Ask 411 Wrestling 04.09.08: Contacts, Crotch Grabs, Cocktails and More!

Hey, guy. Where’s ask 411? I needs my fix! – Chris

Ask 411 Wrestling got a week off last week so I could fill in for the esteemed Jonathan Meehan on the Friday news beat. I can only do so many Internet columns in a given week or else my head explodes. But I’m back this week and probably several weeks after that, so be not afraid!

Who am I? I am Steve Cook…leader of men, follower of women. Welcome to the show. I hope you are having a wonderful Wednesday mid-morning, afternoon, evening or late night. If you aren’t, I guarantee that you will be by the time this column is over. And if you’re still not having a wonderful day by then, e-mail [email protected] and let him know what you think.

I suppose we should go ahead and get things started…

Comments, Corrections & Other “C” Words

I am a chiropractor in the St. Louis area and wanted to respond to a reader-asked question. The question was from Adam and had to do with the tape Homicide uses on his shoulder. The tape is known as “Physio Tape” and is used by physical therapists and rehab specialists as a means of support by using the tape in specific patterns on the injured body part. You see it periodically in the NBA (like anyone watches that), and other sports. It is usually used on people that opt for doing rehab as opposed to going “under the knife” as a means to provide the support they lack due to the injury they have. If you follow his matches since he started wearing the tape, you’ll see that it is usually in an identical (or close to it) pattern every week. Sometimes they may use more or less depending on the severity of the injury, but it generally follows a very specific, distinct pattern. It is different from athletic tape in that the body part it is being used on is not wrapped completely or protected by a pre-wrap, which anyone that has rolled an ankle can tell you is a lifesaver (or more importantly, a leg-hair-saver) when trying to remove the tape. Physio Tape is usually applied directly to the skin over the affected area. Keep up the good work and hope this helps! – Dr. Matthew Gravel, D.C.

You know you’ve arrived when the doctors start writing in. I always wondered about those weird tape jobs, so that’s good to know.

I’m usually a week or two behind in your columns but as for other wrestlers
who have clean wins over HHH and HBK, here’s a list I came up with:

Kurt Angle
Bret Hart (I think he beat HHH during the D-X/Hart Foundation wars)
Undertaker (He had to have a few in there)
Randy Orton (Last Man Standing vs. HHH and I think he has a clean win over
HBK in there somewhere)
What about Hall and Nash in their Razor Ramon and Diesel personas? They
both have clean wins on HBK, and I think they probably took out the blue
blood once or twice too.

Anyway, nothing to base this on. Just brainstorming. – Nelson

Randy Orton has accomplished this feat. He pinned Shawn Michaels clean at Survivor Series 2007 after HBK hesitated to use the Superkick and ate an RKO. He also defeated HHH in a Last Man Standing match just a couple of PPV’s prior. I guess you would call that a clean win since Orton didn’t cheat to win, just RKO’d Hunter on the announce table.

Hulk Hogan has pinned both Triple H and HBK, but the pin over HHH wasn’t exactly clean, it came after Undertaker got involved.

Undertaker also has clean wins over both I believe. I know that he pinned HHH clean at Wrestlemania 17, and he spent so much time feuding with Shawn that I feel like he has to hold a clean win over main event HBK.

That’s all I can think of off the top of my head. – Scott

I do not recall Undertaker defeating Shawn Michaels in a singles match. Could be wrong, but I don’t think it happened.

so, not to spoil anything, but undertaker was in the casket for the SD tapings, and right before he came out, one of the ringside guys jumped up on the apron and knocked on the casket to let him know it was time to come out, so thats how taker got his cue this time. – Manu Bumb

Just a little something to add to your response to the reader’s question about who would define the 00’s as the best wrestler, or in ring performer. I agree with all that you mentioned, Angle, Joe, Styles, etc. But i couldnt believe you left out Christopher Daniels. Ive always put him on par with the late great Chris Benoit. His moves are crisp and perfectly executed. Ive never seen him mess up a move and his matches are always great to watch. Look at the history of TNA and a big chunk of their all time greatest matches involved him. Just my two cents. – Jason

Jason, I hope you enjoyed WrestleMania! I am a huge Daniels fan, but something’s missing there that makes me not put him on the tippy-top level. I’d say he’s good but not great, and I would induct him into the 411 Hall of The Very Good.

