The Bell To Bell News Report 03.06.10

Posted by Randy Harrison on 03.06.2010

TNA closes up shop on Thursdays as they head towards a live Monday night Impact, Bret Hart and Vince McMahon finally agree to a match at WrestleMania, Edge continues to get the best of Chris Jericho and Batista cuts the promo of a lifetime on John Cena. It's been a busy seven days in wrestling, so catch up on all of that and more in the Bell to Bell!




Hello again wrestling fans and welcome back to another edition of the Bell To Bell with plenty to cover this week. Over in the WWE, there's more action on the road to WrestleMania as the main matches are set and the card continues to fill out, while TNA is less than three days away from making the leap to a Monday night timeslot to go head-to-head with Monday Night Raw to give us the first weekly competition in wrestling programming since 2001.Outside of the majors, we had the television debut of the GLOW revival Wrestlelicious, the passing of another wrestling legend and more.

It's a stacked week this week and we'll get right into it, but first, I talked last week about how while I was writing the column I was also enjoying the Olympic hockey semifinal between Canada and the upstart Slovaks. Well, I saw that game, as well as the heavily-hyped Gold Medal game between Canada and the United States and while the game itself may not have been a technical classic, there was no beating it for drama and excitement. After a whole country nearly had their hearts ripped out by Zach Parise's late goal, Sidney Crosby potted the overtime winner to send Canada into the kind of hysteria not seen since the 1972 Summit Series win over Russia. Much like Henderson in '72 and Lemieux in '87, Crosby's name will now be etched in the history books of Canadian hockey forever and those three names will be forever linked as three of the greatest goals in Canadian hockey history. Hell, even Wayne Gretzky was happy for Sid The Kid.



And if you're questioning just how hockey crazy Canada can be and just how important a game this was, here's a rather cool video that not only shows the beauty of Vancouver as a city, but shows just how loud the city celebrated the golden goal. The fun starts about 1:10 in or so;



Chills. The reaction wasn't just in Vancouver though as cities all across Canada had fans filling the streets like their city had just won the Stanley Cup. Never have I been prouder to be Canadian than I was when I saw a country that has been all too often torn apart by the in-fighting between Anglophones and Francophones, singularly unified in celebration. I honestly don't know what would have happened, in terms of the country and their support of the boys in red and white, had Canada lost and I'm very happy that we'll never have to find out.





Now that we've gotten all of that out of the way, let's get to some 'rasslin', shall we? If there was a Canadian version of Apollo Creed, you can bet that he would be in the column this week to get us started, but since Rocky never explored the concept of a Canadian hero or villain in any of the movies (Andre "Le KO" Gagnon, anyone?), here comes Apollo to do that thing that he does better than anybody else...


You know the drill...





Ding Ding....









Monday Night Raw Results:

Randy Orton vs. Ted DiBiase - Winner: None (no contest, Cody-ference)
Jack Swagger vs. Santino Marella - Winner: Jack Swagger (pinfall, Doctor bomb)
Zack Ryder vs. MVP - Winner: MVP (pinfall, Playmaker)
Diva Pillow Fight: Kelly Kelly vs. Eve Torres vs. Gail Kim vs. Maryse vs. Alicia Fox vs. Jillian Hall - Winner: Eve Torres (pinfall, somersault legdrop on Alicia)
WWE Unified Tag Team Championship: D-Generation X vs. The Big Show and The Miz (C) - Winners: The Big Show and The Miz (pinfall, Miz's jackknife pin on Michaels)


This week's episode of Raw was again rather light on the wrestling and rather heavy on the storyline progression and things of that nature, but while last week's show was a blow-away that saw a lot accomplished, this week felt a little bit like a placeholder show where there were no big announcements, just solid storyline progression. That being said, there were a couple of big moments here, which not surprisingly took place outside of the wrestling action rather than during it.

