Hitting Below The Beltway 12.09.07: This Week in Pro Wrestling

Posted by Alex Barcham on 12.09.2007

I'm giving you my take on this week's biggest pro wrestling stories including Samoa Joe's promo at Turning Point, Senshi's release from TNA and Carlito staying with WWE.

Normally, I like to have one single subject I address in my column, but a busy week and a case of writer's block have prevented me from coming up with one. So here's my rundown for this week's news from the wrestling world.

Scott Hall no showed at Turning Point. Samoa Joe cut a scathing promo before the main event deriding Hall and the older stars of TNA.

Scott Hall failing to show up to his main event match at Turning Point shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Hall has been extremely unreliable for the last ten years. This far from the first time he's pulled a stunt like this. I actually would have been more surprised if Hall had shown up. I hope that Hall can someday over come his demons, but I would never book him in a high profile match if I were a booker or a promoter.

While Hall is responsible for his own actions, one can't help pointing the finger at TNA management for failing to deliver their advertised main event at Turning Point. TNA should have been smarter than to rely on Scott Hall in as big a situation as PPV main event. Hall has a well documented history of no-showing. Even if he had shown up, Hall is well past the point of being a big draw. He was a solid performer in WWE as Razor Ramon, and he was part of one of the hottest angles in wrestling history in the NWO, but his time his more than passed. TNA should never have put themselves in a position to let their fans down like this.

Samoa Joe's promo introducing Eric Young as Hall's replacement summed up what every member of the IWC has been saying for a long time now. TNA needs to focus on their young home-grown stars like the Motor City Machine Guns and Jay Lethal, rather than WCW has-beens who are just there to collect a pay check. It was great to hear it from the mouth of one of TNA's brightest young stars. Will it make a big difference? Probably not. Hopefully, it will wake up Dixie Carter and the booking committee to the mess that they have on their hands in TNA. However, without some serious management changes, the same problems with persist. There have been rumors that TNA will cut out some of their dead weight in the up-coming weeks, but so far nothing major has happened.

Kevin Nash was said to be irate following Samoa Joe's promo at Turning Point. Nash did not appreciate being lumped in with Scott Hall. Nash certainly has a point in this regard. He is not Hall's keeper. They are friends, but Nash isn't responsible for Hall's actions. If Nash was the one who pushed for Hall's to be brought in, then may be he deserves blame for that, but Nash showed up Turning Point and has put in a solid effort in his most recent run in TNA. Nash is definitely part of the old guard in TNA and shouldn't be a main-eventer anymore, but Hall is his own man and should be held responsible for his own actions.

Following Turning Point, TNA management held a meeting in which they offered every wrestler on the roster their release. Only Senshi accepted.

I'm not sad to see Senshi leaving TNA. I'm a big fan of his work, but he was being wasted in TNA. After seeing his work in ROH, IWA-MS and Japan it was disappointing to see him stuck in meaningless matches in TNA. It would be great to see him back in ROH, but given his problems with ROH booker Gabe Sapolski that seems unlikely. He'll probably be headed back to Japan and the smaller American indies.

TNA could have gotten a lot more out of Senshi than they did. Aside from a brief run with the X-Division title and an outstanding match with Chris Sabin at Bound For Glory 2006, Senshi's run was nothing noteworthy. If pushed right Senshi could have helped revitalize the X-Division and been an important part of the current Team 3D vs. the X-Division storyline. Senshi was stuck in the reformed XXX, because TNA management couldn't thing of anything better for them. Even then, XXX could have had a good run contending for the Tag Team championships, but aside from their one Ultimate X match, they didn't do much in the tag division.

I'm surprised Senshi was the only wrestler who accepted TNA's offer. Morale in TNA is said to be extremely low and there hasn't been much reason to believe things are about to pick up. If I were a TNA mid-carder I certainly would have thought about walking away and going back to the indies or taking a shot at getting into WWE.

WWE has announced Hulk Hogan for Monday's Raw 15th Anniversary Show. It is reported that Vince is attempting to bring in Hogan for Wrestlemania 24 and a possible match with Stone Cold Steve Austin.

It would be very surprising to see a Hogan vs. Austin match come together at Wrestlemania. The relationship between Hogan and Vince has been extremely strained lately. Hogan missed WM23, not wanting to work with Vince any more and unimpressed with the money he'd been receiving. Things have changed a lot for the Hulkster recently following his son's racing crash and up-coming law suit. It has been reported that Hulk had been drinking at the time of the accident and may have provided his underage son with alcohol before accident. These reports are not confirmed, but they are disturbing nonetheless.

