger has all of the tools to be a big deal in WWE. He's got the size, the ability and the charisma…his main problem might be his amateur background, as WWE has had some bad luck with those guys in recent history (Angle, Lesnar, Lashley). Hopefully WWE hasn't been too jaded by those guys and is willing to give the All-American American a chance. His entrance is so goofy that it's cool.

Jamie Noble – Noble was great in his run on the independent scene in 2005, and he had some good stuff on Smackdown back in 03-04 when he was doing the gimmick with Nidia. He's done absolutely nothing of note since returning to WWE, which you can't entirely blame on him, but it's always a pleasant surprise to see Noble on WWE television.

Jerry Lawler – Lawler is a god in my region of the country. The Memphis promotion had television in most of Kentucky during the heyday, and anybody who's anybody in the Kentucky wrestling scene right now grew up watching Lawler and were inspired by him to get into the wrestling business. So he can do whatever he wants on commentary and it's all good as far as I'm concerned.

Jillian – Speaking of my region of the country, Jillian Hall is from Ashland, KY and trained with my buddies at the Northern Wrestling Federation. She looked a lot different back then. I'm not a big fan of the singing gimmick but it's a lot better than the mole thing she started with, so more power to her.

John Cena – I don't love Cena. I don't hate Cena. He's just kind of there to me, really. I don't get a lot of drama out of his feuds because there's never any doubt who's going to ultimately come out on top. But, I don't think he's a terrible wrestler like a lot of people do. His promos are hit or miss, they were a lot better when he was younger and the writers weren't paying as much attention to him. I don't hate the fact that he's constantly pushed on top, but he doesn't make me want to watch their shows.

Kelly Kelly – Kelly has improved, but not nearly as much as some would like you to believe. At least she's moved up in the world and is now dating actors instead of wrestlers.

Kofi Kingston – I talked about my confusion with Kofi's popularity in the Rs this week…it's not that I dislike Kofi or anything, I just don't really get what he's done to win two secondary titles and don't know how he got so popular. Good for him, but I don't see it.

Lilian Garcia – I'll miss her. People complain about her screwing things up sometimes, but look at the people she has to take direction from. I wouldn't say she's as good a ring announcer as Howard Finkel, Gary Michael Capetta or the guy who used to do the JCP ring announcing in the 80s, but she's decent enough and seems like good people.

Mark Henry – Misark's grown on me over the years. It seemed like he was on the verge of really getting over when he beat Orton on his first night on Raw, but then somebody decided that wasn't supposed to happen and his push got quieted down. Hopefully he gets more of a chance soon, because I loved that thing he did where he raised his arms up and down in unison with the crowd. He needs to stop wearing that red singlet he's been wearing lately…he looks like the Western Kentucky University mascot when he wears that thing.

Maryse – The girl has potential, even if Manu Bumb despises her. I just hope he didn't scar the poor lass. Anyway, Maryse seems to have a natural heel charisma about her, though her in-ring work could use some work it wouldn't take much for her to become one of the top in-ring WWE Divas.

Michael Cole – Cole's not exactly Gordon Solie, Bob Caudle or Lance Russell, but that's not what WWE wants him to be. He needs to be an overexcited laughing goof, and he seems to do that well enough.

Mickie James – Sigh, Mickie's half the girl she used to be. I like Mickie, her in-ring skills are probably overrated a little bit…as she usually blows at least one spot per match, but there aren't many Divas currently better at the wrestling aspect of the game. She needs to go back to wearing skirts.

MVP – I've never really gotten the Internet hype around MVP…even during the celebrated series with Benoit in 2007 he never really impressed me that much. His in-ring work is decent, his promos are ok but nothing special, and I don't see him getting to the main-event level. I hear people put him over as a "young star"…he's 35 years old so I don't know where they get that talking point from. Young compared to Bob Barker, I suppose.

Mr. McMahon – Vince is listed on the Raw roster for some reason. He's less annoying when he's not on television every week…when he is, I usually end up reaching for the remote. Obviously he's one of the greatest sports-entertainment characters of all time, but the character is well past its prime.

