Ask 411 Wrestling 07.11.07: Commissions, Sawyers, Angelic Diablos and More!
Posted by Steve Cook on 07.11.2007
Including a Big Gulp! Not really, I just wanted to make a 7-11 reference.
It's time to Ask 411 Wrestling! I'm Steve Cook, and I hope everybody's having a good week so far. If you're not, don't worry because it's Hump Day! I still have no idea what that means...but I never get humped so what the hell do I know?
47 e-mails currently sit in the in-box. Lots of questions in there, but that doesn't mean there isn't room for you! I always have time for the opinions of readers, even those that aren't very nice...
Comments, Corrections & other "C" Words
RE: "Of course, the fact that he goes to Ohio State makes me question his mental state."
Mr. Cook,
Fuck you.
Thanks, Mr. Clark
I don't get hate mail very often, so I'm touched.
Cook--
I didn't have any questions or corrections this week but I just gotta say I laughed out loud with your response about Tony Chimel's job. You said his entrance for John Cena was kick-ass and I was thinking the same thing reading the question. I can here it in my head while I type this.
Anyways keep up the good column and props for a Benoit-free article. It was refreshing... - Mark S.
Refreshing's what we go for around here. Ashish loves it because the more you refresh, the more hits we get. Ashish loves you all...almost as much as he loves me. Don't hate him for it, I'm cute as a button. He can't help it.
Hiya mate, good column, just a couple of things about your current column.
Booker T dropping the N bomb is on Youtube. Im not plugging this as its nothing to do with me but there's a collection of videos called Botchamania 1,2,3,4 etc. If you search Botachamania you will find them and one of them has the Booker clip on it. Not sure which one but they are all pretty funny so it's no hardship if your correspondent wants to sit through them. There is a classic one where Mean Gene is interviewing Ken Patera and Patera makes a silly comment, that sounds kind of gay, and Mean Gene cracks up. Its really funny watching him trying to stifle his laughter!
As for tapping out, I agree that Shamrock really brought this to wrestling (and deserves a lot of credit for not only that, but for revolutionising submission wrestling in general, that he never gets) but I think Tazz also used this in the early days and probably deserves some of the credit for it. It's also interesting to note that Tazz was the one who ended Kurt Angle's undefeated streak.
Anyway, keep up the good work dude. - PureDynamite
in response to your readers question about james laurinaitas I heard a year ago that Vince McMahon has already mentioned to him a future career in WWE if football doesnt work out for him but Animal wants to keep him as far from that as possible right now... don't remember where I heard it, just that Vince personally mentioned it to him. - Jerry
Animal's a smart man...he knows where the money is.
I seem to remember the Iron Shiek claiming that Verne Gagne offered him money to break Hulk Hogan's leg prior to the first Wrestlemania. Maybe that was after he was turned down by Brody, who made the odd appearance in the AWA around that time. - Andrew Prentice
Yeah, I hadn't thought of Verne, but if there was a deal with Brody, he might have been the one to make the offer.
You mentioned Rick Rude always being a heel, but I think he was a mid card face in Mid-South around 1983, before he went to Memphis and turned heel. - Nick
Was there a time when Tito Santana was ever a heel? - Luke
Good question...I'm not sure he was one.
As for rude - wasn't he in nWo wolfpac for a couple weeks with curt hennig before defecting to hollywood? I pretty much consider them faces.
Was tommy dreamer ever a heel in ECW?
yeah, i know steamboat is the first name everyone thinks about, but these other names are worth considering. - Manu Bumb
I wouldn't count Rude's stint in the Wolfpac because he wasn't an active competitor.
Dreamer might have always been a babyface. He wasn't always treated like one, but he was always on the right side of things.
Just read another great edition of ask 411wrestling. In response to the Ricky Steamboat & Rick Rude face/heel career question, you mentioned that Rick Rude was a perennial heel throughout the duration of his career. However, I beg to differ.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I remember Rick Rude as a face for ECW back in '97. As I recall, he appeared as a "mysterious" masked man who would taunt Shane Douglas and Francine (see ECW Barely Legal). He stayed on as a quasi-face color commentator alongside Joey Styles. Of course, by that summer, it was discovered that Rude was in cahoots with the heels when he helped Lawler and company put the boots to Tommy Dreamer's motley crew of extreme loyalists. Hope this helps.
