The Bell To Bell News Report 01.16.10

Posted by Randy Harrison on 01.16.2010

Lots of news, lots of shows, lots of opinions....click on in for the entire week of wrestling in one convenient column!




Howdy folks, and welcome in again to the latest edition of your weekend news fix, the Bell To Bell! A bit of a slower week this week when it came to the news (at least in terms of wrestling as it seems like all hell broke loose in the rest of the world), but there's still plenty to talk about as we've got my usual take on the weekly programs, potential legal troubles for Randy Orton, Tyler Reks possibly committing career suicide on a WWE flight, Stone Cold Steve Austin returning to the WWE, THE Brian Kendrick showing he needs to lay off of THE hippie lettuce and lots more. Now that I think about it, it wasn't necessarily that slow a news week, it was just a week where nothing big happened so it felt like there was less going on. Either way, we're jam-packed this week as always, so let's stop with the chitter chatter and let's get at 'er!


You know the drill...





Ding Ding....











Monday Night Raw Results:

Kelly Kelly vs. Alicia Fox - Winner: Alicia Fox (pinfall, powerbomb)
Legacy vs. Evan Bourne and Mark Henry - Winners: Legacy (pinfall, Rhodes' Cross-Rhodes on Bourne)
Over The Top Rope Challenge: Jack Swagger vs. Santino Marella - Winner: Santino Marella
Randy Orton vs. Kofi Kingston vs. John Cena - Winner: Randy Orton (pinfall, RKO on Kingston)
Eve Torres vs. Katie Lea Burchill - Winner: Eve Torres (pinfall, roll-up)
D-Generation X vs. Chris Jericho and Mike Tyson - Winners: D-Generation X (pinfall, Tyson's knockout swerve)


Unfortunately, I actually missed Raw this week as I'm still trying to get the hang of my new DVR system and for whatever reaason, Raw didn't actually record for me when it was supposed to. In a piece of good news though, my episode of The Big Bang Theory recorded without incident, meaning that at least part of my Monday night wasn't ruined. The rest of the week was just too busy for me to be able to find any other way to watch the show and as is my policy, I don't talk about shows I don't watch, so I'll be back to talking about Raw next week when Bret Hart is supposed to return, presumably to confront Vince McMahon about his nutshot a couple of weeks ago. I'll be back into my Raw report then, so check back in next week for my thoughts on the WWE's flagship program.






ECW on SyFy Results:

Zack Ryder vs. The Hurricane - Winner: Zack Ryder (pinfall, Zack Attack)
Goldust vs. Trent Barreta - Winner: Trent Baretta (pinfall, leg lariat)
ECW Homecoming Battle Royal: CM Punk, Matt Hardy, Kane, Ezekiel Jackson, Shelton Benjamin, Yoshi Tatsu, Vance Archer and Evan Bourne - Winner: Ezekiel Jackson (last eliminated Kane)


The ECW Homecoming came to a close this week on ECW on SyFy with a bang as a new number one contender to the ECW Championship was crowned in the Homecoming Battle Royal. Before we get there though, let's look at the rest of the show, beginning with the match between Zack Ryder and The Hurricane. This one started out with a talky segment between the two with Ryder playing up his retirement of Tommy Dreamer and Hurricane just kind of insulting him. They built it pretty well with the segment and the match itself was pretty good, but the ending was kind of nasty with Hurricane getting brought down off the top rope awkwardly before Ryder hit him with the Zack Attack for the pin. It looks like they're getting behind Ryder a lot more after he ended up kind of aimless for a few weeks and I'm interested to see where they're going to go with him from here.

Next up on the docket was a singles match featuring one of Team Generic, Trent Barreta, taking on Goldust. Barreta did a decent job in this one and Goldust is a pro that's capable of putting together a passable match with anyone, but this one wasn't that much better than what Barreta has been putting on with his partner Caylen Croft. The more I see of these two, I'm just not convinced that they were completely ready to be brought up to the main roster. A little more time in developmental would do wonders for both of them as they just don't look like they're going to last if they keep going the way that they're going. This one was alright, but when alright is the best that you can say after they've had a couple of months worth of matches on TV, that's not good.