The first big moment out of this week's Raw was the promo work by John Cena and Batista, which almost singlehandedly made the rest of the build to their WrestleMania match must-see TV. Batista had been on a stale streak for a while before his heel turn and while he was embracing the heel role he still had a bit of staleness in his character. After a couple of weeks of tweaking though, he has it down cold if his promo on Monday night was any indication. For someone nicknamed "The Animal", Batista cut one of the most intelligent and insightful promos that I have ever seen, full of great moments like him suggesting that security was there to keep Batista from kicking Cena's ass instead of the other way around. I will be the first to admit that I haven't been very keen on Batista for a long time, but this promo did a lot to reverse those feelings. For everything negative that I've said about his mic work while he was working the babyface side of things on Smackdown, there is just as much positive nowadays as he has been killing it as a heel on Raw. Hell, he even made sitting through the opening of another one of Cena's "Great Orators of the 20th Century" style promos a little easier, even before he cut Cena off at the knees.

The next big development on the night saw Vince McMahon and Bret Hart finally agree to a WrestleMania match after weeks of back and forth verbal jostling and physical attacks from both men. The segment began as what was billed as Bret Hart's farewell to the WWE, but sure enough McMahon interrupted, kicked Bret's leg out from under his leg (ok, crutch, but work with me here people) and basically acted like an ass until he had goaded Hart into a match. I'm on the fence about all of this as they have to have some sort of in-ring payoff after all of the build this has been given since the new year along with all of the years of history heading into this. Best case scenario, this comes off as solid as the rest of McMahon's WrestleMania matches have and it ends up being about as good as McMahon/Hogan at WrestleMania XIX and Bret gets his revenge once and for all. When it comes to building this one in the past couple of months, they've done a great job of not over-exposing Hart, while also having McMahon continue to get over on Bret in the little ways that make you want to see him get his ass kicked. Adding in the mileage they got from having Batista and John Cena involved for a couple of weeks, this one has been simmered to perfection. My only worry is whether the in-ring work will be able to measure up even close to what people are hoping for because if it doesn't, one of WrestleMania's main matches will be considered a disappointment. The best thing going for this one in terms of being a good match (besides Bret and McMahon's willingness to do anything for the business) is that this is the fourth or fifth biggest match on the card, meaning that there won't be the kind of pressure there would be on a main event match. That could ultimately be the saving grace for this one.

Speaking of main events, one of the biggest matches of WrestleMania has to be the Shawn/Taker rematch, which got a little play this week thanks to an impromptu DX reunion as they challenged for the Unified Tag Titles in their rematch against The Miz and The Big Show. The match was set up by a great promo segment featuring HHH and Shawn with Shawn starting out talking about the upcoming match, while HHH played the role of a cheerleader, giving Shawn the "rah rah" speech about how he believes that Shawn can do it and all of that. That led into the title rematch and that it could help build Shawn's confidence up even further. The match itself wasn't much of anything as it was pretty rushed and seemed to be there more for the Sheamus run-in and beatdown more than anything involving Shawn, which is a little confusing following the promo we just talked about. That being said, they had to come up with something for Sheamus/Triple H to be based on now that Sheamus is without title and Triple H is without title shot and this seems like a hell of a start. They don't have a lot of time to build this one so they'll have to come up with something quick for this upcoming Monday, but much like the reverse of the Vince/Bret match, the good news is that this one is so far down the card, the build doesn't have to be the greatest so long as the match delivers.

The only other match on the show worth mentioning was the Randy Orton/Ted DiBiase match playing off of last week when Orton turned on Legacy before they could turn on him. These two are starting to build a real chemistry in the ring and while this looks like a two-on-one feud for now, I'd love to see Orton and DiBiase get the chance to revisit this one-on-one down the road. They booked themselves into a corner a bit here with neither man being able to afford a loss heading into WrestleMania (DiBiase for credibility reasons, Orton because of his recent turn), but did alright getting out of it by having Cody run down for the distraction and the schmozz finish. As I said last week, it's good to see that instead of trying to turn Orton into a baby-kisser, they're just having him go up against the heels to become a face, which works here because he's already got the deck stacked against him in the feud. The only problem in this is that with as uneven as Legacy have been booked in the past, along with the way that Orton handled them in the post-match brawl, they have a lot of work to do to seem like they have a chance to beat Orton. There may be not be enough time for that to happen, which will take away from the match a little bit, but if this is more about giving them the rub from competing with Orton, they won't need to worry about it.





