wrestling / Columns

News From Cook’s Corner 04.26.11

April 26, 2011 | Posted by Steve Cook

Hi, hello & welcome to News From Cook’s Corner! I’m Steve Cook, and I hope you all had a fantastic Easter! I had a pretty good one, as I ate way too many jellybeans & way too much chocolate. I even mixed in way too much ham, which isn’t something I do very often. All I know for sure is that you couldn’t pay me to get on a scale right now.

Programming Note: We are a mere five weeks away from the Second Annual News From Cook’s Corner Hot 100. If there’s somebody you want to see do really well but are afraid that I’ll overlook them because I have no taste when it comes to women (even my mom says this, so maybe it’s true), make sure to mention them in the comment section, or via e-mail to [email protected]. If your favorite is left off the list and you didn’t mention them to me, you only have yourself to blame.

Well, I guess you can blame me too, but I can plead ignorance. In a world that’s no longer Dashing, that’ll happen.

I’m not debating that The Royal Rumble in 92 was the best because it was. But I’ve always thought that the 90 Royal Rumble had the better roster. Andre, Hogan, Warrior, Savage, Hart, Michaels, Rude, Perfect ,Rhodes, Dibiase, Snuka, Santana, Demoliton, Piper, Honky Tonk Man. That was a pretty stack roster do you think.

Also when we look back in another 5 years time (maybe even now?) The 04 Rumble that Benoit won. Had him, Orton, Cena, Jericho, Angle, Goldberg, RVD, Big Show, Foley, Steiner, Kane, Booker T, Hardy etc.

What ya think?Muta Mark

1990 & 1992 will be fairly easy to compare because fourteen guys were in both of them: DiBiase, Roberts, Savage, Piper, Warlord, Haku, Smash/Repo Man, Snuka, Martel, Santana, Hogan, Michaels, Barbarian & Hercules.

1990: Andre, Bret, Dusty, Warrior, Bad News Brown, Akeem, Dino Bravo, Earthquake, Neidhart, Honky, Rude, Perfect, Jannetty, Ax, Koko, Red Rooster

1992: Flair, Bulldog, Sags, Kerry, Valentine, Duggan, Volkoff, Bossman, IRS, Undertaker, Berzerker, Virgil, Mustafa (Iron Sheik), Skinner, Slaughter, Sid

Let’s do this Tale of the Tape style, looking at four categories: The three titles that were around at the time, and who’s been inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. I thought about adding a “Fun Gimmick” or “Guys That Sucked” category, but those seem too subjective.

WWF Champions:
1990:
Andre, Bret, Warrior
1992: Flair, Undertaker, Sheik, Slaughter, Sid

Advantage: 1992

Intercontinental Champions:
1990:
Bret, Warrior, Honky, Rude, Perfect, Jannetty
1992: Flair, Bulldog, Kerry, Valentine

Advantage: 1990

Tag Team Champions:
1990:
Andre, Bret, Bravo, Earthquake, Neidhart, Jannetty, Ax
1992: Flair, Bulldog, Sags, Valentine, Volkoff, Bossman, IRS, Undertaker, Sheik

Advantage: 1992

Hall of Famers:
1990:
Andre, Bret, Dusty, Perfect, Koko (total of 11)
1992: Flair, Kerry (part of Von Erich Family induction), Valentine, Duggan, Sheik, Slaughter (total of 12)

Advantage: 1992…but let’s look at this one a little closer by adding guys that should be in the WWE Hall of Fame.

1990: Warrior, Honky, Rude, Ax (as part of Demolition)
1992: Bulldog, Bossman, Sid, Undertaker (will be as soon as he retires)

You could make an argument for others, but those are the guys I think deserve it most due to title reigns & drawing money. Sid will probably raise some eyebrows, but he did win the WWF title two times and was always over with the fans whenever he was around. Hell, they popped for him tossing Hogan out at the 1992 Rumble. As it is, 1992 still has a slight edge, but it’s really close. 1990 having Andre, Bret, Dusty, Warrior, Rude & Perfect adds a lot to its argument.