Finally, we got to the Homecoming Battle Royal to determine the new challenger for Christian's ECW Championship. Like most people, I thought that CM Punk winning the match and actually getting to have something to do for a while in feuding with Christian would have been the best bet, but that's not how it ultimately went. In the end, Kane was eliminated by Ezekiel Jackson and Big Zeke became the new number one contender in a bit of a shocker. Jackson has had some issues in singles matches against Vladimir Kozlov so I'm not terribly optomistic for how this is going to turn out when he and Christian finally meet up. That's tempered by the reports from the house shows they've wrestled at have their matches going fairly good, which gives me some hope. When you add in that Regal is going to be at ringside, there's a little more reason to think that this might be halfway decent. There's not a ton else to say about this one because all battle royals are pretty much the same, but in terms of battle royals this one was solid.





WWE Superstars Results:

Primo and Gail Kim vs. Chavo Guerrero and Jillian Hall - Winners: Primo and Gail Kim (pinfall, Primo rolls up Chavo)
Carlito vs. Chris Masters - Winner: Chris Masters (submission, Masterlock)
Jimmy Wang Yang and Slam Master J vs. Mike Knox and Charlie Haas - Winners: Jimmy Wang Yang and Slam Master J (pinfall, Yang's moonsault on Haas)
Christian vs. William Regal - Winner: Christian (pinfall, Killswitch)

This week's Superstars show was a bit of a mixed bag as the first three-quarters of the show fell a little flat before an excellent main event saved it from being a complete disaster. The opening mixed tag bout was a bit of a snoozer for me and I didn't really care too much for it. Gail has been pretty much forgotten since she's come over to WWE from TNA and in my opinion it's starting to show in her wrestling as she looked a little bored if I'm being honest. There was nothing overtly bad about this, it was just kind of there and that's not a terribly good thing.

The Carlito/Chris Masters match was a little bit of the same thing with both guys seeming to be going through the motions a little bit. At least Masters has the face turn going for him to where he had a little bit of fire throughout the bout, but that's not much to hang your hat on. Remember when Primo and Carlito were a successful tag team that seemed to be on their way to becoming a big part of the WWE roster? Yeah, apparently the WWE's booking team doesn't either as Primo is all but forgotten and Carlito is as good as released. I don't really know what they're planning to do with Masters either as he's not really over enough to enter into the US Title mix at this point. I guess he'll just keep touring the circuit and collecting a paycheck, which isn't the worst thing in the world these days.

The tag match up next was actually a bit of a surprise as I thought sure that Knox would destroy one of if not both Slam Master J and Wang Yang, but they managed to survive and thrive, pulling the upset after they pinned poor Charlie Haas. Haas seemingly can't buy a win these days and it's a shame because he's shown in the past that he's technically capable of putting on great matches. He's also shown that he can be entertaining as he was when he was channeling other gimmicks like Bret "The Hitman" Haas or whatever it all was. He just can't seem to put it all together and that's a real shame. If I don't miss my guess, I'd expect to see Knox turning on Haas sometime soon and we'll see that match on Superstars in a few weeks. Wang Yang and J have a little bit of momentum now, but let's be serious. They're not going to be Unified Tag Champs or anything, but it was nice to see them get a little moment in the sun.

All of those adequate matches were just appetizers for the main course though as Christian and William Regal met in the main event in a non-title match. This one was exactly what you'd expect from two professionals like Regal and Christian and had the extra added bonus of having newly-named ECW Championship number one contender Ezekiel Jackson at ringside. Jackson got himself ejected, meaning that the majority of the match was Regal and Christian one-on-one and that was a real treat. Regal continues to bring it with quality efforts, even at this late stage in his career, and Christian is really starting to show that he's ready to make the move to either Raw or Smackdown to start injecting himself into the main event scene. If he's able to put together a really good WrestleMania match, I think that would just put him over the top.