Also, I vaguely remember TNA attempting to turn Steamboat heel shortly after their inception in 2002. I wasn't following the TNA product at the time, but I remember hearing about Steamboat acting as a guest referee and screwing the babyface out of a win. Perhaps other readers can clarify this. - Wes Childers
I wouldn't count Rude's stint as a face commentator in ECW for the same reason I didn't count his stint in the Wolfpac, he wasn't an active competitor at that point. Steamboat wasn't active in TNA either, but I'm not sure they were actually trying to turn him. If I remember correctly, his decision was against Ron "The Truth" Killings, who TNA was pushing as a heel. But Killings was over with the crowd, so they kinda turned on Steamboat. Soon after, Steamboat gave Killings a title shot against NWA Champion Ken Shamrock and disappeared.
I will say this though, after watching his feud with Mick Foley in ROH, Steamboat really came off as either a dick or a guy that had no idea what he was talking about. On one show he was complaining about a hardcore tag team match with the Carnage Crew vs. Dan Maff & BJ Whitmer, then he cited an earlier match with CM Punk & Homicide as a classic example of "pure wrestling". Which is all well and good except for the fact that Homicide hit Punk with a chair just before finishing him off. Whoops!
The Steiner Brothers used Sid's WCW theme in Japan.
You can find it at yucube.com under New Japan theme
songs. It's also available on the soundtrack to Touken
Retsuden 3(NJPW 3) for Playstation 1.
Bagwell's finisher was named the Blockbuster to fit in
with his new "hollywood star/primadonna" persona. - Jamel Wright
Wendi was indeed married to Hugo Savinovitch; but they divorced several years ago.
I think Cena "got" that move (blockbuster/throwback) from Mr. Perfect Curt Hennig, who used that move quite often.
I never saw Tito Santana as a heel. In Puerto Rico, Carlos Colón (Carlito's father) has been a face forever (since the 70's) - Ariel Cardona, Vega Baja, Puerto Rico
I read somewhere that Wendi & Hugo had re-married after their divorce, but they could be wrong. In the weirdest e-mail I received last week, I got this one after my rant last week about diet soda and how it tastes good to me now...
While this is available please send this to your Senator and Congressman to help remove aspartame from the market. Below the video are some other links having to do with the new Ramazzini Study, Report For Schools, etc. Please also send this to the media in your city and state and countries around the world.
Lets help get aspartame out of the schools to save our children and off the planet.
Also we want people to know not to use Splenda a chlorocarbon poison. There is a safe sweetener now we've had an analysis run on, called Just Like Sugar which can be gotten from any Whole Foods or Wild Oats or on line. The large food chains in the UK are removing aspartame but then going to Splenda, like taking out cyanide but adding arsenic.
Also, Diane Fleming is in this movie. She was imprisoned because her husband died of methanol poison. Several aspartame experts have signed affidavits that on seeing the autopsy he died from aspartame. She passed 3 lie detector tests and the detective on the case says she is innocent, of course. http://www.namastepublishing.co.uk/Diane%20Fleming%20Story%20.htm
If everyone receiving this will send it to Congress, State and Federal, they will get the picture. And with the Ramazzini Studies in the news it will tell the story. The FDA, of course, knew aspartame caused cancer from the beginning. http://www.wnho.net/fda_letter_on_new_aspartame_study.htm
Here is the Report For Schools: http://www.wnho.net/report_on_aspartame_and_children.htm to save the children.
On Splenda: http://www.wnho.net/splenda_chlorocarbon.htm
Ramazzini Studies: http://www.wnho.net/new_aspartame_studies.htm and
http://www.laleva.org/eng/2007/04/aspartame_fda_spins_news_on_second_cancer_study.html and http://www.wnho.net/new_soffritti_study_on_aspartame.htm
And here is the movie. Enjoy! Let's do something great with it, like save millions of lives from aspartame (NutraSweet/Equal/Spoonful/E951, etc.)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-566922170441334340
Also, should be sent to all members of Parliament in every country.
All my best,
Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum, Founder
Mission Possible International
9270 River Club Parkway
Duluth, Georgia 30097
770 242-2599
www.wnho.net, www.dorway.com and www.mpwhi.com
Aspartame Toxicity Center, www.holisticmed.com
The Whole Story: http://www.mpwhi.com/ecologist_september_2005.doc
So if there's any members of Parliament reading this...there ya go. In related news, I highly recommend the new Diet Pepsi Max. Good stuff.
