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Thursday Sports Entertainment News Report 08.02.12: The Newest Wrestling Fan Returns!

August 2, 2012 | Posted by Sean Kelly

I’ve been coming to 411 for like 12 or 13 years and this is my first ever comment. Your daughter’s intro to and thoughts on wrestling are fucking adorable and I sincerely hope it becomes a recurring feature

Posted By: Guest#6713 (Guest) on July 27, 2012 at 04:58 AM

Thank you very much. And thanks to everyone that took the time to express such heartwarming and funny comments on Victoria’s RAW review. It does my heart good to know that my kid brightened your day, even just for a little bit.

It also pleases me to announce that, due to popular demand, Victoria has returned this week to review RAW 1001!

Liked the stuff about your kid…but why’d you tell her its fake? Finding out it was fake was one of the most disappointing days of my life when I was a kid. My dad told me during Bret Hart’s fued with Lawler after a house show.

Posted By: Guest#1705 (Guest) on July 26, 2012 at 01:47 AM

While I understand that there’s a certain “magic” to believing that wrestling is real, it had more to do with understanding my daughter’s personality than taking any moral or ethical stand. Victoria is a worrier – even though she knows it’s fake, she keeps asking me if they are hurt. To make her feel better, she needs to know that they aren’t really hurting each other, they’re just putting on a show. That, and I don’t want her thinking that people beating up other people is ok, or trying any of the moves on her sister.

“- In a funny moment regarding Brock, Victoria asked why “that man is a lobster.” My guess is she kept hearing “Lesnar” & “Brock,” combining them into the word “lobster”

IT WAS A BROCK LOBSTER

Posted By: The B-52’s (Guest) on July 26, 2012 at 05:11 AM

There are many people that type “LOL” to signify that they find something funny, not necessarily because they literally laughed out loud. Well, not me. When I read that comment, I legit LOLed.

BROCK LOBSTER!

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Greetings, folks, and welcome to another edition of Thursday Sports Entertainment! The bird is the word!

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WORLD (WRESTLING ENTERTAINMENT) NEWS TONIGHT

Dolph Ziggler is currently expected to get a World Title run some time this year. Ziggler’s work rate and sell for his opponents has been winning people over, and many of the company’s top babyface talent are eager to work with him because of his ability to make people look good.

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Well, winning the Money in the Bank briefcase is certainly a good indicator that Ziggler will be in a Main Event program at some point this year. Also, Dolph does take some awesome bumps (although my personal favorite bump this year is Slater selling JBL’s clothesline from hell). But making people look good is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it makes you valuable to the company, as the WWE could always use a talented sports entertainer that makes the rest of their roster look unstoppable. Steady employment is a good thing! On the other hand, it could become your calling card, where all you do is lose to the next up-and-coming guy. Just ask Chavo Guerrero how well that worked out for him.

And what is “Dolph” short for, anyway? Rudolph? Dolphin? Or, let’s not hope…Adolph? Ziggler would had a ready-made feud with Goldberg, if it’s Adolph.

The Great Khali underwent surgery at UPMC Presbyterian in Pittsburgh to get a tumor removed from his pituitary gland yesterday. The tumor could have led to acromegaly, which Andre the Giant had and can be fatal if not treated. The procedure was performed by Joseph Maroon, who is WWE’s medical director.

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Said tumor was reported to be found during one of WWE’s Wellness Examinations. Say what you will about the Wellness Policy, but it sure saved Khali’s life. ABC News ran an article questioning whether WWE could be liable for not detecting the tumor earlier, but I think that’s pushing logic a bit. If Khali were still in India and never became a wrestler, the odds of getting the quality medical care that would have detected this tumor would be long, in my opinion. Best of luck to Khali as he recovers from a successful operation.

Charlie Sheen recently spoke with IGN about his run-ins with Daniel Bryan and possibly wrestling him at Summerslam and being the Social Media Ambassador for RAW 1000. Highlights are below.
“Well, the numbers worked for us. Because I cancelled Twitter, I had to do that as a backup plan. It was fun. It was the deepest into that world I’d ever gone. And I guess the guy who was egging me on is a real problem. And he and I will solve that later. Print that.

“It was a promotional tool for our show [Anger Management] and I think everybody is going to win on that one. But it was exciting just to step into a different world that I didn’t ever really believe existed – and still don’t!”