2004’s slightly harder to compare because it’s a different era with more titles that mean less, but let’s go ahead and give them the championship breakdown:

WWE/World Title:
Benoit, Orton, Bradshaw, Booker, Kane, Angle, Foley, Show, Jericho, Cena, RVD, Goldberg

Intercontinental/US Title:
Benoit, Orton, Bradshaw, Matt Hardy, Booker, Kane, Rikishi, Shelton, Angle, Christian, Jericho, Gunn, Cena, RVD, Rhyno, A-Train

WWE/World Tag Team Titles:
Benoit, Orton, Tajiri, Bradshaw, Hardy, Steiner, Hurricane, Booker, Kane, Spike, Rikishi, Dupree, Shelton, Angle, Rico, Foley, Christian, Show, Jericho, Haas, Gunn, Cena, RVD

Lots of champions here, but keep in mind that WWE had twice as many major titles for people to win and did title changes a lot more often in this time period. It’s probably too soon to say for sure who will be in the HOF out of this group, but here’s my guesses out of people on that roster:

WWE Hall of Fame Locks: Orton, Bradshaw, Booker, Kane, Show, Jericho, Cena

These guys I think are definite Hall of Famers when the time comes. Bradshaw is on good terms with the company and has no bitterness towards anybody, while Booker’s announcing now and he’ll probably be in it in a few years unless something weird happens. The rest of the guys listed have resumes that merit induction when they’re ready to retire.

TNA Guys: Angle, Foley, Steiner, RVD, Hardy, Morgan

Out of this group, I think Angle & Foley definitely merit induction and will be inducted when they’re done with TNA. Foley’s a lock, and Angle is too as long as he doesn’t do anything too crazy. Steiner has a pretty solid resume, but I don’t think he’s on great terms with the company. I could go either way on RVD…he had a solid run with
WWE, but he dropped the ball when they finally pushed him to the top. I don’t think either of the Matts have much of a chance. Morgan wasn’t there long enough, and I can’t see Hardy getting inducted considering how he left the company.

Debatable: Christian, Goldberg, Billy Gunn, Rikishi

I don’t think Christian’s a lock, but he could become one by the time his run with the company ends. Heck he might become one by the end of this year if the cards fall right. Goldberg probably deserves to be in because of his insanely popular WCW run that was only rivaled by a few people in history, but certain people don’t seem high on letting him in. Billy won a pretty insane number of championships during his time with the company and was part of one of their most popular groups ever. WWE loves their Samoans, and Rikishi is definitely one of them. He won an IC & Tag Team title and was tremendously over with the sumo gimmick. There was one point where people thought he could be a main eventer…then he did it for the Rock and it was over from there.

The Rest: Benoit, Henry, Tajiri, Rhyno, Hurricane, Spike, Dupree, A-Train, Shelton, The Cat, Rico, Nunzio, Haas

Benoit’s not getting in. You can make the argument that he should because he was a great wrestler and had a lot of memorable moments in WWE, but he has less of a chance of getting honored by WWE in this fashion than I do. I like some of these guys a lot, but I can’t make any type of HOF argument for them with a straight face. Might not stop one or two of them from getting in.

2004 has a couple of factors working against it, the biggest being old farts like me that grew up watching the guys in the late 80s & early 90s are going to favor those wrestlers over people that come along later regardless of whether they’re “better” or not. I’m willing to revisit the question in a few years, but right now I wouldn’t put the 04 class in the class of 90 or 92.

The fans at Raw were chanting “who are ya”,not “water.” It’s a standard chant at football matches here.Crunch King

I like British chants, and British beer is pretty good too. I appreciate the pro-American sentiment from last week, but we don’t need hate between America & Britain. Back when I used to get e-mails, a pretty good percentage of them came from readers in the United Kingdom, and they were always fantastic people. Some of my best Internet friends are from England.

I don’t buy that the face divas don’t have any personalities. When the Bellas were faces, their matches on Superstars always had Nikki doing something to mock her opponents and poor Brie was the whipping girl. The result was that the crowd was into what they were doing most of the time.