TNA Impact Results:

The Motor City Machine Guns vs. Generation Me - Winners: Generation Me (pinfall, 450 splash/moonsault combo on Shelley)
The Beautiful People vs. Hamada and Awesome Kong - Winners: Hamada and Awesome Kong (pinfall, Kong's Awesome Bomb on Rayne)
Team 3D vs. Lethal Consequences - Winners: Team 3D (pinfall, 3-D on Creed)
Beer Money Inc. vs Hernandez and Matt Morgan - Winners: Hernandez and Matt Morgan (disqualification, Big Roberference)
Desmond Wolfe vs. Samoa Joe - Winner: Desmond Wolfe (pinfall, Tower of London)
TNA World Heavyweight Championship: Tomko vs. AJ Styles - Winner: AJ Styles (pinfall, Pele kick)


After last week's historic and somewhat frenetic Monday night show, Impact returned to Thursday night this week with their regularly taped program and the show, while MUCH less in need of Ritalin than their live effort, was still a pretty hit and miss affair with the hits being big ones and the misses being just as big.

One of the big hits for me came right out of the gate as the artists formerly known as the Young Bucks made their TNA debut as Generation Me against the Motor City Machine Guns. Both teams looked fantastic in this one, despite it being a somewhat shortened version of what a great match should be, but the Bucks really proved something with their effort in their first match for one of the "Big Two" promotions. I loved their tandem work and the finish with the 450 splash into the moonsault was great. I am looking forward to seeing a lot more of them in the coming weeks and I hope that they get a chance to shine at the Genesis PPV in an opening match or something because they could really tear the house down given fifteen or twenty minutes.

That good was tempered with the bad of having more of the Nasty Boys/Team 3D nonsense from last Monday continuing on this week's episode as the two teams got into a war of words and Team 3D took back control of their locker room with the help of a trusty ax. Of course, that ended up leading to a beatdown from the Nasties, which looked about as good as you'd think a team of bloated fifty-year olds laying a beating on a team of bloated forty-year olds could look. This isn't so much a mistake in how they're using Team 3D as they don't really have much to offer the top of the TNA tag division anymore, but more of a mistake in that they're using the Nasty Boys at all. I get that Team 3D is trying to cement their legacy as the greatest team ever by beating all of the old greatest teams from back in the day, but it's starting to get out of hand. Hopefully, this gets blown off quick and Knobbs and Saggs are on the first train back to Nastyville so we don't have to suffer through months of this crapola.

Another good thing was the Desmond Wolfe/Samoa Joe match, though not for the reason you might expect. Yeah, a match between these two would have the potential to be a classic encounter and yeah, it was a little disappointing to see them only get the time that they got, but the result in the end was the right one. Wolfe has dropped matches to Kurt Angle at the pay-per-view and to D'Angelo Dinero on last week's Impact and if he didn't get a big win soon, he was going to have some serious credibility issues when it came to his role as one of the upper-level heels in TNA. It's too bad that that kind of a win had to come at Joe's expense, especially considering what Joe could have been if TNA had booked him properly, but they're going to have to do a major salvage act on him anyways, so what's one more loss to someone that really needed a win.

Before we get to the main event, I have to levy a similar criticism for the show this week as they got last week as there was just too much crap going on in too short a period of time for anything sink in. Between Angelina Love's return, Sean Morley's in-ring segment, the stuff with Bischoff and "The Band", the stuff with Mick Foley, the stuff with Jeff Jarrett, the stuff with AJ and Angle, the stuff with the masked assailant and even more that I'm forgetting about, there was just too damn much to keep track of, even for a show like Impact that has usually had a lot of problems in keeping themselves from doing eighteen things at once. I appreciate that they're trying to go ahead and get new talent and new storylines introduced and trying to get over the idea of change being the new norm in TNA, but when things are almost too confusing to follow between the ambiguity and the sheer overwhelming volume of things to compute, it just doesn't work. I hope that things settle down a little bit after Genesis because that would really be a good thing for the show as a whole.