He said it would take a lot of money to get him to wrestle Bryan at Summerslam.
“Oh, there’s gonna have to be a lot of money on that one, but yeah, if it’s the right look at that moment, sure, why not?”

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They definitely have plans for Charlie Sheen. Sheen and Bryan wouldn’t keep mentioning each other if they didn’t. My gut feeling is that they plan on doing something with the two of them, but haven’t worked out anything specific yet. If I’m WWE, I’m using the fact that Charlie quit twitter right before RAW 1000 as leverage in getting him to do something that generates a lot of publicity. After all, they were counting on getting the exposure of Sheen tweeting to his 7 million-plus followers, with the expectation that many of them would tune into RAW. Getting him to do a live appearance (possibly a match) or a pre-taped bit is win-win, as it would promote both WWE and Anger Management, Sheen’s new series on FX. With Kane attacking Bryan this past Monday & saying the words “anger management,” I wouldn’t be surprised if the Big Red Monster was thrown into the mix as well.

And I still marvel at how far Daniel Bryan has come in the past year and a half. In Wrestlemania XVII he wrestled in a pre-show dark match. He then won Money in the Bank, became World Heavyweight Champion, participated in one of the more memorable Heavyweight matches at WrestleMania XVIII, kicked off the “Yes!” phenomenon, stayed in the main event scene and looks to be feuding with an A-list television star/pop culture mainstay. Not a bad rise, if you ask me.

Word is that the majority of WWE talents are said to be unhappy with Raw moving to three hours. The general feeling is that in the long run, the move will prove to be a bad idea.

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PROS: So far, after two episodes, the three hour RAW experiment has been successful. Just look at RAW 1001. Back before the switch to three hours, the fantastic Bryan/Sheamus street fight would have been given 5-6 minutes, tops. Young guys like Tyson Kidd, Darren Young and Titus O’Neal are getting more TV time. Yeah, the Tout stuff is annoying and I still don’t see the point of Shazam, but the experiment is still in its early stages and they’ll refine as they go forward.

CONS: After three hours of wrestling, I was feeling a bit worn out. Also, I wonder if the talent & crew are being compensated for working an extra hour every Monday?

There were numerous names that were contacted to appear at last week’s Raw 1,000 event. Some of those names were Tatanka, Steve Blackman and Big Daddy V.

Going forward, WWE may be using older names as a weekly gimmick for the show. Internally, many believe that the Heath Slater storyline (featuring cameos by past stars) helped bring back some of the audience that had tuned out.

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Man, I hope this happens. I mean, it’s 5 minutes of a three hour show. I could watch Slater get beat up every week for the rest of my life. It’s also nice to see some of the “old-timers” get the chance to step into the ring and soak up the adulation of the fans one last time. Not only that, it’s something unique to add to the mix. I say do it, WWE!

WWE spokesman Brian Flinn recently spoke out on the latest criticism aimed at WWE during Linda McMahon’s Connecticut Senate campaign, claiming that the WWE TV product is violent. Linda’s chief opponent, Chris Shays, has previously stated that McMahon benefited from violence and brutality as CEO of WWE. Here is what Flinn had to say…

“WWE’s 13 million weekly TV viewers and our 100 million social media followers would disagree that WWE’s content is violent. WWE programming is TV-PG and family friendly, with women making up nearly 40 percent of our audience. Contrary to the assertion about our content, WWE is in the business of putting smiles on people’s faces.”

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Wha? WWE isn’t violent? Come on. I understand that Linda feels she needs to disassociate her past from promoting violence, but that’s exactly what she did for decades. Guys beating each other up is the definition of violence, so don’t piss on our legs and tell us it’s raining, Mr. Flinn. Linda McMahon has personally made hundreds of millions of dollars off of violent television programming, why not own up to it? It’s a free country, if you don’t like the programming WWE has to offer, then don’t watch.

And what’s with politicians trying to conform to a certain mold? They should just be who they are. For example, Mitt Romney is running scared from the fact that he’s worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Why? Why not just say “Hey, I love making money. I love making money so much that I want you to make money, too. Yeah, I outsourced jobs, but only because the government makes it expensive to keep them here with the highest tax rate on businesses in the world. I’ll make it easy to keep jobs in America. I’ll make it easier for you to make money, just like I did. Oh, and my specialty is taking large organizations on the brink of financial catastrophe and making them profitable. Sound familiar?”