I think the face divas problems is that they are as emotionless as the crowd is dead for a LayCool segment. I know people on the internetz get boners for movez, but the live crowd wants emotion. If the people in the match don’t give off a vibe of not giving a damn, why should the crowd?

When Eve came out on Raw, she just smiled like she was brain dead. Hello? These two sneaky Bellas just took your title and all you have to show for it is a mindless grin? Then the match that followed was Eve trying to be flashy while Nikki was trying to soften Eve up as much as she can. I would understand if Eve “knew” she could beat the Bellas, but what harm would it have done to try to pull some hair? (Besides to Nikki of course)Guest#0339

I think the Bellas “get” wrestling a lot more than people give them credit for, and that’s a pretty great point about Eve. She should have been pissed that the Bellas stole her title, but it didn’t seem to bother her all that much. Maybe that’s her being extremely confident that she’ll get the title back, but usually when people lose things they get mad about it.

Personally, I’d rather have Daniel Bryan and Sin Cara as a tag team. Cara could dazzle the fans while Bryan tied opponents in knots. Then, when they eventually broke up, you know the feud would be good.G-Walla

This is a pretty great idea and I wish I‘d thought of it. For one thing, Sin Cara wouldn’t have to change his style to work with the rest of the WWE guys. Bryan has worked with lucha libre guys in the past, and I doubt he’d have any problems with getting on the same page with Sin Cara.

The whole “WWE style” thing is already a problem for Sin Cara…since they didn’t stick him in developmental forever and are kind of letting him do his thing, he’s in the ring with a lot of wrestlers that have no idea what his thing is. Like last Monday. Miz & Alex Riley are pretty much the epitome of WWE style workers. They know that style and very little else. The style can work, but this leads to another problem that WWE has had for quite some time…everybody works the same style. If everybody’s working the same style of match, then nobody’s going to stand out from the pack. If nobody stands out, nobody draws money. I’ve always thought of good wrestling shows as a three-ring circus type of thing. If you don’t like the high-flyers, maybe you’ll like the big bruising brawlers. If you don’t like the technical wrestlers that can‘t talk, maybe you’ll like the great talkers that can’t work. If you have lots of different things going on, that can draw in fans with varied tastes. For the last decade or so, WWE’s been training all of their performers to work the same way, and a lot of them seem to look the same and say the same things, albeit with different accents. Some do it better than others, and some bring unique things to the table that get them a fan following.

Sin Cara needs to be Sin Cara. It’ll take some time to adjust to the ring and the workers, but he doesn’t need an overhaul or anything like that. I mean, if you’re going to bring in a masked wrestler that works just like everybody else, why would you bother to sign the biggest star in Mexico? You could find some random little guy on their roster & put him under a mask like TNA’s doing in response to all of this if you just want another generic dude that wears a mask.

Watch the IWC suddenly like Truth.The Great Capt. Smooth

Tell you what, if he has a few good matches in the next few weeks he could very well become the newest IWC darling. I haven’t been a huge Truth fan for most of his career, for the exception of very early TNA when he was working the “held-down African-American” gimmick and getting all sorts of heat from the Nashville fans. That guy showed some fire and looked like he could be a pretty big deal. He disappeared not long afterwards. Maybe he can find some of that fire he had back then and make this heel turn work.

Who do you think is going to the NBA finals and who will win the title Steve (you could also include NHL if you want)? If you don’t want to answer the question you don’t have to.Still Guest#8287

I’m not a hockey guy, so I’ll leave that alone.

I think the East comes down to three teams: Chicago, Miami & Boston. That Miami vs. Boston series in the conference semi-finals is going to be sick. I was cold on the Celtics heading into the playoffs because they played like crap after the Kendrick Perkins trade, but it looks like they’ve turned it on like so many veteran teams do in the playoffs. The Knicks weren’t the same without Billups & Amar’e being healthy, but I thought they’d at least win a game. I’m really high on the Celtics right now. Yeah, Perkins is gone, but they’ve still got that veteran group of Allen, Pierce & Garnett that know how to step their game up to another level. Perhaps more importantly, they’ve got Rajon Rondo. Derrick Rose is better than Rondo, but he doesn’t have the weapons around him that Rondo does. The Celtics are finding their mojo, and I think it’s going to be a rerun of last year, where they weren’t the best team in the East all year but were the best at the right time. I don’t think the Heat figure out how to beat them, and I don’t think Derrick Rose has enough help to take the Bulls back to the Finals twenty years after the beginning of their first three-peat.