WWE NXT Results:

David Otunga vs. Darren Young - Winner: Darren Young (pinfall, full nelson belly-to-back suplex)
Wade Barrett vs. Daniel Bryan - Winner: Wade Barrett (pinfall, toture rack)
William Regal and Skip Sheffield vs. Matt Hardy and Justin Gabriel - Winners: Matt Hardy and Justin Gabriel (pinfall, Gabriel's 450 splash on Regal)


This week's WWE NXT had the momentum from the strong debut show last week and while it may not have had quite the impact that the initial episode did, it was still a fun hour of TV that was a lot more entertaining than most of what ECW was pumping out near the end of their run. I loved how the show actually went through the concept this week in terms of the voting structure and how a winner will be chosen, but I also felt disappointed that they didn't explain things last week. While things were a little crowded last week as they tried to get over the concept, they could have easily done the same thing they did this week at the beginning of last week's show. I am also enjoying that they are continuing the promo videos of the rookies to be able to help introduce them to the audience. All of the guys seem to be sticking to their characters and are doing their best with them and while it's not something that I can see sticking with them for long once they're promoted to the main roster, it helps differentiate them while they're part of the NXT roster.

Last week's big star, Daniel Bryan, continued to be one of the featured stars this week with a match against fellow rookie Wade Barrett that saw him lose the match and get beaten down by Chris Jericho yet again after the match. While there's surely going to be a lot of complaining about Bryan losing back-to-back matches, he has been getting the most time in terms of storyline building and is currently in a program with the World Heavyweight Champion, so there's not a lot of room to complain. Another of last week's big debuts, David Otunga, got a rematch with Darren Young and while this one was longer than the 30-second squash from last week, it wasn't that much better. They both got to show more offense and have an actual match, but the rookie/pro interaction ended up taking away from the match, especially at the finish. For all of Punk's talk about not liking the format and not wanting to have anything to do with Young, he ended up helping Young get the win and afterwards the Otunga/R-Truth team ended up fighting after seeming to be on the same page last week for the most part. I'm all about having the pros and rookies interact to help them grow, but they need to do a better job of having things make sense from week to week.

While last week's stars got to see their momentum continue, one of the rookies that didn't even get face time last week got over HUGE this week with Justin Gabriel and Matt Hardy taking on William Regal and Skip Sheffield in the main event. The Regal/Sheffield teaming is still kind of odd to me, but Hardy and Gabriel worked very well together, with Gabriel taking the Jeff Hardy role. It was great to see a rookie get a big win over a pro, especially one with the credentials of William Regal and Gabriel looked like he belonged in the ring, something that a lot of newcomers to the WWE tend to struggle with early on. Not only that, but he hit a perfect 450 splash to end the match, something that will only help him get over even further. Provided he doesn't turn into an Evan Bourne-type where he has one big move that pops the crowd, but rarely uses it to win the match, Gabriel could give Daniel Bryan a run for his money as the winner of the show. Granted, Gabriel doesn't have as much going for him in the way of storylines, but he has a lot of potential, which could only continue to grow if he gets to keep working with Regal and Hardy in the future.





WWE Superstars Results:

Kofi Kingston vs. Chavo Guerrero - Winner: Kofi Kingston (pinfall, Trouble in Paradise)
William Regal vs. Evan Bourne - Winner: Evan Bourne (pinfall, Air Bourne)
Mike Knox vs. Kane - Winner: Kane (pinfall, chokeslam)
Chris Jericho vs. Goldust - Winner: Chris Jericho (submission, Walls of Jericho)