That being said, the whole masked guy beating down AJ Styles angle was finished off this week as Tomko was finally revealed to be the guy that was stalking and beating up the TNA World Heavyweight Champion for the past few weeks and months. I loved how Tomko talked about their history as TNA tag champs and that it was one of the big reasons for him to attack AJ. I love nods to the past with continuity like that and it was kind of surprising from TNA as they tend to gloss over things like that most of the time. That all led to a match between the two in the main event for the belt and it was actually a pretty good match. Tomko is at about the same level he was when he left (which was decent to good) and Styles is on another level at this point with the ability to pull a great match out of just about anybody. AJ picked up the win to continue his momentum heading into Genesis, but I'm hoping that this isn't the end of the AJ/Tomko deal as it would be silly to have a months-long storyline pay off in a ten minute TV main event rather than an extended in-ring feud between the two men. Time will tell, but I'm worried that Tomko will just drift away from Styles and into some pointless big man feud with Morgan or Hernandez.





Friday Night Smackdown Results:

John Morrison vs. Chris Jericho - Winner: Chris Jericho (pinfall, Codebreaker)
Cryme Tyme vs. Matt Hardy and The Great Khali vs. The Hart Dynasty vs. CM Punk and Luke Gallows - Winners: CM Punk and Luke Gallows (pinfall, Gallows' 12th Step on JTG)
Mickie James vs. Beth Phoenix - Winner: Mickie James (disqualification, Phoenix disregarding the referee's orders)
Kane vs. Dolph Ziggler - Winner: Kane (pinfall, chokeslam)
Number One Contender's Cage Match: Batista vs. Rey Mystero - Winner: Rey Mysterio (escaping the cage)


Smackdown ended the wrestling week with a really strong show that had pretty much the best wrestling from the entire seven days at both the beginning and the end of the show. We started things out with Chris Jericho, fresh off of his humiliation on Raw at the hands of Mike Tyson. Jericho cut his usual awesome promo and promised a Royal Rumble victory before moving on to his match against John Morrison. These two had a ton of time and used every second of it to their advantage, putting on a great back-and-forth match that let both guys shine. My only quibble with the match was the ending that saw Drew McIntyre distract Morrison for a split-second to allow Jericho to hit the Codebreaker. I get that they're trying to further the McIntyre/Morrison deal as we head towards the Royal Rumble, but it made Jericho look a little weak and like he needed the help for the win. On the other hand, Jericho does manage to look pretty sinister for taking advantage of a split-second of weakness to come out on top. The more I think about it, the less it actually bugs me, but I still think that a match that good deserved better.

New challengers for the Unified Tag Championships currently around the waists of D-Generation X were also crowned as a fatal four-way match was held following the latest of CM Punk's audience saving revivals. Honestly, these segments are just showcasing how great Punk's character is progressing and how entertaining he has become since the heel turn and "I'm better than you" deal. I had spoken about being a little worried about what Punk would be up to after he didn't win the ECW Homecoming Battle Royal on Tuesday, but it turns out that it was all for naught as Punk and Gallows are now in line to face DX next after Gallows got the pin on JTG to pick up the win. Punk vs. DX has win written all over it and should be a lot of fun on the way towards WrestleMania.

The World Heavyweight Champion, The Undertaker, was a busy man on Friday night as he addressed the Shawn Michaels challenge from Raw while also seeing who he would be facing at the Royal Rumble for his title. The promo featuring Taker talking about the possibility of facing Michaels again was somewhat standard as he talked about how all of the guys he's faced at WrestleMania have never wanted a piece of him again (not entirely true as he and Kane have met at two separate WrestleManias), except for Michaels. Granted, he seemed to acknowledge that fact a bit, but it still made for a fairly clunky boast. Long story short, Taker is going to be at Raw on Monday to answer Michaels' challenge and I'm fairly certain that the answer is going to be yes. It's going to be interesting to see how they get there though, especially with what I've talked about previously in terms of Taker and Michaels both likely needing to drop their respective belts for the match to take place.