As for the West, it’s a little tougher to read. You’d think the Lakers & Spurs would be the favorites since they’ve got the experience, but they’ve both been very unimpressive in their first round series. People were sleeping on Dallas heading into the playoffs, but they’ve been good so far…at least until that last game where they blew a huge lead & let Portland back into that series. How about Memphis? That’s a good-looking young team, and they’ve got the King on their side! I think the Lakers turn it on eventually, and it’s tough to pick against them in these situations. But I will, if for no other reason than picking Celtics/Lakers seems boring. The Oklahoma City Thunder is my favorite team to watch and they’ve been on fire lately. Durant & Westbrook are two young players that are already among the best in the league, guys like Serge Ibaka have stepped their game up, and the addition of Perkins gave them some much-needed toughness & playoff knowledge. I think they’re the best team in the West right now, and they’ve taken care of business against a very good Denver team. They’ve got everything a team could need to make it to the Finals.

I think if it comes down to Celtics vs. Thunder, it comes down to experience and the older guys on the Celtics wanting one more ring while they can still get one. I never thought I would pick the Celtics as recently as a week ago, but that’s the way it’s looking right now. I may change my mind next week.

And now, the fake news!

So the WWE Draft was pretty eventful. The word was that people within WWE were in a panic and that’s why they bumped the draft up to April when it was originally supposed to be in June. The scripts given out at Raw did not contain the names of the performers getting drafted. That’s how WWE keeps these things from getting out on the Internet…unless WWE.com moves people to different roster pages. That kind of defeats the purpose. I’m a bit torn on this policy…on one hand, it makes sense to keep people in the dark so they don’t go running to the Dave Meltzers of the world and tell them who’s going where. On the other hand, it’s kinda shitty to give people a new job and not pull them aside & tell them before making it public knowledge.

I dunno, I have the feeling that somebody like John Cena knows where he’s going to be next week. I could be wrong, but I think WWE tells the tippy-top guys what’s going on, and the other people who might be prone to spill the beans probably aren’t told anything.

WWE & USA issued a press release announcing that next week’s Raw will celebrate the Rock’s birthday. It notes that celebrities will be in the house, the Divas have promised to give Rock a present he’ll never forget, and all of the WWE Superstars will be in attendance. It’ll be the biggest birthday party in television history! What would be the biggest birthday party in television history?

Gail Kim & Awesome Kong have been going back & forth on Twitter in order to build up interest in a possible WWE feud. Considering Gail’s status in WWE these days, this is probably how their feud should go…

-Kong debuts against Gail
-Kong kills Gail
-Kong moves on

I hate to say it because I’m a big Gail fan and love what she has to bring to the table, but the fact is that she hasn’t meant a whole lot to the WWE Universe in quite some time. If Kong debuted and had some good, even matches with Gail, they wouldn’t be saying “Wow, they’re great wrestlers”, they’d be saying “Jeez, this chick was supposed to be tough? She can barely beat Gail Kim!”. I’d love to be wrong on this, but I doubt I am.

The Divas got to go home early from the European Vacation because they would not have been allowed to perform in their costumes in Qatar. They wouldn’t have been allowed to perform out of their costumes either, in case you’re thinking they’re some kind of nudist country or something. Quite the opposite.

Jerry “The King” Lawler was at the Spurs/Grizzlies game on Saturday night and led Mempho to their first ever home playoff victory. Video below:

It looks like the Spurs need Shawn Michaels to show up for Game 5 & super kick the Grizzlies back to Memphis.