This week's edition of Superstars was all about solid, if unspectacular, wrestling and one of the rare times that one of the WWE's top champions main evented the show, even though the title was not on the line. In fact, the entire show was fun enough, minus the Kane vs. Mike Knox match that added nothing to the show and honestly could have been chopped to give more time to the Bourne/Regal match. Speaking of the Bourne/Regal match, it was one of the better Evan Bourne matches as of late in that it actually got more than three or four minutes. Sure, it was only about five minutes, but with Bourne in there against a true pro like Regal it was more than enough time for them to put together a solid bout. Speaking of the match not getting enough time for my liking, it really showed in the finish where Regal controlled the majority of the match and then Bourne just exploded out of nowhere with a knee and his finisher. If they had cut Knox/Kane, the comeback could have been done a little better and the match would have benefitted as a result, but that could just be me.

The show opened with a match between Kofi Kingston and Chavo Guerrero that was either a big match for Chavo against a future star, or evidence of just how far off the map Kofi has fallen since his feud with Randy Orton. The match itself was actually pretty good as despite barely seeing him on TV these days, Chavo can still go and Kofi is still the coiled spring that sometimes reminds me of a young Randy Savage in terms of his athleticism and speed. There wasn't much more to this one than what was there and while there wasn't really much of a thought that could be given to Chavo actually winning the match, they still made the most of it and gave the people a good showing. It's sad to see Kingston spinning his gears here, but I think that's how we're going to have to get used to seeing him for the next while as no one is going to be moving around the card until after WrestleMania and likely until after the draft.

As I mentioned before, the main event was graced by the presence of a World Heavyweight Champion as Chris Jericho took on Goldust and much like the previous match, while the outcome was never in doubt, these two still put on a quality match that made you feel like there was a slight chance that Goldust could pull off the upset. Granted, there was really no doubt that Jericho was going to win this one based on where he is on the card and the fact that Goldust is about two releases away from being the lowest man on the totem pole, but it wasn't about that. This one was about getting to see Jericho put on a ten-minute match and show off his skills in the ring as they continue to build towards his title defense against Edge. This match served that purpose tremendously and while there may be a bit of a stigma attached to having the champion wrestle on the "D" show and that being a statement on the type of reign he's due for, it was a good chance to see Jericho shine in the ring against someone who is enough of a pro to make someone look even better than they are. Jericho looks to be firing on all cylinders and if Edge can get himself back into top form heading into WrestleMania, they may just steal the show.





TNA Impact Results:

Beer Money Inc. vs. Matt Morgan and Hernandez vs. Generation Me vs. The Motor City Machine Guns - Winners: Beer Money Inc. (pinfall, Storm's Superkick on Morgan)
Sean Morley vs. Jeff Jarrett - Winner: Sean Morley (pinfall, various plunder shots)
Doug Williams vs. Rob Terry - Winner: Rob Terry (pinfall, chokeslam)
Tomko vs. Jeff Jarrett - Winner: Jeff Jarrett (pinfall, roll-up)
TNA World Heavyweight Championship: Abyss vs. D'Angelo Dinero vs. Desmond Wolfe vs. AJ Styles (C) - Winner: AJ Styles (submission, figure four leglock on Dinero)


Impact this week was the "talk Hulk Hogan out of the ring" tour as it seemed like virtually the entire show revolved around Hogan and whether he was actually going to be teaming with Abyss next week against Ric Flair and AJ Styles with nearly every segment having at least a mention of the match and whether Hogan should do it or not. That includes the opening talky segment that saw AJ Styles and Flair confronting Hogan and Abyss to try to help hype up next week's match. The segment was what it was and actually ended up bringing out Eric Bischoff to make a four-way main event between Abyss, Styles, Desmond Wolfe and D'Angelo Dinero for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship. It may be a little biased of me, but the first thing that I thought of when Bischoff announced the match was how they would screw it up and whether it would be a lack of time or some sort of Flair/Hogan involvement that would botch it up. I just want to let TNA fans know that it's not some sort of WWE superiority complex that I was feeling there, but rather a frustration with TNA in teasing us with a match like that that could be really good, but ultimately ends up being a disappointment.