Thank God you said Ashley needs to go. I get so tired of everyone acting like
she’s hot. She’s way too skinny and just unattractive. She does need to go. I
agree with your list. Big Daddy V too. And who said Hennig selling wasn’t good?
Did he oversell? Of course. Did it look goofy at times? Yes. But he was
“absolutely perfect!” haha. I had to. I loved Mr. Perfect. As a kid,
he was the first heel I started to like. During his IC title runs with Heenan
and The Coach (why? Heenan was so much better) as managers. Hennig was awesome,
and so was his selling. He made Hogan look like a million bucks at Royal Rumble
90. He didn’t just go over the top rope, he went flying over the corner. Hennig
was great, R.I.P. And to the person that said Savage was great too, you’re
dead-on. Savage was a hell of a worker. He played a great babyface in peril who
fought with all his heart and he also played a bastard heel. It’s a damn shame
he’s not in the HOF. Best damn elbow drops in the business, Savage and
Michaels. – Joey Gladstone

We could check Test’s claim with a simple back-of-the-envelope calculation:

For each day on the road, he would have the following expenses:

1. Hotel: $50-100 per night

2. Rental car: $25-50 per day.

3. At least 3 meals per day: $50-$100

Assuming he works 200 days per year (which is conservative), that works out to
$25000-$50000 of road expenses per year for just the necessities.
I haven’t even factored in expenses for gym facilities, alcohol, nutritional
supplements (legal and illegal), etc.

Also, I’m not sure how much of this he can write off as business expenses, but
we’d also need to consider taxes. Suppose he made $75000. He’d lose about 1/3
of that to taxes, so take-home would be about $50000. Thus in paying for only
necessities on the road he could be left flat broke.

According to his book, Foley was able to save money because he split rooms at
the Super 8 Austin and DDP, bummed rides off of Vader, and ate junk food like
pizza every night. – Eric Von Erich

you have to remember also, regarding traveling expenses, that WWE wrestlers are
independent contractors and can recoup most if not all of their on the road
expenses.

also, WWE wrestlers are now on a 4 on 3 off schedule with bonuses for
international tours, so the travel expenses now are not nearly what they were
when they did have the 200+ day per year schedule. – Darth Mortis

Did somebody really question Dave “Fit” Finlay. My god, what a silly
twat.

Dave Finlay has been a great wrestler since the late 70’s, and his toughness is
reknowned the world over. He’s considered by a fair few (including Lance Storm)
to still be the top talent in the world, and that’s at the age of 49. And his
amazing work for Joint Promotions and the CWA is something I still fondly
remember today, as well as his wars with Regal in ’96, and the time I saw him
against the Dynamite Kid in Plas Madoc Leisure Centre in 1994 (No, Billington
wasn’t fully retired by 1991, and still did work for Orig Williams along the
North Wales Coast).

Finlay was also advised to retire in 1999 after nearly losing his leg against
Brian Knobbs, but returned about 6 months later.

Dave “Fit” Finlay is one of the biggest badarses in Wrestling for my
money, and anyone who doesn’t think so is a fucking windowlicker. – ButchReedMark

Francis: the Beer Bashes are on the Stone Cold truth dvd, which is still
available. Anyone reading the package for the Legacy or Stone Cold dvds should
be aware that dvd 3’s bonus is NOT the redneck triathlon, as stated. It’s the
“who’s vince’s son?” bit when Austin comes out. – scrp11

Whats with all these idiots? “Long time reader, first time submitter”
and “my name is Jason and i have a question.” No one cares. I wish
Cook would cut all that foreplay out and just post the questions. – Champ

Sometimes foreplay is better than what follows it. OK, so I’ve had some bad experiences in my life. What about it? I’m just saying, foreplay rules if you know what you’re doing.