-It’s too bad Rima couldn’t cut the mustard. I think she’s got a future in the business if she wants it. You’d be surprised how spots will magically open up for beautiful women in wrestling.

-They didn’t waste any time starting that battle royal. I guess that’ll happen when you’ve only got a two-hour draft.

-Unless this is a JCW-style battle royal that lasts three minutes, wouldn’t they be better served doing something that takes up less time?

-Evan Bourne in the Final 4! Did they forget to eliminate him?

-Kofi’s also in there even though people keep telling me he’s getting fired. Hmmm.

-I think Evan & Mason Ryan could be a fun tag team if one of them turned. So of course they get dumped out by Big Show & Kofi.

-SD Draft Lottery Pick 1…John Cena? Woah. Anybody call that one?

-Cena’s going back to the show where he started out! I can dig that. I bet SyFy can dig that too…kids love them some Cena, and they’ll surely tune into SD on Friday night to see him.

-Yeah, I think that makes up for Edge leaving. (No offense to Edge)

-Is Todd Grisham draft-eligible?

-Cena’s taking all of this a million times better than JR did in 2008, or Triple H did back in 2004.

-No music for R-Truth? Maybe his heel theme should be “Get Crunk”.

-R-Truth doesn’t do a lot of live promos, the “WHAT” is rattling him badly.

-Why would the fans boo themselves?

-I think Truth’s a lot more interesting as a heel. I’m not sure if this has to do with him being dull as dishwater as a face or not, but he does seem fresher now than he did two weeks ago.

-I think I see what that commenter was talking about with Eve. We see a big scary video featuring Kharma Kong (I bet this is what Byers calls her in WOTW), and she’s just standing there smiling and waving to the people. Poor girl doesn’t realize she’s a Barbie doll. A Latina Barbie, but a Barbie nonetheless.

-So why is Michelle here anyway?

-I would say it would be to further her angle with Layla, but it got overshadowed by Cole yelling like an idiot.

-Layla beats up Michelle. You go girl! Oh, and Eve won the match. How about that.

-Raw Draft Lottery Pick 1…Rey Mysterio!

-Well, obviously Cody vs. Rey is ending at Extreme Rules

-Maybe this will help Cody become more mentally balanced.

-Maybe this gives Sin Cara somebody to work with that knows his style.

-Good God, JR has a match tonight? Who did I piss off?

-This is the part where somebody tells me that Cole’s been talking about it all night. You think I listen to what Cole says? I got a news column to write here, I don’t have time for drivel!

-“Booyaka Booyaka bye bye bye.” says Cody. Speaking of “Bye Bye Bye”, I think Nsync is the only boy band not on the Dancing show this week. Probably because the rest of the boys called Justin Timberlake and he just laughed at them before hanging up.

-Sheamus looks even more ridiculous than usual wrestling in a red t-shirt. I’m usually a fan of Sheamus’s ridiculous look, but it’s not really working for me.

-Not that it matters if Sheamus’s look works for me. Between talking about boy bands and whether a dude’s look works for me…you know, I should probably get off this train.

-Of thought! Freaks.

-Kofi Kingston beats Sheamus. Obviously he’s getting fired.

-SD Draft Lottery Pick 2…Randy Orton?

-Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle. Who’s gonna be the top face on Raw? Rey? Santino? ZACK FREAKING RYDER? Nah, that’d be way too awesome.

-Not that I’m complaining, send all the talent to SmackDown! I need things to write about for the Rs!

-I wonder if England won’t show this match because it features “Sir Michael Cole”.

-The Miz’s shirt said 40 because he’s the 40th WWE Champion. JR’s jersey says 7 because that’s how many McSkillets he had for breakfast.

-This has been quite the match. Hey, who’s representing what brand here?

-Doesn’t this referee know there’s no such thing as a timeout? Who makes the rules around here?

-SOME GROUND & POUND BY ROSS! Ha, he busted Cole’s lip! Tremendous!

-JR gets whipped by Cole, but since it’s Cole doing the whipping it probably doesn’t hurt much.