The main event I spoke of a little earlier saw Rey Mysterio and Batista meet in a cage match to finally determine once and for all who would challenge for the Big Gold Belt at the Rumble. For a WWE-PG cage match, this one was pretty good and I actually thought that this was one of Batista's better matches as of late. I especially loved Batista channeling some old-school Big Poppa Pump when he dropped for some push-ups in the middle of the ring after crushing Rey-Rey with a spinebuster. The heel turn has really freshened him up a little bit and while it would have been fun to see him get the title shot to reward him for his work since the turn, Batista vs. Taker, Part 8,025 isn't exactly an enticing proposition. Mysterio won after escaping the cage by being Tito Santana to Batista's Greg Valentine. Mysterio/Undertaker has me a little worried with both guys' injury woes, but if they're able to get past their respective injuries, it could be a show-stealer.







-- Randy Orton had a rough week including the incident with Kofi Kingston on Raw as well as the news that a 15-year old boy has filed a police report against Orton, claiming that Orton assaulted him, spit gum at him and called him a derogatory name after the boy asked Orton to pose for a second picture with him after a picture had already been taken inside the restaurant where Orton was eating. It's alleged that the boy's mother confronted Orton following the incident and Orton responded with the always classy "So sue me...". There's a witness in the parking lot that seems to be able to corroborate the 15-year old's story and the police have filed a hearing request on the matter for simple assault and battery. A clerk magistrate will decide if the incident warrants a criminal complaint and things will go from there.

While Orton has had a checkered past (gym bags and trashed hotel rooms anyone?) and was thought of as someone who could potentially see himself being released by the company for those problems, he had seemingly gotten past those issues in the past couple of years. I'd wager that the truth is somewhere between the 15-year old's innocent request and Orton's jerk-off behavior, as is usually the case with situations like this one. I'd also expect the criminal complaint to go away fairly quickly and I'm sure that any potential lawsuit that the family looks to lay against Orton will probably be settled outside of court, if it even comes to that. I mean what this kid classifies as assault is pretty sketchy at best and I don't really think that this is going to be going forward into the legal system.

The bigger issue here lies with Orton's immaturity issues that had seemingly been buried in the past, but have reared their ugly head once again. As I said earlier in the report, if Orton had not drawn so much attention to the botched finish of the match with his somewhat childish temper tantrum, the whole situation would have probably gone mostly unnoticed. Sure, there's reason for Orton to be upset as the victory that earned him his title shot at the Royal Rumble came off as less than perfect, but there were much better ways for him to handle it. If he had discussed the situation with Kingston backstage or wherever else, there would be a lot less to question in regards to Orton's immaturity. Instead, he looks like a spoiled brat, much like Shawn Michaels did when he pitched a similar on-camera tantrum during his SummerSlam '96 title match with Vader.

While this is the latest in a long line of problems that the WWE has had with Orton, I don't see this growing into a bigger issue unless he continues down the same path and there are similar incidents in the future. Hopefully Orton goes through a similar growth process that Michaels did and it would be better if he did it without having to go through the drug problems and personal problems that Michaels suffered through during the end of his first WWF run and immediately afterwards at the end of the 90's. Many thought that despite his obvious in-ring abilities, there might not have been a place for him in the WWF due to his rampant immaturity problems and some will surely think the same thing about Orton, but I can't see the WWE getting rid of him no matter how terribly he acts. With TNA looking to snap up anyone that could help make a dent in the WWE's stranglehold on Monday nights, Orton is probably safe unless he fails a batch of Wellness tests.

Let's hope for Orton's sake that this is an isolated incident and that the tantrum on Monday night was a one-off. I don't want to see him end up going down the same road that Michaels did for so long as outside of his sometimes repetitious offense, Orton is one of the more entertaining stars of the past decade. I'd hate to see him squander that talent due to a poor attitude.



-- Current ECW afterthought and frequent WWE Superstars contributor Tyler Reks may have hastened his exit from the roster of WWE superstars by holding up a flight from Green Bay in the early morning hours on Thursday morning. Reks' exploits were first reported on the Twitter account of a WWE sound crew member who posted the following;

"Thank you Tyler Reks for not only delaying our flight, but also for providing me with blog material. Nice knowing ya."