I don’t know about anyone else but I am sick of people having 5 or 6 questions
that are in such detail that it gets terribly boring to even read an answer.
The short, TO THE POINT, questions are interesting. Enough with these 5
question people…they take up a big part of the damn column. – Ltown1985

One of the previous writers of this column instituted a policy where readers could only ask three questions. I’m not sure that’s necessary, but I’m willing to listen to the readers on it. If nothing else, I do agree that some of the questions are a bit too lengthy. Fortunately for you, I don’t think anybody asks more than three questions in this week’s column.

Brian Delaney??? No wins, No entrance music and now people can’t even get my
name right… or even close!!!

Colin – C.O.L.I.N. – COLIN Delaney

For the record, that wasn’t me. However, Brian Delaney is a noted session drummer, so perhaps one of our readers is quite the music fan and had Brian on the mind.

OK, probably not.

Questions!

RJ starts us off with three questions…

1. I’ve seen clips on youtube of the Freebirds in the WWF and I’m pretty sure they were booked as faces. Did they do anything notable during their stay and why did they leave?

They did very little of note during their brief WWF run in 1984, and they were brought in as babyfaces. They left because WWF officials wanted to split the team up, and they thought they could make more money elsewhere. Which was probably true.

2. Assuming the salaries listed in the last column were downside guarantees, any idea what the average pay off for a house show, TV and PPV are? (Mike asked if they were downside guarantees)

I can’t say I have a good answer for this question. Raven said in one of his shoot interviews that the standard rate for lower-card guys was around $500 a night, but most wrestlers (and people in general) aren’t going to run around telling other people what they make.

3. What exactly makes an Irish Whip ‘Irish’? I know that the ‘Japanese Arm Drag’ is just an arm drag in Japan, are there any other moves that go by different names internationally?

Again, there’s no good information on the Internet about this, but I’m guessing that an Irishman was the first man to regularly use the move. As for moves with different names in different places, I’ve always been a fan of the clothesline being a LARIATOOOO in Japan. BRAINBUSTAAAAAAAAA!

The Irish Whip is also a cocktail…

INGREDIENTS:
1 oz vodka
1 oz Pernod
1 oz Cuban rum
1 oz crème de menthe
1 part 7-Up
1 part orange juice
PREPARATION:
Pour the vodka, Pernod, rum and crème de menthe into a pint glass with ice cubes.
Fill with equal parts of 7-up and orange juice.
Stir well.

Have fun, kids!

My question is was there ever a “Monday night wars” type of ratings war in Japan between NJPW and AJPW? Did any company ever get close to going out of bizness and did they have workers jumping ship back and forth? – SYC

I’m pretty sure All Japan & New Japan never had competing television shows in the same timeslot, although they have competed for the top spot in Japan for the past couple of decades. All Japan & New Japan had an inter-promotional war from August 2000 until January 2002, at which point Keiji Mutoh left New Japan for All Japan and became President of All Japan. The climate in Japan is very different as far as competition between the major promotions goes…it’s not unheard of for All Japan wrestlers to make appearances in New Japan or even NOAH, and likewise for the New Japan & NOAH wrestlers.

The closest AJPW came to going out of business was in 2000 when Misawa formed Pro Wrestling NOAH and took everybody except two people from the All Japan roster with him. All Japan lived on though, and they seem to be doing pretty well today.

Hi. I was wondering about the 1997 King of the Ring. At first, there was supposed to be a match between Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels with the Hart Foundation members handcuffed to the ring posts. But then Austin injured Bret’s leg and the match was changed to Austin-Michaels. Was Bret Hart too hurt to wrestle or did they just change their minds? – Alex

I couldn’t find any information on whether Hart’s leg injury during that time period was legitimate or not, but Hart & Michaels’ backstage problems were reaching new highs around KOTR and it was probably for the best that they didn’t have a match with each other at that time.

The illustrious DarkNightwolf101 has two questions…

1. I noticed that Wrestlemania IX is the only Wrestlemania to be held in the day time. What is the reason behind this?

I’m 99.9% sure it was just a matter of time zone differential. WM was still at 8 PM on the East Coast, but Las Vegas is three hours behind, therefore the show started at 5 PM local time. The same thing happened when WrestleMania appeared in Anaheim, Los Angeles & Seattle.