From there, we headed into another four-way match, this time in the tag division with Matt Morgan and Hernandez in non-title action against Beer Money, Generation Me and the Machine Guns. The match was really good, albeit a little too short, and Beer Money picked up a win on TV, which is a big step up from what they've been doing on TV as of late (nothing). My biggest problem with this match though was that there was some teases of dissension between Morgan and Hernandez as champions, less than two months after they won the titles at Genesis. I don't understand why TNA has to tease a break-up of a team so quickly, especially when they've barely established themselves as champions, when the rest of the division seems to be bereft of quality challengers to take the belts if Morgan and Hernandez break up. I'm not saying that Morgan and Hernandez are going to break up sometime soon, but with the way that they're teasing it, I wouldn't be surprised and if they do break up, I wouldn't be surprised to see TNA get another title tournament going for the tag belts as TNA seems to love tournaments whether there's titles on the line or not.

Jeff Jarrett's humiliation at the hands of Eric Bischoff continued this week as well as Jarrett was in two matches with Sean Morley and Tomko. The Morley match was more of a Crash TV style of match with Morley attacking Jarrett backstage while Jarrett was doing his janitorial duties in the men's room. Morley ended up getting the win after ramming Jarrett into various doors and walls, a win that ultimately means next to nothing now as it appears that Morley has left TNA to wrestle in Mexico. Always nice to see TNA give a non-contracted guy wins over the likes of Jeff Jarrett and Chris Daniels before letting him walk away with no explanation or reasoning given to the fans. Jarrett ended up having to face Tomko later in the show despite the backstage beating and while he took a beating, Jarrett managed to squeak out a win to ensure that the angle will continue on at least until the live Impact on Monday night. I don't know what they're trying to do with all of this as Jarrett is too old to become a hot top babyface, which is how an angle like this should get paid off, but they seem to be commmitted to it so we'll see where it goes.

The Ken Anderson/Kurt Angle feud continued with Anderson mocking Angle in the spirit of the DX mocks The Nation segment with Anderson going all out with the bald cap and everything. Not only did he mock Angle's looks, but he also mocked Angle's dog tag, his broken neck, called him "injury-prone" (pot and kettle anyone?) and more before Angle came down and started to open the ass-whip. From there, Anderson took over, laid out Angle and stood tall heading into a commerical, which was a rather poor way to build off of what they've been doing the past couple of weeks that I actually enjoyed. Sure there were times where Anderson was doing was kind of funny, but for the most part it was just kind of forced and seemed like it was Anderson trying to be edgy just for the sake of being edgy without it adding anything to the segment. I get that they're trying to be the alternative to the WWE-PG movement by going a little more adult and a little more "Attitude" in their storylines, but this just felt tacked on and while it had its moments, it wasn't enough of a justification for what happened and will likely be forgotten about in a week or two.

The end of the night saw AJ Styles defend his title against D'Angelo Dinero, Abyss and Desmond Wolfe in a match that deserved far better than it got considering the principles involved. They got very little time for this match and it felt a lot like it was just there to set up the after match stuff with Hogan and Flair and the barbed wire bat. Dinero took the loss after a figure four from Styles and that part I actually liked as not only did it put over Styles' figure four as a finisher, but it actually played into Dinero's injury that he came into the match with, which was a nice touch. The post-match brawl saw Flair bleeding like only Flair can and while a lot of people are feeling like Abyss and Hogan are ready for war against Styles and Flair, part of me is beginning to feel like Hogan is going to go for the shocking swerve heel turn on Abyss during the match or after the match to rejoin Uncle Eric on the side of the baddies, while Sting, Jarrett, and Abyss side against Hogan, Bischoff and whoever they end up joining forces with. It may not be a technical classic, but they're trying pretty hard to build to this main event and I guess that's a good thing. Too bad that Hogan and Flair can't be seconds on the floor while four of TNA's best do battle, but a guy can dream.