-Where the hell did the blood on JR’s face come from? Did he head butt Cole? And how come the announcers are allowed to bleed & the wrestlers aren’t?

-SCOTT STANFORD! He’s been moved to Miz interviewing duty now that Randy Orton’s on SmackDown & he’s sold all of his InviZible Jump Ropes.

-Miz guarantees that Raw will be cancelled if he gets drafted to SmackDown. Not if they have Zack Ryder as the top face they won’t.

-The commercial for the Raw house show in Highland Heights hypes Cena/Orton vs. Miz/Punk. Card subject to change.

-Dolph Ziggler vs. Randy Orton illustrates how bad an idea it was for Dolph to get that haircut. HE LOOKS JUST LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE NOW!

-When did Randy start trying to grow a beard? I kinda like it, it’s a different look for him.

-SD gets two picks now! Man, there might not be anybody left on Raw by the end of the night!

-SD Draft Lottery Pick…well, never mind, CM Punk has something to say!

-Mark Henry & Sin Cara got drafted to SD during the commercial. Cara makes sense, I thought he’d end up on SD to begin with anyway. Henry is Henry. I like him, but I don’t see him doing much more on SD than he was on Raw.

-Poor Wade, you know he’s doing the job since Raw has to get some picks one of these days.

-Rey’s music playing means I’m right.

-Raw Lottery Pick 2…The Big Show!

-He’s a Tag Team Champion, so I guess he’ll still appear on both shows. Maybe?

-Raw Lottery Pick 3…Alberto Del Rio!

-John Morrison seems unimpressed, but Yoshi Tatsu is pleased!

-Indeed, what about Brodus Clay? What about Raven?

-Good ol’ NC State. I’m a little surprised Kevin Nash hasn’t shown up since it’s the home of the Wolfpack.

-Teddy Long in the hizzy!

-Raw heels against SmackDown faces! Go SmackDown!

-What? When I write about SmackDown people expect insight and analysis. When I write about Raw people expect drunken ramblings. One is much harder to do than the other, and I need good talent to help me out with it.

-The Supplemental Draft happens Tuesday at noon! I hope Csonka covers it live again, his coverage of last years Supplemental Draft was one of the greatest things ever. Him slowly losing his will to live made for some interesting reading.

-Alberto looked pretty mad when he got drafted, but he seems happy now that he has a spiffy red t-shirt.

-A “Ryder or Riot” sign! Where’s that pesky sign police?

-The World’s Strongest Man is wearing the World’s Biggest T-Shirt.

-Remember when Cena & Christian had quite the tiff going a few years back? I wonder if Christian will remember that in a few weeks or so…

-Looks like Mark Henry noticed how many faces are on SmackDown now and figured “Hey, maybe if I turn heel I’ll get some attention!”. Smart man.

-And Cena puts over Miz.

-Punk & Del Rio embrace! Alberto, you don’t know where that man’s been!

-Raw Draft Lottery Pick 4…John Cena! SWERVE~!

-I don’t think the Raw heels appreciate this as much as the fans do.

-This reminds me of the time where Cena got fired from WWE and didn’t actually go away. Oh well, Randy Orton is your new top face on SmackDown. Rey & Del Rio go to Raw. Sin Cara goes to the show where they can edit him. Not all that much really changed, though I’m sure WWE will say it did.

-Now we wait for the Supplemental Draft, where all of my favorite wrestlers will probably switch brands!

Rumors are running rampant about changes coming to TNA, but I think we’re going to wait until somebody other than the Honky Tonk Man reports them before running with the stories. Nothing against Honky, he’s great people, but the bosses here don’t want me saying something unless Da Meltz or PWInferior report it first. So we’ll just run with the “safe” stories this week.

Former X Division Champion Jay Lethal was released from TNA last week. I think Lethal‘s fans would describe his TNA run as frustrating, as on a few occasions they gave him major victories over guys like Kurt Angle & Ric Flair, but then he would get jobbed out and ignored until the next time they felt like doing something with him. He held the X Division title on six separate occasions and also won the Tag Team title once, but every time it seemed like he was ready to move up and become a star in TNA, he’d be losing in the opening matches again. Weird stuff.