Questions!
Jeremy Morgan kicks it off with two questions...
1. I was watching WCW SuperBrawl III on WWE 24:7 and the opening contest saw Marcus Alexander (Buff) Bagwell and Erik Watts come out to the American Males theme in their match against The Hollywood Blondes. Now seeing as how Austin & Pillman came out to some generic dubbed over theme, it may be safe to assume they did this for Bagwell and Watts... but the American Males? Was this just a weird choice to dub the music or was this the original American Males team?
Sounds like a bizzare dubbing choice to me, since the American Males didn't debut until 1995, well after Superbrawl III took place in February 1993. Bagwell was being pushed as WCW's Rookie of the Year while Watts was another exciting newcomer that happened to be the son of Bill Watts, who just so happened to be running WCW at the time. How convenient. Bill wouldn't last much longer in that position, and Erik wouldn't last much longer in WCW either, leaving Bagwell to jump around from partner to partner much like Matt Sydal does these days in Ring of Honor.
2. What is the meaning of the "4-UP" on Elijah Burke's wrist tape?
The only thing I could find 4-UP standing for is Fourth Universal Paper. So I have no earthly idea what Elijah's wrist tape is supposed to mean. Readers?
Luke Smith brings us 2 questions from the land where the men are men, the women are women and the sheep are scared, New Zealand.
Are the Indy wrestlers of today as good as the Indy wrestlers of the past? I'd consider the top guys right now to be the likes of Bryan Danielson, Nigel McGuinness, Roderick Strong, Mistico etc. In the past the top guys have been the likes of Dean Malenko, Chris Jericho, Rey Mysterio etc. Do you think the 'new breed' are as good as these guys were when they were Indy workers or even as good as the last crop of top Indy workers who have been scooped up by TNA (AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Samoa Joe, Low Ki etc.)?
Well, it would be easy to say "no" because of how great guys like Jericho, Mysterio, Styles, Joe and the others have become. But that wouldn't be taking into consideration how guys like that were when they were in the indy promotions. I think the talent level in the indies has taken a hit due to the inception of TNA, since there are now two "non-indy" places to work in North America, and due to WWE having more developmental territories for young wrestlers to work. That being said, guys like Danielson & Nigel are superior to most of the guys in WWE developmental, and superior to a good portion of guys in WWE & TNA. The indy scene has a lot of crap in it, but there's also a lot of good young talent looking for a place to shine. I'd say the top talent in the indy scene now is pretty equal to the top indy talent from the early 2000s...I wouldn't quite rate them with the workrate~! guys from ECW in the mid 90s though. If ROH ever decides to shed that indy label and make their guys exclusive to them, that could change things in a negative direction for the indy scene.
Who from the Indys would you consider the closest in style to Sabu? I won't take no one for an answer!
That's too bad, because I'm tempted to go with "no one". Jack Evans doesn't use very many of Sabu's moves, but I see a lot of Sabu's insanity and not giving a fuck about the consequences of his moves on his own body in him.
Pete has two questions from Sydney, mate!
1/ Johnny Nitro is now the ECW World Champion. He has won a second teir in the IC championship and he has won the WWE tag titles many times. Does this make him a triple crown champion in wwe's eyes? IF he is now a triple crown champion, has anyone done it quicker? He won his first title in April 2005 so in reality, he has done it in just over two years.
No. He won the IC title on Raw, the tag team titles on Smackdown, and the ECW title in ECW. I would assume that a triple crown champion would be somebody who won three titles on one show. And I don't think anybody really considers the ECW title to be on the same level as the WWE or World titles because the competition for the ECW title isn't nearly as difficult as the competition for the WWE or World title. I would consider the ECW title to be on the same tier as the IC & US titles. I get the feeling that a lot of people out there will disagree with that stance, but does anybody really consider ECW to be on the same level as Raw or Smackdown? Of course not, so winning their main title isn't as impressive as winning the main title on Raw or Smackdown.
2/ Thinking back, Rick Steiner won the WCW tag titles on his own against The Giant and Scott Steiner at Haloween Havoc 1998 and Chris Benoit defeated La Resistance to win the world tag titles at Taboo Tuesday without the use of a tag partner. Have their been any other instances of one wrestler winning tag titles on his own?