In spite of his incredible wealth Hulk is going to need all the money he can get. The cost of the trial and the likely huge settlement is going to set him back quite a bit. This might push Hulk to comeback to WWE. His payday may not be the monster salary he got back in his heyday, but $500,000(his reported pay for his Summerslam match with Shawn Michaels) is nothing to scoff at.

Getting Stone Cold to agree to the match presents an additional challenge. While Hogan has expressed interest in working with Stone Cold before, Austin has never returned that interest. For the right amount of money it might be possible to convince him, but Stone Cold should already have plenty of cash and probably isn't interested in working with or jobbing to the Hulkster.

This match has been rumored for Wrestlemania the past several years and never came to fruition. At this point I'm not really looking forward to a potential Hogan vs. Austin match. Hogan's occasional returns for nostalgia trips are fine, but they're nothing all that amazing at this point. Same goes for Austin. Given how badly both men's bodies have degenerated over last few years the match itself would probably be very poor from a work-rate standpoint. Hogan vs. The Rock was nothing special from a work-rate stand point, but was great because it was an epic clash of two of the biggest stars of all-time. Hogan vs. Austin probably wouldn't be able to recreate the unbelievable atmosphere that surrounded that match. Both men are far removed from their glory days, where the Rock was still in his prime and Hogan wasn't as far past his. Hogan vs. Austin would probably draw in some PPV buys, but the match itself would be a disaster.

WWE has denied Carlito his release, not wanting to have another one of their former stars going to TNA.

I understand WWE's desire not to have their talent wind up benefiting another promotion, but I don't see Carlito helping WWE or TNA much at this point. Carlito is not a big-time star. Fans aren't going to start watching TNA to see a mediocre mid-carder like Carlito. If the additions of much bigger names like Kurt Angle, Booker T, Christian, Kevin Nash and Sting haven't boosted TNA's ratings then Carlito certainly isn't going to do anything for them. TNA doesn't need more of WWE's garbage.

If I were working for WWE I wouldn't want Carlito on my roster. As a general management principle in any field, you don't want people working for you who don't want to be there. They aren't going to do good work and they're taking up space that could be filled by someone more motivated. Carlito has expressed his displeasure with WWE on multiple occasions and is clearly dogging it in the ring. He was never all that great in the ring, but in the past year he has gotten lazy and stopped trying to improve or put on a half-way decent match. Guys like that don't sell tickets and they can kill your locker-room morale. Cut him loose and let him waste TNA's money instead of yours.

Ring of Honor has announced they will begin selling DVD's in nationwide retailers in April 2008. "Blood Stained Honor" will feature ROH's bloodiest battles, while "Stars Of Honor" will feature the ROH work of the biggest stars of TNA and WWE.

This is a great opportunity to ROH. In order to continue expanding ROH needs to find new ways to reach potential customers. Getting on PPV was a step in the right direction and this continues down that same path. The more mainstream exposure ROH can get the better.

As for the DVD's themselves they both look excellent. I'm not going buy them myself, because I already own most of the matches, but I'm not their target audience. They're looking to attract new fans, not get more buys from their existing fan base. Blood Stained Honor has a ton of great matches for only $15. They may be advertising the DVD based on how bloody and brutal all the matches were, but they also contain some really good wrestling. Stars of Honor isn't quite as good in my opinion, but still very worthwhile for the money. The idea of showing what bigger stars can do in an unrestrained environment like ROH is cool, but a lot of the matches feature no current ROH stars. I like the inclusion of matches like James Gibson vs. Roderick Strong and Matt Hardy vs. Roderick Strong, because they make Strong seem like a big deal for facing WWE wrestlers. While Samoa Joe vs. CM Punk III was incredible match, neither guy is ROH anymore. I'd prefer that they showcased their current talents.

Kenta Kobashi successfully made his return to Pro Wrestling NOAH after a year and a half absence due to kidney cancer on December 2, 2007. He was pinned by Mitsuharu Misawa in a tag team match, that is reportedly very good and featured an incredible crowd.

This just all-around great news. I'm just happy to hear that Kobashi survived cancer, let alone made his return to the ring. The fact that he was able to make his return to the ring so soon after a potentially fatal illness is a testament to Kobashi's incredible dedication and physical conditioning. Lance Armstrong's incredible athleticism and fitness helped him rapidly recover from cancer and I'd imagine Kobashi's case was similar. I though it was strange that Kobashi was pinned in his first match back, but from what I'm reading that is pretty standard in Japan. Kobashi even hit a moonsault, which is something hadn't even done in a while before his illness. Hopefully, Kobashi's return will help revitalize a stale NOAH title scene. The possibility of Joe vs. Kobashi II is something to get excited about for 2008.