Friday Night Smackdown Results:

Drew McIntyre vs. Matt Hardy - Winner: Matt Hardy (pinfall, sunset flip)
Shelton Benjamin vs. Dolph Ziggler - Winner: Shelton Benjamin (pinfall, Paydirt)
Jimmy Wang Yang vs. Ezekiel Jackson - Winner: Ezekiel Jackson (pinfall, Book of Ezekiel)
Luke Gallows vs. Rey Mysterio - Winner: Rey Mysterio (pinfall, powerbomb reversal)
John Morrison and R-Truth vs. The Hart Dynasty vs. Cryme Tyme - Winners: John Morrison and R-Truth (pinfall, Truth's Lie Detector on Kidd)
The Big Show vs. Edge - Winner: Edge (pinfall, spear)


After the great show last week that finally set up the Edge/Jericho match that we've all been anticipating since Edge won the Royal Rumble, Smackdown took a bit of a step back this week with a show that featured a lot in the way of setting up things in the future and not a lot in the way of entertaining stuff during the actual broadcast. The show started out with an Edge promo as he talked about Jericho and their match before he was interrupted by The Big Show. The interruption led to some Show/Edge talk based off of Edge's defeat of The Miz last week and ultimately we got an Edge vs. Big Show main event, which while it fits in with what's been going on lately, is about the last match that I would want to have as a main event for a show. The match turned out to be halfway decent with Edge getting the win before he speared Jericho for yet another week as he ran in from the crowd to try to attack Edge with the World Heavyweight Championship belt. I'm starting to worry that with how much they're putting Edge over Jericho week after week that we might not get the blow-off to this feud at WrestleMania and their match could just end up being a set-up for a title change at a future pay-per-view, but it's a little early to tell that just yet. If Jericho can get a couple of weeks of one-upping Edge my feelings might change, but for now it feels like this could see Edge come up short.

The qualifying process for the Money in the Bank match continued this week with Drew McIntyre getting another chance to earn his way into the match before coming up short against Matt Hardy. Much like last week after his loss to Kane, McIntyre pitched a hissy fit and continued on his path of Jericho, circa 1997 WCW and I don't mind it because it's actually giving McIntyre something interesting to do instead of just being a guy that wrestles and thinks he's better than everyone else. I'm still not totally sold on McIntyre, but this was a little better than what he's come up with so far. Two of the other participants in the MITB match, Shelton Benjamin and Dolph Ziggler, met in a match to help build to that match and this one was actually alright, even if it was a little bit short. Benjamin picked up another win to continue gaining momentum towards the MITB match and while it's necessary for him after coming over from ECW, I don't see it leading to much as Benjamin's chances of winning MITB are about as good as the chances of me winning MITB. It helps to add another guy that "could" win the match, but I don't see it going anywhere as Benjamin is about as much of a dark horse to win as you can get outside of his opponent in this match.

The Rey Mysterio/CM Punk angle continued this week as Mysterio took on Punk's lead follower Luke Gallows in what was one of Gallows' better matches that I've seen since he began in the WWE. Mysterio and Gallows worked really well together here and Mysterio picked up the win after reversing a power bomb from Gallows following a series of spots that saw both Serena and CM Punk get involved in the match to try to help Gallows. Not only did we get a very good TV match from the two, but we got more awesomeness from Punk on the microphone and an aftermatch segment where he tried to get the best of Mysterio and failed as Mysterio managed to reverse a Go 2 Sleep attempt into a kick to the knee that gave him the chance to escape. Punk/Mysterio is actually being built really well and I'm enjoying what they're doing heading into WrestleMania. This match was rumored to be a bout that would put Punk's hair up against Mysterio's mask and while they've got three weeks before the big show, they really need to introduce the stip next week to avoid having it feel tacked on.






Still under the weather with what has turned out to be a severe case of bronchitis and with there being nothing happening in the past seven days that could be considered worth of five or six paragraphs as a top story, everything is just going to get one or two paragraphs again this week.