Not in a tag team match, but I do recall 2 Cold Scorpio winning the ECW tag team titles in a singles match against Rocco Rock where Scorpio's TV title was also on the line. He gave the other tag team title belt to Sandman, but lost those titles and the TV title to Mikey Whipwreck in a singles match 2 months later. (December 1995 is when that took place) Cactus Jack accepted the other half of the tag team titles, much to Mikey's dismay. In April 1999, D-Von Dudley defeated Rob Van Dam in a singles match and won the tag team titles for himself and half-brother Bubba Ray Dudley.
Chris Vining has some questions concerning the Truth Commission...
Back in the day when the WWE/F was rampant with stables one of my favorites was the Truth Commission. They had a cult like leader in Cyrus (mostly on ECW fame), Kurgan (minus the dancing), Bull Buchanon, and a fourth member. I can't remember or find out tho the 4th member was. I have asked around and have heard Val Venis (before he was Val) and the guy who later became the Goon (despite having no talent he did have cool hockey skate boots and would just throw the gloves down and fight when the bell rang instead of locking up), or Eric Watts, but who was it?
The original members of the Truth Commission were Kurrgan, Don "Jackyl/Cyrus" Callis, Recon & Sniper. Recon was later known as Bull Buchanan, Sniper was previously known as Rambo, real name Luc Porier, who mainly competed in the Catch Wrestling Association in Europe. You're forgetting about The Commandant, who served as the group's mouthpiece until Jackyl usurped the role from him. There was a Commission member exclusive to the USWA that went by the name of Tank...you may remember him from another role he played, that of Mantaur. Mantaur was one of the great WWF mid-90s gimmicks that went absolutely nowhere, but made for entertaining television.
Also Cyrus would join the announcers during the matches and once talked about how he saved the group from their horrible lives where they were so poor they had nothing to eat besides Tuna fish for over a month. Was this a rib at the Stone Cold statement that he was once so poor he ate nothing but potatoes for a month?
I'm not sure if it was a rib on Stone Cold or a social commentary on the conditions in post-apartheid South Africa. The whiteys just don't have it as good as they used to, you know? Poor babies.
The two question trend continues with DarkNightwolf101...
1. Why doesn't WWE do any more Bad Blood Pay-per-views, the last one I remember seeing was with Triple H vs HBK Hell in a cell?
WWE only has so many PPVs a year...I think Bad Blood bit the dust because it wasn't a name people were very attached to. Looking at the buyrates, the show didn't draw very well...the 2004 edition only got a .47 buyrate, which was even lower than the miserable Great American Bash held a month later. I was at the 2004 show...so I can tell you that the live attendance wasn't all that great either. When they added the One Night Stand show, one of the PPV names had to bite the dust, and it ended up being Bad Blood. I wouldn't rule out it coming back though, since there was a gap of six years between the first and second Bad Blood shows.
2. What led to the Road Warriors/ Koloff ( Ivan and Nikita) feud?
Bossman Larry tells me that it started out as a champions vs. champions deal...the Warriors held the AWA titles while the Koloffs held the NWA titles. It went on from there because the Road Warriors didn't like anybody and the Koloffs hated all Americans. Lots of hatred going on there.
Paul Hunt is next on the clock...
You want questions? Why doncha just make them up like every other columnist?
I think most columnists are far too lazy to make up their own questions. Somebody once accused Dave Schilling of making up his own feedback that he put in his news column. I defended Schilling, saying that it was obvious the feedback was real because he couldn't write anything that good.
I miss Dave. Good thing I have Domingo to feud with, otherwise I wouldn't know what to do with myself.
Anyways....
Back in the dying days of WCW a masked wrestler
appeared on Thunder and did the job. Nowt unusual
about that you may say - except this one was very well
put together and the commentator (Tenay I presume) all
but said it was someone "known" under the mask thru
the commentary. The wrestler was called "the Machine"
and I believe he only made the one appearance in this
guise......so who was he? I'm guessing Mike Awesome
but that is only a guess.
I remember reading about this guy in the Death of WCW book...apparently his squash by DDP was a hilarious moment in the dying days of Thunder. Apparently the man under the hood was Emory Hale, who would go on to minor fame as "Hail", a guy Jimmy Hart managed on Saturday Night for a few weeks. Hart & Hulk Hogan took a liking to Hale and thought that he could eventually feud with the Hulkster due to his size. Hale didn't do a whole lot after WCW folded, and passed away in January 2006.