In the following blog post, which along with the Twitter post have since been removed, the crew member elaborated on the situation, saying that Reks had asked to leave the plane because he claimed that he saw something outside the window on the plane's wing that would make the plane unsafe to fly and that as a pilot, he didn't feel comfortable flying. He raised enough of a stink that the pilots turned around and returned to the gate to allow Reks to get off of the plane. While he was leaving, Reks allegedly stated to the rest of the passengers that if they didn't want to die, they should get off the plane as well.

Now, increased airport security and anxiety about terrorism in the airline industry notwithstanding, Reks has almost certainly signed a death warrant on his career at this point. There are about a hundred different ways that he could have handled this situation and all of them would have been better than what happened. Causing a commotion on a flight is usually not a good idea, but when you add in that he allegedly told other passengers of their impending doom, it's about as bad as it can get. He hasn't made much of an impact in his time in ECW thus far and after the recent sweep that the WWE made of their developmental territory, the lower level of the roster is likely next on the chopping block. There are usually a spate of releases at the bottom of the card just prior to or just after WrestleMania and I would be shocked if Reks' name isn't on that list this year.



-- Stone Cold Steve Austin will make his return to the WWE airwaves as he will be serving as the guest host for Monday Night Raw on March 15th, less than two weeks before WrestleMania XXVI. Austin will be there promoting his new movie Damage while making his first appearance on WWE TV since last year's WrestleMania when Austin was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. Considering that this will be one of the most important shows heading into WrestleMania and considering the history that Austin has with guys like Shawn Michaels, Vince McMahon, Triple H, Bret Hart and others that will be heavily pushed heading into the big event, it could make for a very interesting evening. When you add in that Austin is always a big crowd favorite and hasn't been seen in almost a year, he'll get a great pop and the fans will be happy. In a semi-related story, with Austin announced as the biggest guest host leading into WrestleMania (outside of a rumored appearance by The Rock), look for TNA to continue making questionable decisions by announcing that they'll permanently move to Monday nights beginning....March 15th (or whatever day that The Rock comes back).



-- Bret Hart has weighed in with his feelings on his return to Monday Night Raw last week, posting the following on his Facebook page;

"It's worth mentioning that although I did see Shawn earlier in the afternoon in the cafeteria, our in-ring face-off was unrehearsed and heartfelt on both sides and I can finally say that Shawn and I have finally made peace in what has been a long, draining, and sometimes pointless war of personalities. As for everything else that happened, on one hand, I finally found some closure. On the other hand, as far as Vince McMahon goes, I haven't closed anything at all. I have a lot of friends in a lot of places and we'll just have to see what happens next."

You've got to love how Bret speaks the truth during the first portion of the posting talking about how he and Shawn have finally put the past in the past and then kayfabes it up for the second portion when he starts talking about Vince. Bret is nothing if not old-school, so seeing him lay it on like that with the knowledge that he's scheduled to appear on Raw again this Monday is tremendous. I'm also glad to see that the in-ring closure is actually closure in reality as well as it's clear that the events of 1997 have taken their toll on both men. Seeing them be able to move on as they get to the age where grudges shouldn't matter anymore is great to see for both guys and I'm glad that there is finally some full peace in this for both Hart and Michaels.



-- There hasn't been much to talk about in the career of THE Brian Kendrick since he was released by the WWE outside of a couple of indy appearances and an announcement that he would be returning to Ring of Honor this year. That all changed this week however when Kendrick spoke to SLAM Wrestling on a variety of topics including these two potent quotables that have me wondering just how much sticky icky Kendrick has been smoking now that he doesn't have a Wellness Policy to worry about.

On Being Fired By WWE: "He then tells me ... I wasn't really getting the job done like they expected, at which point I said, "Bulls--- Johnny, I made a 60-year-old man look like he still belongs in the ring; don't give me that.' Johnny had always been very supportive of my work to my face, always. I know that was garbage. He then says, 'Look do you want help getting to Japan or what?' I was insulted. I don't want his help. I told him I don't need his help. I asked for the real reason, 'Is it the pot fines?' I had a script for it, I had heated discussions with Dr. Black, I had to refuse a test to get him to call me at one point. He wouldn't admit to that."