-- Hulk Hogan has hinted during a recent radio interview that TNA has signed former ECW and WWE Champion Rob Van Dam, though there is no formal indication from either side that a deal is in place. Van Dam has been virtually non-existent in the national wrestling scene since he left the WWE back in 2007. Outside of the odd appearance for the WWE, as well as some work on the independents and his movie career, things have been rather quiet on the RVD front, which will make his potential return to the ring that much more of a story. It's not like he's been gone for three weeks or three months. He has been off of national TV for nearly three years minus a couple of "one shot deals", meaning that he is going to be completely fresh as a character when he debuts for the company. When you add in the fact that he is on top of the heap when it comes to talent that is always going to be over no matter what, he has all of the makings of being a big splash for TNA on their Monday night debut next week.

The flip side of this is that while Van Dam is undoubtedly over and can still go in the ring against some of these young talented stars in TNA, he is also nearly forty. TNA has a big problem brewing as it relates to using older talent at the top of the card and while Van Dam would be a breath of fresh air as opposed to guys like The Nasty Boys, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair and the like, he is still on the tail end of his career rather than the front end and is a guy that would be hard to book as a long-term cornerstone of the company due to that age. I'm not saying that Van Dam isn't in shape or that he would be a step slower in the ring, I'm merely saying that he doesn't have the shelf life of someone like D'Angelo Dinero or Samoa Joe or Christopher Daniels in that all of those guys are nearly a decade younger and have a lot left to do in their careers. Van Dam would be one of the biggest signings for TNA since they managed to get their hands on Kurt Angle and he would likely draw a good number of fans for his debut in TNA, but if the promotion is hoping that he'll be the kind of boost that can turn them into immediate competitors with the WWE's show on Monday nights, they're sorely mistaken. He is a star, and probably one of the biggest stars not under contract with the WWE currently, but there's no way that he will be the guy that turns the tide. If Kurt Angle, Christian, Hulk Hogan, etc, etc, weren't the guys to do it, how could RVD be expected to pull it off?



-- The list of the WWE's house-cleaning releases heading into WrestleMania got a little bit bigger as longtime tag team performer Charlie Haas was let go at the end of last week in a move that happened a little too late for me to comment on in last week's column. Haas is one of those guys that could have gone somewhere in the WWE had he been able to capitalize on any of the three or four chances he was given to get over, but for one reason or another he just never could. When he was with Shelton Benjamin and Kurt Angle in Team Angle, he had a chance to do something there and actually did in the spin-off World's Greatest Tag Team with Benjamin, but he was never able to translate that team success into a singles run. He got a bit of a push with his gimmick of imitating other performers a while back, but that was more for comedy than anything else and probably could have been done by anyone. The WWE won't be hurting at all with Haas' release and it will probably open up Haas to start working with ROH, TNA, or the independent circuit, so he won't suffer much either. Not to mention that not being on the WWE's grueling road schedule will make it much easier for him to spend time with his wife and young daughters.



-- Ring of Honor has announced the main event for their "Big Bang" internet PPV show on April 3rd in Charlotte, NC as newly crowned ROH Champion Tyler Black will defend against former champ Austin Aries as well as top contender Roderick Strong in a triple threat match. The show, which is expected to kick off a new era in Ring of Honor, could not have chosen a better main event as Black, Aries and Strong are three of the guys that will be the cornerstones of the new decade of Ring of Honor and all three are capable of putting on a showstealing performance. I also like that they're going to not rely on another Aries/Black match-up since it feels like they've done that match to death as of late. Adding Strong into the mix is going to give another dimension to this one and add an element that will keep this match from feeling like something the fans have already seen too many times before. When you add in that the show will feature Lucha stars like Blue Demon Jr., Mark and Jay Briscoe against The Kings of Wrestling, and more, this looks like it could be one of Ring of Honor's biggest shows ever in the ring and out of it.