John Bryant has two questions...
I've always wondered whatever happened to *blows whistle loudly* "The manager of Champions" Mr Bill Alfonso?
Alfonso is currently serving as the General Manager of Women's Extreme Wrestling. I have heard he is also working as an insurance salesman, but that's purely speculation.
Who was Joey Styles' Color commentator before Styles went it alone? no one I know knows the answer, and I'm just curious as to why he disappeared.
I didn't know Styles had a color commentator until later on in ECW. Early ECW fans?
So we all know that Vince hates Kayfable breaking and all. But when it came to the tribute show (and any other one) they always break Kayfable and shoot from the hip so to say. Do you think this hurts the casual fan who thinks the storylines are real (who hates who and such), or the fans who want to believe with all the hope and merriment of a young child that it's real? An example would be Vince explaining how the story line of (and he said it speficly) "his character's alledged demise." And do you think they will drop the storyline now because of it, thus make WWE creative scramble to find a Summer long story line, or shall we have the "Whodunnit" angle still? - Travis
I don't think dropping kayfabe to address real-life situations, especially deaths of people that regularly appeared on WWE programming, hurts the casual fan or the true believer. In the case of Vince dropping his death storyline to appear on the Benoit tribute, I don't think it really had that much of an impact on people. Were that many people really buying into Mr. McMahon's "death"? I hope not. And considering what was going on at the time, concerns such as these were the furthest thing from most people's minds.
WWE has already dropped the planned Mr. McMahon death storyline, and I don't see it being revived. With things the way they are, it would be a huge mistake for WWE to promote a storyline about the "death" of one of their characters. If you think the media's having a field day with them now, imagine what they'd have to say about that...
JLAJRC has three questions...
What is the record for the most times two or more wrestlers have faced each other? I remember Ric Flair saying on his DVD or somewhere they he had about 3,000 matches with Ricky Steamboat. Obviously, that's an exaggeration (that would mean that he wrestled Ricky everyday for a little less than 10 years). So what's the real record?
I wouldn't be surprised if Flair & Steamboat actually did hold the record, considering how often their paths crossed over their careers. There's no record of this that I can find anywhere, but even if they didn't have 3,000 matches, they probably had more than anybody else. If not them, my guess would be the Rock & Roll Express & Midnight Express...actually, I bet the record could be the Rock & Roll Express vs. *insert team managed by Jim Cornette here*.
In the past, announcers would make a big deal out of some state's "athletic commission." Heck, I just got done watching the Great American Bash 88 and the commission stopped the Ric Flair vs. Lex Lugar main event due to a cut on Lugar, even though hardly see any blood. Is this for real or part of the script? Do these things still exist?
Athletic commissions do still exist. I can tell you this because Kentucky's Boxing & Wrestling Authority fined WWE $3,250 for violations of state wrestling rules at WWE Backlash 2006. My goal in life is to head up Kentucky's Boxing & Wrestling Authority...I'm not sure how you get that kind of a job though. The state athletic commissions do exist, and rules vary widely from state to state...occasionally you'll see them used as a tool to do a screwjob finish, like at Bash 88 with Luger & Flair.
Has a heel ever won a flag match? I don't think I've ever seen that happen.
LAX won a flag match with America's Most Wanted at Turning Point 2006. I've heard it claimed that this was the first time that a team not representing the U.S. won a flag match in the U.S...it could be true, but I have to assume that somebody did it before them. But until proven otherwise, we'll say that was the one instance.
Joey Romero brings 3 questions from Tucson...
1. Going back to the old World Championship Wrestling days, were Buzz Sawyer and Brett Wayne really brothers? I thought that storyline was pretty good and I think WWE or TNA should use it for a compelling storyline.
Buzz & Brett were in fact brothers, with the last name of Woyan.
2. What led to the Battle of Atlanta with Tommy "Wildfire" Rich and Buzz Sawyer?
I wish I had a really good answer for that, but I don't. Chris Hyatte's column about the Last Battle of Atlanta is probably the best piece of writing you're going to find about it. I don't think there was a sports-entertainment storyline behind Rich & Sawyer's feud...they were just polar opposites that really didn't like each other.