2. How did the LT/ Bigelow feud come about? Was the WWE really expecting this?

Lawrence Taylor attended the Royal Rumble and sat ringside, Bam Bam Bigelow got mad after a match, LT heckled him and Bam Bam shoved him down. The WWF was expecting it because they made a deal with LT to wrestle Bam Bam at WrestleMania XI.

Speaking of LT & Bam Bam, here’s another question about the matter…

With the upcoming Big Show/Mayweather match at WM24, it made me wonder about another high profile celebrity/wrestler mania match. I read somewhere that Bam Bam Bigelow was promised a WWF title run for jobbing to Lawrence Taylor, is there any truth to that? If so, why didn’t it work out? – Rey

Bam Bam was promised a push, but I don’t think the WWF title was ever mentioned. As for his push, they ended up turning him babyface and getting him out of the Million Dollar Corporation. He got a cool jacket and it seemed like he was getting some traction, but eventually he fizzled out. He wasn’t friendly with the Clique, so there wasn’t much room for him at the top of the card.

Sam H. has three questions…

1) Why didn’t The Undertaker come out for the 10 bell salute on Raw is Owen?

Throughout his career, Undertaker has always tried to stay in character as much as possible. At the time of Owen Hart’s death, he was in a more demonic phase of his persona and it wouldn’t have been appropriate for the Deadman to come out on a show mourning a death. I can see why some people wouldn’t like it, but I understand why he didn’t appear on the show.

2) Who were the knights HBK was teaming with on Survivor Series 1993?

Barry Horowitz was red, Greg Valentine was blue, and Jeff Gaylord was black. Glen Jacobs was not one of the knights no matter what people want you to believe.

3) How come Rick Rude and Hulk Hogan never feuded in the WWF?

I have read that Hogan was not interested in feuding with Rude at the time, so it never happened. If Hogan didn’t want to work with somebody, he wasn’t going to. That’s one of the perks of being a top star. Now, as for why Hogan didn’t want to feud with Rude…your guess is as good as mine. But it should be pointed out that both Hogan & Rude were kept pretty busy during Rude’s time in the WWF, and had Rude stayed in the WWF longer he may have got that shot against Hogan, especially when you consider how well he did in WCW. Had Rude’s career not been shortened by a back injury in 1994, they may have met up sometime after Hogan’s arrival in WCW. I think it’s just a matter of “wrong place, wrong time”.

Hello Steve. Now that WWE programming is in HD, I have really noticed Rey Mysterio’s crazy contact lenses, and as a lens wearer myself, I was wondering about wrestlers with poor vision. I’m sure most guys who wear glasses could pull off a match without them, but what about guys with contacts? If a guy with a very strong prescription were to lose a lens during a match, do the wrestlers have a contingency plan to change the match on the spot? I’ve seen it happen during a hockey game, when after the whistle you see the players and refs looking on the ice for a lost lens, or the player simply going back to the dressing room for a spare. But for a wrestling match? You’ll never see a match stopped for a lost lens, but if a high-flyer like Mysterio really was blind as a bat, it would seriously affect his ability to fly off the ropes! – Steve in NL

If Rey ever loses a lens during a match, I think we’ll notice it. I am a contact lens wearer myself, and quite honestly I can’t see how somebody would wrestle or compete in a sport with them in. I have a hard enough time exercising with them in. I don’t know how poor Mysterio’s vision is, but I have to assume that if he lost a lens during the match, the other wrestler would work around it and they would have a match that would keep Mysterio from too much danger. So you just have to hope that Rey’s opponent knows what the heck he’s doing. If he’s working Santino Marella or something, it’s going to get ugly.

I was watching the RAW vs Smackdown 5 on 5 match from Survivor Series 2005 recently, and Tazz and Cole’s remarks to the RAW announce team during the match seemed a little harsh and…shoot-like. Do you know if Tazz and Cole were really pissed about something, or was it just a work to show how proud the announcers were of their brand? – Paul

Cole & Tazz were trying to push the inter-brand rivalry and there was a part of them that felt like WWE treated Smackdown like the B-Show (which they did then and still do today), so they were probably a bit harsher than the Raw guys expected. We can file it under the hated “work-shoot” category.