Primo – He seems more motivated than his brother, so that's a good thing. I don't see him ever being a top guy or anything like that, but he could be a decent mid-card babyface for many years.

Randy Orton – Randy has phases where he's very interesting, but he also has phases where he's very dull. It's tough to explain. I think the Internet would like him not to be a chickenshit heel, so they get pissed when he does chickenshit things and gets treated like a bitch…but that's what his character is. He does have good music now, so that's a good thing.

Rosa Mendes – Rosa falls into the same category as Alicia Foz…somebody I haven't seen do enough to form an opinion on. She wasn't the best in-ring worker in her OVW days, but she seems to have improved a little since then. Possibly.

Santino Marella – I think my feelings toward Santino are pretty much public record by this point. I do like him more in the comedic babyface that interacts with the Raw guest host every week role.

Shawn Michaels – I give Shawn a lot more leeway than a lot of people on the Internet. In his prime, he was probably the best in-ring performer that I've ever seen. The guy could bump like nobody else, he had great-looking offense, had good charisma…there are few that have been on the level that HBK was in the mid-90s. Some have taken issue with the quality that he's produced during his comeback, but I don't see the complaint. From where I sit he's one of the greatest of all time.

Ted DiBiase – Which one? Junior's somebody that the office is really high on, and he's shown flashes of brilliance. He had a match with Cena on an episode of Superstars that impressed me. He's still got the stink of somebody who only has his spot because of his daddy, but he has the potential to prove himself. I wouldn't say he's that much better than Cody Rhodes right now, though.

The Miz – Miz is a great heel because I think it'd be impossible to actually like the guy. He started the trend of douchebag male reality TV stars and still portrays the character well in 2009. People thought that getting jobbed out to Cena and getting banned from Summerfest would hurt him, but I'm more concerned about what his changing from wrestling in shorts to a banana hammock will do for his career. Did he really need to look like Chris Jericho 2.0 or something?

Triple H – I'm torn on the H's. On the one hand, he's married to the bosses' daughter and therefore doesn't need to do anything ever and will still be main-eventing shows thirty years from now. When he's on TV a lot, it does get a bit tiresome. But…if it wasn't him, it would be somebody else. When motivated and in shape, Triple H is a solid wrestler that's good at working the WWE main-event style. That's really all you can ask from a Raw main-eventer, right? I do enjoy his wacky DX work better than his mean and nasty heel persona, which was rather stale when he retired it.

And there's the Raw roster! Next time we'll cover Smackdown, which I imagine will be a more positive outlook…well damn it, Batista will be on that list too. I'll just skip him then, ok?



Talk of pro wrestling titles is something I gave up on a long time ago, but Peters' article is actually interesting even though I really don't care if the WCW title = the World title on Smackdown. For all I care, they could say that the World title goes back to the days of David vs. Goliath.

Gun goes off on Undertaker's booking and Harvey Wippleman. I wonder whatever happened to ol' Downtown Bruno, he was a funny guy, or so Mick Foley's stories indicate. Hey Gun, you were getting your masters degree when I was 8 years old and didn't even know what a "chick" was or how to buy her a drink…feel old yet?

Hell, who am I kidding, I still don't want to buy drinks. They're expensive, yo.

Hubbard puts way too much thought into a match that lasted eight minutes.

Ari rips off my old Saturday news column name. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

Dunn reviews the Rise & Fall of WCW, which I also watched recently. The documentary is kind of disappointing…though it's cool to hear from Jim Crockett Jr. & Goldberg, most of the other comments are re-hashed old stuff, and the story is nothing new. Now the matches…hoo boy, that's what you buy the set for. You've got some Flair, some Andersons and some Midnight Express…speaking of which, my boy Kenny Bolin has plenty of great videos from that particular era that would be great for your viewing. Check him out.

Finally, your AJ Grey article of the week. I dunno, the ridiculousness of a girl yawning being newsworthy makes it top-notch stuff. And I'm a Dushku fan, so there you go.

Well, I'm off to see Metallica! Got ROH later in the week, so it'll be a good week here at the Corner. JP Prag is in tomorrow, and I'll be back here next week with more News From Cook's Corner!