-- In news that came as a bit of a surprise to this writer, TNA original Traci Brooks has been released from her contract by the promotion this week. Most of the surprise stems from the fact that with how infrequently Brooks had been featured in TNA as of late, she was still on the roster. This isn't a big loss for TNA as she didn't add a lot to the program outside of her massive boobs and while she is an original, her loss can't be measured in the same vein as the loss of someone like AJ Styles or any of the other originals that are being looked to as the future of the company. If Brooks wants to stay in wrestling, she'll probably bounce around on the indy and convention circuit and make a pretty penny off of appearances and signings and things of that nature. The only sad part of all of this is that the move comes just a couple of weeks after her real-life husband Kazarian made his return to TNA as an on-screen character after his time under the mask as Suicide. The timing sucks to be sure, but there's not a lot of loss for TNA here as she wasn't a great wrestler, wasn't a great talker and didn't have a lot to offer in terms of being a manager or valet. Best of luck to Traci in her plans for the future and I'm sure that she'll do just fine without TNA. By the way, the statement that Brooks wrote on her website following the release is one of the classiest things I've seen in a long time in wrestling and was a real breath of fresh air from the usual sour grapes coming from the mouths of the recently released. Here's one for the road....you surely deserve it...





I will never get tired of the motorboat.....never. And judging from the recent trends in wrestling, I don't think it will ever go out of style as the WWE and TNA seem to both have a never-ending well of uh....well-endowed....women to add to their rosters. As I said before, best of luck to Traci and Kazarian in their future, whatever it holds.



-- Continuing with TNA news, TNA President Dixie Carter posted on her Twitter account that she had spoken with Sting and that his contract is renewed and he wouldn't miss this Monday's live show for anything. She also spoke of him being excited about the prospect of working with Hulk Hogan, meaning that I'm sure that Sting will find his way into the main event tag match featuring Hogan, either during or afterwards. After hearing this, it looks like the return of Sting, who has not been featured on TNA TV since a fleeting image of him in the rafters was shown on the January 4th live Impact show and hasn't wrestled since October of 2009 at Bound For Glory, will be one of the big surprises that TNA will have planned for their debut show in their new timeslot. While this is good news for fans of Sting, this is bad news for TNA as it's just another old-timer who will likely clog up the top of the card and keep talent like Desmond Wolfe and D'Angelo Dinero waiting a little bit longer for their shot. I would be wrong if I was to lump Sting in with the guys like The Nasty Boys and Scott Hall as those guys seem to still fully believe that they're top guys, while Sting seems to want to use his name to give some of the younger talent the rub. Unfortunately with the way TNA has been going as of late, there won't be a lot of young talent at the top of the card for Sting to work with, which will be a real shame. Maybe Monday will begin the build for Sting vs. Flair #6,548,210 though, so it might not be all bad.



-- Finally we end off this report on a sad note as wrestling legend Angelo Poffo has passed away at the age of 84. Poffo is best known to be the father of WWF stars "Leaping" Lanny Poffo and Randy "Macho Man" Savage, but was also the promoter of International Championship Wrestling, a renegade promotion that ran out of Kentucky and was the main opposition for the Memphis promotion that had Jerry "The King" Lawler as its top star. Both sides engaged in a bitter promotional war that is outlined rather well by Dave Meltzer and Jim Cornette on the bonus commentary on the Wrestling Gold DVD series with actions like giving away the real identities of rival wrestlers and fistfights with stars in the other promotion being the order of the day. Ultimately, Poffo opted out of promoting and ended up making peace with the Memphis promotion, leading to a series of "inter-promotional" matchups that were some of the best that Memphis had seen including Savage vs. Lawler and Savage and Poffo vs. The Rock n' Roll Express. My condolences go out to the entire Poffo family and hope that they can celebrate the amazing life that Angelo lived


Well folks, that's it for me for this week. Randle has you covered on Monday with his always entertaining, highly Canadian Wrestling News Experience with a Raw preview, the injury bug, the title pictures and all of the features you all know and love. I'll be back in seven days with another look back at the week that was in professional wrestling including a recap of the first live Monday night Impact show in TNA history and a look at who came out ahead on the night, the reaction from both companies, the ratings for both shows and a whole lot more including my look at the first two weeks of Wrestlelicious. In the mean time and in between time, I'll see you all back here next time for another brand new 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.