On Bryan Danielson Succeeding In WWE: "I could have molded my attitude to be what they wanted. I prefer to be rebellious, or not be a slave, or what ever you want to call it. His lifestyle is clean, he should be fine. He doesn't have a problem with authority the same way I do."

You don't say. Well, first off, Kendrick is incredibly talented in the ring, but it's not like he's the only one that has that kind of talent. There are a ton of guys on all three major rosters (WWE, TNA and ROH) that are just as entertaining in the ring with a whole lot less of the attitude that Kendrick seems to possess in every interview he grants. When you add in the comments regarding Bryan Danielson and how Kendrick didn't want to be a slave in the WWE and preferred to stay rebellious, you can see just how far off Kendrick is from a place in reality.

It's all well and good to act like a rebellious free spirit when you're in your teens and even into your twenties, but when you're in your thirties, it's time to think about your priorities and where you want to be with your life. I'm all about doing what makes you happy, but there's a huge difference between plying your trade for the biggest company in your industry and being "miserable" and being happy doing what you're doing in front of a couple of hundred people. Kendrick was incredibly over when he was having his run on Smackdown with Ezekiel Jackson and was even a pseudo-WWE Champion during the Championship Scramble match he took part in at Unforgiven in 2008. If he had just been able to keep himself in check, he could easily be a big star for them right now based on the promise he was showing in his heel work back then.

It's funny that Danielson was mentioned because he is someone that has a real love for the craft of professional wrestling, yet doesn't have any of the airs or attitude of someone like Kendrick. I don't want you to think that I'm bagging on Kendrick as I think he's very talented, but the sooner he realizes that he's holding himself back with some of the things he says, the better off he'll be in his career.



-- Sad news to pass along again this week as former WWF wrestler and part-time MMA practitioner Tony Halme, better known to wrestling fans as Ludvig Borga, passed away in his native Finland at the age of 47 earlier this week. Halme debuted in the WWF in 1993 after competing previously in Herb Abrams' UWF reboot as well as in New Japan Pro Wrestling. During that stint, Halme even managed to get a short run with the IWGP Tag Team Championsips with Scott Norton, defeating the Steiner Brothers to earn the belts. Once in the WWF, Borga ran roughshod over the roster, handing Tatanka his first defeat in a two-year WWF career and feuding with Lex Luger. There was even a brief tease of Borga as Intercontinental Champion at a house show where Borga defeated Razor Ramon for the belt leading up to WrestleMania X, but there were a couple of screwy finishes (Razor's foot under the rope, Shawn Michaels hitting Ramon with his fake IC title belt) that ultimately overturned the decision.

He left the WWF after suffering an ankle injury, just over six months after his debut, and ultimately left wrestling altogether to pursue an MMA career and a career in Finnish politics, where Halme served a five-year stint in that country's Parliament. On top of all of that, Halme also managed to write four books, record an album and star as one of the gladiators in Finland's version of American Gladiators. There are not a lot of details surrounding Halme's death, but there are reports in the Finnish press that Halme died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Halme had a long history of battles with substance abuse according to those same reports, so I suppose that it's plausible, but until more news comes out one way or the other, it would be irresponsible to comment any further on the situation. The condolences of myself and everyone else here at 411 go out to Halme's family and friends during this time of greiving and sadness.


That does it for me this week folks. As has been the case for the past couple of weeks, it doesn't look like there's a Sunday news guy, so Randle will be in Monday with his News Experience. If you haven't been living under a rock for the past few days, you know that there is a crisis of massive proportions going on in Haiti after the earthquake there, so if you can, please donate to help with the various relief efforts. I've already sent my text for a ten dollar donation, as have most of my friends, so just Google the Red Cross or visit your favorite emergency relief charity's website to pitch in what you're able to. We're all in this crazy thing called life on this little planet of ours together, so what does it hurt to send a little love to people who desperately need it. In the meantime and in between time, I'll see you back here next time for the next edition of the Bell to Bell!


If you're a fan of MMA, be sure to check out Nokaut.com for more of my work.