How long was the longest match ever and who competed in it? – TheMidnightPunk

There were wrestling matches back in the olden days that lasted several hours…but we don’t count those because it was before the inception of most of pro wrestling’s current techniques. The longest match in recent memory took place between CM Punk & Chris Hero on February 7, 2003 in Clarksville, Indiana. It lasted 93 minutes.

I could swear we had a question similar to this appear recently and somebody came up with an answer out of left field, but I couldn’t find it.

Andrew Prentice has some questions for us…

Where has Mickie James gone? And why on earth did they edit out the spot in WM 22 on the DVD where she grabbed Trish by the box then licked her hand?

Mickie appeared on WrestleMania as a lumberjill and on Raw to help the Divas beat up Santino Marella after a brief absence from televised competition. She had been spending some time on Sunday Night Heat…I would be the wrong person to ask why she has been featured on that show and not Raw.

As for the licking of the hand business, I can only presume that the PC police got a hand on the footage and edited it out. Strange how male wrestlers can grab their crotches all the time and nobody thinks anything of it, but one woman does it and people go crazy. Did they edit out Mankind using the testicular claw on people? Of course not.

Why, when announcing the entrance of Ric Flair and Shawn Michaels, do these guys never have their weights announced?

Michaels is listed at 225, but they’re probably being generous with that number. Wrestlers by nature are very image-conscious, and Michaels may fear that people wouldn’t take him seriously if they knew he weighed a little bit over 200. As for Flair, once you get to his age you’re not sharing any personal information with anybody.

Didn’t Vince pin both HHH and HBK?

Yes, but he hasn’t defeated either man in anything resembling a clean finish. I can’t think of anybody Vince’s beat cleanly, actually. Hell, he needed a lead pipe to beat his daughter.

Do you think that it’s a little ridiculous for the WWE to have “Hardcore Wrestling” on the ECW title’s plates or have a title that makes you think that you got to go through broken glass when in fact, they have done an abysmal amount of hardcore matches since the crapticular resurrection of Entertainment Championship…..err I mean Extreme Championship Wrestling? – Michael

Well, on the bright side the title belt is the one thing they haven’t changed since re-starting ECW. Think positive, man!

I’ve been wondering- how was the dual personas of keiji muto/the great muta handled in japan? I’ve seen him use both in one match, each in two matches on the card, etc. Is it similar to the 3 faces of Foley or a totally different take on the angle? How did the gimmick originate in New Japan’s storylines? – Billy

The Great Muta persona originated during Mutoh’s excursion to the United States & Puerto Rico in the late 80s. It became popular during his time in WCW, and once he returned to Japan he took the persona with him to use on special occasions. I would say that Great Muta is the equivalent of Mick Foley’s Cactus Jack. But, I may be totally wrong because it’s tough to understand what Japanese wrestling announcers say when you don’t speak Japanese.

How would you bring prestige back to the U.S. and I.C. titles,you know,make them important again? – Tim S.

It’s simple, really. All you need to do to make a title seem important is establish the fact that people want it and will be willing to do anything to get it. Who is the top challenger for Chris Jericho’s Intercontinental Title? Big Show decided he wanted a title shot one week, but after he ended up not winning the title he just moved on like it didn’t mean anything and he didn’t care if he won the belt or not. If the challengers don’t care about the title, why should we? So all I’d do is establish some top contenders to each title and have them regularly challenging for it. They’ve been trying to do this with the U.S. title for months now, but between MVP & Matt Hardy’s health problems their feud has completely lost any momentum it had and very few people even remember that the U.S. title is involved in their feud, if they even remember that Hardy & MVP are feuding. It doesn’t help that whenever I see MVP wrestling the U.S. title isn’t on the line. If the champion regularly defends the title against challengers that desperately want to be champion, the people will think that it just might mean something. It isn’t rocket science.

I’ve been watching a lot of Vader lately and I was just wondering if any wreslters ever spoke out about him being stiff. He clearly is one of the more stiffer strikers, so did guys just deal with it, or was there a general dislike for Mr. White? – Jason E.

I don’t know how popular Vader was in dressing rooms across America. Some people say that he was a really nice guy, but then there was the time that Paul Orndorff beat him up backstage and everybody thought it was hilarious. I think people were afraid to complain before that happened.