I always thought the kid (I can call him a kid, he’s younger than me) had a heck of a lot of potential. He was pretty impressive during his time with ROH & had some great moments in TNA. I’d love to see him in WWE because that’s where the money is, but there’s always the indies & Japan as options. I have to figure WWE would be interested, if for no other reason that they signed Consequences Creed to a developmental deal and he was the weak link of Lethal Consequences.

We should be expecting Mick Foley to return to Impact in some capacity very soon so they can plug his new DVD. There were some rumors going around last week that he had rejected a potential storyline where he would have been the person at “the network” that has been giving Hulk Hogan & Eric Bischoff so much grief. That did seem to be what they were building towards, though you can never really tell for sure since it’s TNA. I’m not a mind reader, but if I had to guess, Foley knows how this whole authority figure thing goes and he knows it’s not going to change from the last time, when he was the “executive shareholder” and that got blown to hell when Bischogan showed up.

Thing is, I’m not sure what else you do with the guy. Do you feud him with Abyss again in a battle of guys with missing front teeth?

There have been reports going around that Ric Flair would be undergoing surgery to repair his rotator cuff, but Jim Ross reported over the weekend that while Flair’s shoulder was “horrid”, he would not be undergoing surgery. Hopefully Flair can recover and be able to go about his everyday life, but having a “horrid” shoulder doesn’t sound all that great to me.

There have been rumors going around about Desmond Wolfe’s medical status. All I can say for sure is that he doesn’t seem to be returning to TNA anytime soon, and is apparently appearing in some community plays in the Central Florida area and pursuing some writing projects. I remember reading about him working on a book early in his ROH days, so maybe writing is something that he could pursue without suffering more concussions or bicep tears.

It’s been way too long since we had some Sexi Star in the column.

Former WWE main-eventer Batista will not be appearing with the MMA promotion StrikeForce as had been originally planned. It seems that the new ownership behind Strike Force (UFC) wasn’t too enthralled with the idea of having an ex-wrestler in his late-30s with no experience in martial arts, amateur wrestling or any other form of legitimate combat make his MMA debut on their broadcast. Before you ask “But Steve, what about Brock Lesnar, who UFC pushed to the top of their cards immediately?”, keep in mind that Brock was an NCAA heavyweight wrestling champion and is eight and a half years younger than Batista. His case is much different from Batista’s.

So what’s next for Batista? Will he follow his MMA dream elsewhere? Will he continue to try and find movies to be in? Or will he return to pro wrestling, which I would consider the “sure thing” for him as far as making money goes. WWE would gladly take him back at this point, and TNA could probably get Spike TV to pay him enough money to make a couple of trips to Orlando a month. TNA’s limited schedule could be quite appealing to Batista, who’s in his early 40s and might not be up for the WWE road schedule.

Charly Manson (or Charly Malice depending on where you watch him) was arrested on Sunday morning after assaulting two police officers who were trying to arrest him and a friend for being drunk in public. He & the friend (who was underage, by the way) tried to get help from the officers when they couldn’t find their car. This ended up leading to a heated argument & an altercation with the friend being shot in the leg & the two officers being sent to the hospital, one with head injuries. Now this is the kind of guy that could have worked for Bill Watts in Mid-South! Watts always said that if his wrestlers got into fights outside of the ring, they better win or else they’d be fired for making the business look bad. No word on if Charly has been released from prison or not.

Colt Cabana lost the NWA title to The Sheik on Saturday night in Jacksonville, Florida. Cabana had just won the title last month after a lengthy program with Adam Pearce on NWA Hollywood telecasts, so this came as a bit of a surprise to most people. The Sheik was formerly known as Joey Machete in several Florida-area promotions before changing his gimmick in 2008 to that of a Sheik tribute act. He originally called himself Sheik Ali Azzad, but Sabu told him that he could just go by The Sheik as long as he did justice to the gimmick that Sabu’s uncle made famous. Apparently he’s done well enough so far.