Can you imagine if he had the courage to do that? Mitt Romney’s #1 problem is that he seems inauthentic. Why not embrace the capitalist we all know you are and use it as a positive? Like Paul Heyman says “accentuate the positives, hide the negatives.” Romney would then come across as an authentic guy. We may not like him more, but we’ll sure respect him and maybe even trust him to fix the economic problems this country has.

I don’t care whether you vote for Obama or Romney, but I miss the days when politicians could just be themselves, instead of pretending to be what they think people want to see. Think Teddy Roosevelt or Andrew Jackson could get elected in today’s political climate?

In an interview with The Phoenix New Times, Rob Van Dam compared WWE to TNA.

He said: “In Total Nonstop Action, individual wrestlers have a lot more freedom to artistically express themselves versus WWE. When we have our matches, they are known to be more athletic, more competitive in nature, and that’s what wrestling fans really appreciate. And the fact there’s more of a focus on wrestling in Total Nonstop Action over the other major company on TV. Whereas WWE has been known to feature more of the 400-pound giants that aren’t necessarily going to (perform) quite as impressively.”

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I get that RVD is showing support for his current employer. I’m sure if he had a WWE contract he’d be praising the WWE product in every interview he gave. And he’s right in the sense that TNA does emphasize the wrestling aspect of the show more than WWE.

But to say that wrestlers “artistically express themselves” in TNA is laughable. What the hell does that mean, anyway? And yes, WWE does have a few 400-pound giants on the roster, many of whom 210 lb Daniel Bryan beat when he was Heavyweight Champion. They also have athletes of every shape and size, and these days, size doesn’t matter when it comes to being in the main event.

THE NEWEST WRESTLING FAN RETURNS

I am happy to say that Victoria is BACK, here to impart her innocent wisdom upon us, the jaded members of the Internet Wrestling Community. I didn’t plan on having her review RAW 1001 (or even RAW 1000, for that matter. That kind of happened on its own), but between your positive feedback and her enthusiasm for watching wrestling again, I figured why not?

So here, without further ado, is Victoria’s RAW 1001 review!

– When Punk came out to kick off the show, Victoria pointed at him and yelled “BAD GUY!” Good memory.

– Regarding Punk: “Daddy? He’s really skinny. How come you don’t see his muscles? You see muscles on all the other guys…”

– “Mommy told me that the wrestlers are alive.” This comment is great for a number of reasons, but to clarify – we often have to explain to her that the various cartoon characters she watches aren’t “real,” and that they’re just part of a show. She must have applied the same logic to the wrestlers, as they’re just part of a show as well.

– After the recap of last week, Victoria said “I feel bad for the guy who was in Journey 2

– When the crowd was cheering for Punk, she was shocked that people would ever cheer for a bad guy, asking “they’re saying hooray?!”

– Victoria liked how Santino was goofy. In the match between Santino & Del Rio, Victoria demanded that Santino “Do the 1-2-3 thing!” (aka “pin him!”)

– Victoria was upset that the bad guy won. She was incredulous that Santino lost, because “he was wearing his little cobra sock!” When Del Rio cut his post-match promo, Victoria thought he was speaking in Spanish.

– When Del Rio was going back up the ramp, he was asking “who’s the winner? Who’s the winner? Who’s victorious? Who’s victorious?” I tried to trick her into thinking he was asking “Who’s Victoria,” but she was too smart for me. 🙁

– She quickly got bored during the Brodus/Vickie dance segment. When Sandow came out to interrupt, Victoria asked “Is he going to wrestle them? None of them are wrestling!” When Sandow broke the Funkasaurus necklace, Victoria broke out her new catch phrase: “that’s not nice!”

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– She was very frustrated trying to understand who was a good guy and who was a bad guy. Last week, Punk (semi) turned heel and Jericho (semi) turned face, which was hard for her to process. She asked, exasperated, “So the bad guys are turning into good guys and the good guys are turning into bad guys? Arrrrrgggghhh!”

– Victoria laughed when AJ kept saying “No” to Bryan. When Bryan was yelling “NO!” at the crowd, Victoria astutely observed that “if he says no all the time, then he should get a t-shirt that says “NO!”

– We’ve been teaching Victoria about her Irish & Italian heritage. She’s also learning about what it means to be Catholic, even though she thinks Catholicism is a nationality, too. I told her that Sheamus is Irish, just like us. She liked that, then asked if he was Catholic too, adding “but I don’t know how to speak Catholic.”