3. How did The Great Kabuki and The Great Muta spit out the green mist? I have also seen them spit out the green mist and then spit out a red mist during the same match.
The most common way wrestlers do this is by using a capsule...they keep it in their tights until they're about to use it, and then put it in their mouth when attention is drawn away from them. There's also a method where you put a mixture of water and food coloring into a plastic bag, but that method can lead to choking, so it's usually discouraged.
Hey man, I have a question for ask 411. I was watching the 2004 draft a few days ago. and was wondering if the plan was for HHH to stay on Smackdown and was changed last minute, or was the decision to move him to Smackdown just a ploy to get Smackdown ratings up for a week? Thanks man. - Sean
This was the topic of much speculation when it happened...the general consensus was that Triple H was in fact scheduled to make the move to Smackdown, but he vetoed it because he wanted to stay on Raw, the A show. A move to Smackdown would have given H a bunch of new opponents to feud with, it was rumored that he would feud with then-champion Eddie Guerrero once he arrived there. H had run out of people to feud with on Raw...but it didn't matter because Raw was still the A show, damn it! So we got "treated" to the never-ending HHH/HBK feud and HHH vs. Eugene at Summerslam 2004.
Once Evolution really got kicking, H's dominance of Raw wasn't as annoying as it was during much of 04.
Was Vic Steamboat really Rick Steamboat's
brother?He had a short run in NWA/WCW in
the early 90's (I think) but disappeared as quickly as he arrived.Any
idea why he didn't
really make it?He looked good and seemed
good workrate wise,and paid his dues in the
East Coast indie scene. - Jason Bailey
Vic was the brother of Rick, but did not have the same level of charisma or in-ring ability that his brother did. I'd compare him to Eric Angle, though to be fair Vic did have more success on the indie level that Eric ever did. Thing is, when you're a brother of an already famous wrestler, it's tough for you to succeed on a major level unless your ability is comparable to your brother. It probably would have been easier for Vic if he came up at the same time as Rick, or if his father had been a promoter. Hey, it worked for Mike & Chris Von Erich. Well, it didn't really work because they both killed themselves, but what can ya do.
just wondering what happened to matt hardy's angelic diablo gimmick... i presume it got canned due to the whole edge/lita/matt saga but what was his character going to be like and if it wasn't due to the edge/ lita shenanigans what was the reason the wwe rejected it? - Si
The basic premise behind the Angelic Diablo was that Matt Hardy was going to cut these promos about the scar from his knee surgery being a symbol. "The scar is a symbol"...of what, I'm not really sure, but the promos got over pretty well with some of the creative people. I assume he would have been a babyface with heelish tendencies. The gimmick itself wasn't rejected, it just bit the dust once the whole "situation" came to the forefront and Matt got himself fired for a little while.
so when batista had the leg wrap, it was WIDELY reported that it was to protect a new tat he had gotten, but now, no leg wrap, no tattoo. whats the latest on that? i know its possible to cover tattoos with makeup, but a) that wipes off, even if youre not wrestling and sweating, and b) what would be the point in covering it up? - Manu Bumb
My best guess (if there in fact was a tattoo there) is that Batista got the tattoo one night when he was really liquored up or something, woke up the next morning, though that it looked like shit and decided to have it removed. I'm pretty sure that you have to keep the area affected by the removal covered up for a certain length of time.
Who was the first wrestler to use that lasso
signal before using a DDT? - Bryan Jones
I'm pretty sure it was Jake "The Snake" Roberts, who certainly popularized the move in North America.
I was wondering if you had any knowledge if the WWE would be releasing a SummerSlam and Survivor Series DVD 20 year Anthology sets? It should be only logical if they had just released the Royal Rumble one. Hopefully the Benoit tragedy won't affect this. Please let me know if you have heard anything about this. Thanks! - bwymond
It was announced WWE was working on a Summerslam Anthology at the same time they were developing the Rumble Anthology...I've not heard anything about a Survivor Series Anthology though, or when the Summerslam Anthology would be coming out. If it was this year, we'd probably have heard about it by now...so I'd assume it wouldn't be any sooner than Summer 2008.