Interestingly enough, NWA Hollywood, the most visible of the NWA affiliates these days, announced on their Twitter that they do not plan to book the current NWA Champion. There’s probably more to this story than meets the eye, but I haven’t been able to find anything out for certain. One could assume they would not be happy that they spent all this time building the Cabana/Pearce feud on television, did the big title change and then the belt changed again a month later in Florida in another promotion that doesn’t have as many fans or buzz.

All I can say for sure is that I’m a huge Cabana mark and I don’t know much about the Sheik. I’m not sure what putting the belt on Sheik does for the NWA’s status, and it’s a little weird that some of these guys hold on to NWA championships forever (Sheik’s been the North American Champion for over 400 days, and the guy before him held it over 700 days), and Cabana has to give it up in a month. It’s a shame. Expect Randy Harrison to discuss this topic in his Bell to Bell News Report this week, and it’ll be very interesting to read what he has to say since he recaps the NWA Hollywood TV show and is part of their website operation.

We here at the Corner would like to wish a speedy recovery to Road Warrior Animal, who was briefly hospitalized with bronchitis last weekend. Bronchitis can be quite the mother, as this news reporter can attest to. I didn’t have to go to the hospital though, so obviously I am tougher than Road Warrior Animal.

He’s not reading this, right? Good.

Scott Hall is apparently in very bad shape these days. His ex-wife Dana is afraid that he will drink himself to death, and has been trying to get help for Scott via Twitter & an open letter that Mike Mooneyham posted in his column this week. Scott had been trying to overcome his demons recently, but apparently he couldn’t do it. He isn’t the first one & won’t be the last one.

Finally, CZW is having an open talent search! The deadline happens to be today, so you better hurry up and send a photo, resume & video footage to [email protected].

I’ll start with some non-411 stuff. Cageside Seats has been killing it with their coverage of the Daffney situation. TNA fans won’t want to read this one.

Mick Foley‘s #10forRAINN campaign is nearing an end, so I encourage all of you to contribute whatever you can to a worthy cause. If you contribute enough money you can get a phone call from Mick, or an autographed picture, or even a Hardcore Legend mowing your lawn!

The Sandwich included some WWE Draft predictions from myself & Private Kirk. He needs to be around longer before I call him Captain.

I battled Ryan Byers in the latest edition of Buy or Sell. For the record, I didn’t yell at DeMarco because he had “my girl” in his column. I stuck my tongue out at him and did the throat-slash motion, but there was no yelling. I was a little disappointed that she didn’t get more support for being in the Versus segment, but it is what it is.

The Triple Threat talks some Rey Mysterio. I thought Rey Hate was a phenomenon exclusive to SmackDown recap commenters, but I saw a lot of it at the BW3s during WrestleMania too. The common complaint was that he’s too small to beat anybody believably, proving that Vince isn’t the only person who thinks that way.

Weyer talks about appreciation, which is something that I don’t show enough of most of the time.

Ramirez covers the latest lucha news.

Bazar lists ten guys who would have been perfect in different eras. I’m not sure I’m sold on Ricky Steamboat being perfect for the era we’re in now. In-ring, sure. Personality-wise? I don’t see it. WWE wouldn’t push him because he isn’t much of a promo. I could see him adding some psychology to TNA’s X Division, which wouldn’t be a bad thing. But he’d be lucky to get to work one long match a month there, as opposed to back in the day when he & Flair were having long matches every night all over the Carolinas.

Reading Thomas’s thoughts on Impact in the Rs column always makes me wonder if I underrated SmackDown.

Nedeff reviews some SMW. I hate to say it because I love Corny, but with shows like that one you can kind of see why they went out of business. Terry Gordy & Brad Armstrong in a title program in 1995? A midget coming out of a box? “General” Cornette? Are you serious? And I don’t mean that in a good way like when I asked Zack Ryder if his YouTube videos were serious.

Well, that’s all we have time for this week! Don’t forget to join me & the Kirker on Saturday for the Wrestling Sandwich, and I’ll be right back here next week with more News From Cook’s Corner! Until next time…

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