– During the Bryan/Sheamus match, she yelled at Bryan, pleading that he “Stop hurting him!”

– Victoria offered Sheamus some sage advice: “Just kick him in the butt, duuuuuuuude.” And: “If I was a good guy and I was wrestling the bad guy, I would hit the bad guy with the stick 100 times.”

– When Sheamus picked up the steel steps, Victoria was extremely impressed, yelling “Strong man!”

– Once Sheamus won, Victoria literally jumped out of her seat and started cheering.

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– Victoria remembered that Heath Slater was a bad guy. When Orton came out, we had the following exchange:

Victoria: Has that man (Orton) ever won the big belt?
Me: Yes, lots of times
Victoria: Has that bad guy (Slater) ever won the big belt?
Me: Nope.
Victoria: Hooooo boy! (Translation: “He’s dead!”)

– When Bryan was screaming “Yes!” at the doctor, Victoria observed “Oh wow, there’s something wrong with him.”

– For the tag team match, I reminded her that Jericho is a good guy now. She didn’t believe me, with a protest of “but he’s wearing the same jacket!” Gotta love kid logic.

– Someone in the front row was booing the Miz, giving him the thumbs down. Victoria asked “why is that man putting his thumb down at the bad guy?” Then it dawned on me that she didn’t know what booing was. I explained to her that when you like someone, you cheer for them and give them the thumbs up. When you don’t like someone, you “boo” them and give them the thumbs down. She spent the rest of the show excitedly cheering and booing the wrestlers, ensuring that I was aware of which way her thumb was pointing.

– Here’s a quote from Victoria on the Miz. Remember, she’s five. “That bad guy smells like poop and farts and pee in the toilet!” YOU HEAR THAT, MIZ?! But really, I don’t know what Miz did to raise that kind of ire in my daughter, but there you go. The sign of a true heel.

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– Loved loved LOVED Ziggler wiggling his butt when he came out. She imitated him several times during the match.

– At one point, Christian was in a headlock, and he was wiggling his fingers for a long time. Victoria asked “is he doing magic?”

– “When it does the ding ding ding, does that mean the match is over?”

– Victoria thought that Tensai:
a) was really mean
b) made strange sounds and
c) looked like a tiger

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– She remembered the Undertaker, and was upset that he wouldn’t be on the show

– When John Cena was on the Big Show’s back giving him that semi-sleeper, Victoria thought that Big Show was giving Cena a piggy back ride.

– At the end of the show, I asked her what she thought. Victoria said that she didn’t like CM Punk. She also said that she really likes wrestling and that “if I was a wrestler and I knew karate, I would use my wrestling moves and be called The Awesome Ladybug Girl!”

And there you have it, The Awesome Ladybug Girl’s Guide to RAW 1001!

BROCK LOBSTER!

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NON-SPORTS ENTERTAINMENT THING OF THE WEEK

This week is a semi-sports entertainment thing – the release of They Live on Blu-Ray!

Man, I love this flick. The first time I ever saw it was in the summer of 1989, when I was 7 years old. My mom and I were staying at my aunt’s house in Ireland, and my cousins had a VHS copy, which we watched together. I must have watched it seven or eight times in one week.

During one such viewing, I was watching it alone in the living room. Toward the end of the movie, my Uncle Pat sat down to do some paperwork in the room next door. The last scene of the movie was my favorite, as that was the only scene that had sweet, sweet boobies in it. Not wanting to get caught watching a nude scene, I discreetly closed the door separating the living room from the room my uncle was in.

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Later that night, my mom pulled me aside and said “Uncle Pat told me that you closed the door on him while you were watching your movie.” I was frozen. Did he know about the nude scene in the end? Would seven-year-old Sean get in trouble for watching a movie with sweet, sweet boobies in it? And how could my uncle rat me out? That bastard!

She continued: “He told me that you were very thoughtful to close the door so he could do his paperwork in peace and quiet.” Whew! Crisis averted! And the funny part is that my Uncle Pat to this day – twenty five years later – still comments on how thoughtful I was at seven years old. Well, Uncle Pat, sometimes tits make you do nice things.

Nice times!

YOU’RE IN FOR A REAL TWEET

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SIGNING OFF

BROCK LOBSTER!

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Hasta Jueves,

This is Sean.

P.S. Happy Birthday, Momma!

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Sean Kelly

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