I love reading your column, its amazing to me how much wrestling trivia you know or have access to. Anyway for my question. I was watching the 7/2 RAW and noticed that Umaga is no longer wearing his grills. When did he stop, and why? Mouth injury, or did he just forget them? Thanks - Fred
Penguin suggests that the grills are with Umaga's manager, Armando Alejandro Estrada, since nobody knows where he is either. The Hidden Highlights gang might suggest that the missing grills symbolizes a new direction for Umaga or some bullshit like that. It's possible he just left them at the hotel room or something...I don't know anything about a mouth injury causing him to wear them or not wear them.
John has two questions...
1) Concernining Kurt Angle and the names of his finishing moves. If I recall my history, his original finishing move was the "Olympic Slam". Sometime down the road, the name of move got changed to the "Angle Slam". Then later on, he added the "Ankle Lock". Now I've seen the "Ankle Lock" sometimes referred to as the "Angle Lock" on the net. I don't watch TNA but I did catch a bit of one show earlier this year and I believe Tenay was calling it the "Angle Lock" as well. Anyway, my question is was the name ever officially changed to "Angle Lock"? During Kurt's time in WWE, I'm pretty sure it was always referred to as "Ankle Lock", and that only some fans on the net would call it "Angle Lock". (Also, I think that wrestling federation simulator had it called the "Angle Lock", further feeding the misnaming). So are the people who call it the "Angle Lock" just plain wrong in calling it that?
I don't remember who started calling it the Angle Lock (my guess would be Scott Keith, but who knows for sure), but I think most of us internet fans thought "Angle Lock" was a cooler name for the move and continued to call it that. Whether Tenay calls it the Angle Lock or not, it's tough to say. When you say both "Ankle Lock" and "Angle Lock" fast, they sound very similar.
2) Back when Batista won the Royal Rumble, he had his choice of whether to face the Smackdown champion or the Raw champion. I remember the two GM's of each show trying to convince Batista which one to choose, and Teddy Long painted a nice picture of Batista being able to feud with Undertaker and also start a young feud with Cena which could rival that of the Rock/Austin. My question is have Cena and Batista ever had a feud in WWE yet? I can't recall the two ever in a program together. - John
They fought at the end of the 2005 Royal Rumble...other than that Cena & Batista have mostly been on the same side of the fence except for when they had those tag team matches pitting the Raw & Smackdown WrestleMania main event pairings against each other earlier this year. To answer your question, no feud yet. They might be saving it for when Batista has to retire because he's not exactly a spring chicken.
Joshua has two questions...
I recently Netflix'd "Monday NIght Wars" it was good, although a bit short. They brought up the Billionaire Ted skits. Eric Bishoff said that he and Ted Turner thought they were funny and got a kick out of it. When they aired didn't WWE say that WCW was threating to sue them because of the skits. I think the annoucer would say something like "Despite the threat of legal action, tonight we bring you Billionaire Ted"
One of the best ways to get a buzz going about your product is to tell the viewers that somebody doesn't want them to see what they're about to see. This gets the average Joe thinking "Damn, I gotta see this!"...they want to know why people don't want them to see what's about to appear on the screen, and more importantly they want to see it because it's taboo and they're not supposed to see it. The WWF did claim that WCW higher-ups were furious about the skits, when in reality they didn't give a shit and Ted Turner got a kick out of them. But the average viewer didn't know that. It was smart promoting. The only problem was they were putting all of that energy into something that wasn't going to draw a dime.
My other question is why did Bobby Heenan leave the WWE? Last time I saw him Monsoon had throught him out for making comments about his mother, then later on he was up in WCW. Why did he jump?
Heenan wanted to be closer to home so he could spend time with his family. The WWF road schedule wasn't really allowing him to do that, in WCW he could spend more time at home and he probably made more money working there too. Of course, Heenan ended up hating working for WCW and wishing he hadn't made the jump, but at the time it made sense.
Did Shane Douglas leave TNA or get fired, I know he went to rehab came back then was history after The Naturals story line? - Mike
The last I've heard about Douglas was that his status as a road agent was discontinued in December 2006 after he fell asleep in the dressing room before an Impact taping. Rumor has it that he's currently dealing with some serious personal issues. He has commented on the passing of Bam Bam Bigelow & Sherri Martel on his website, but has made no statements on his current status.
As for my current status, I am outta here...any e-mails containing thoughts, questions, comments, or porn can be sent to scook411@hotmail.com. See ya next time!