I’ve always been a fan of Tammy Sytch a.k.a (Sunny). I’m glad to see her getting her life back together and back in Sunny shape. For years I heard people in the wrestling business and the internet sites take shots at her for her weight gain and drug problems. But what really bothers me is the blame she gets for the late Chris Candido’s lack of success.
If you look at there early years in the WWE, it’s obvious that Sunny was more over that Zip. Was it not Candido’s decision to quit the WWE to join ECW, where his drug and steroid use started. By the looks of it. All of Tammy’s problems started when she left WWE to join Chris in ECW, which led to bad stints in WCW, XPW, and then the dreaded indy scene.
I always wondered if Tammy stayed with Vince’s company instead of following the overrated Candido around, how much better her life and career would’ve been. So my question to you is why does get so much criticism for his lack of success? From what I can tell, it was Tammy who was the star, not Chris. – Josh

While you raise interesting points, I think you are terribly misinformed in some of your assertions. For one thing, Chris Candido & Tammy Sytch started using drugs well before their ECW stint. Tammy’s problems started long before leaving the WWF…obviously their time in ECW didn’t exactly help matters, but it’s not like they just went to ECW and suddenly went insane due to something in the Kool-Aid. I would argue that she doesn’t get much blame for Candido’s failures, except that maybe if he had focused more of his attention in the ring than on his relationship and the drugs he could have accomplished more. Both Chris & Tammy were to blame for the tough patch they went through in the late 90s and early 2000s, and I think both of them would admit that.

I don’t see the opinion you rail against in your question as much as I used to back when it was a current news story. I think one of the good qualities about hindsight is that you see things as they are, not as you want to see them. People now realize that both Candido & Sytch were to blame for their lack of long-term success, and it wasn’t a matter of one dragging the other down. It’s possible that they both drug each other down, but I can’t blame one more than the other.

Hi there – love the column and look forward to reading it every week. I had a quick question about a promo I saw on an old NWA compilation DVD I was watching recently. The footage was from 1983 and the interview was Kevin Sullivan claiming he had lured Dusty Rhodes to his satanic ways and then brought out Mike Davis doing a pretty decent Dusty impression and claiming Virgil Runnels was the imposter. First off it seemed to me like a big deal that kayfabe was broken by calling Dusty Virgil Runnells bu8t I was wondering where this took place (I assumed Florida) and if there was an eventual match between the 2 Dustys or what the eventual payoff was? Thanks for your help! – DJBrettA

The Virgil Runnels reference likely went over the heads of everybody watching Florida TV at that point. Indeed, the Rhodes vs. Sullivan feud took place in the Florida territory in the early 1980s and people who actually saw it say that it was ahead of its time on so many levels. You can read about it in great detail here & here.I don’t think Dusty ever faced Fake Dusty, but I could be wrong.

Billy brings us two Terry Funk questions from Wichita Falls…

1) Do you think WWE will ever induct him into the HOF?

WrestleMania will be in Houston, Texas next year. If they don’t induct the Funker then, they are out of their freaking minds.

2) If they do, will he go alone or with his brother, his dad, or both?

I think Dory Jr.’s a pretty safe bet to go in due to his illustrious wrestling career and his good terms with WWE. I have never seen a Dory Funk Sr. match, but from what I hear he would certainly be a deserving candidate. I’m not sure he makes the cut, but I would be surprised if Terry & Dory Jr. weren’t inducted next year in Houston.

If you dont mind can you tell me about this http://youtube.com/watch?v=qBuaj-VPmjo ? It was cool that Michaels did that. I woulda done it too. Thanks. – hiphopshuvit

I never saw this until I watched the YouTube video. For those of you unable to view the video, here’s the description of it:

On June 9, 1997, Shawn Michaels and Steve Austin faced off at the King Of The Ring PPV. During the match an obvious HBK fan jumps the guardrail. The fan happened to be a special olympian who wanted to help him while Austin got the upperhand.

After security caught him and he start struggling the security decided to carry him away. His mom then jumped the rail and argued with the security. This quickly grabbed both wrestlers attention. While Michaels wa down Austin quickly told the ref what to do. Before this could happen Michaels quickly went over and got the security off. Playing the bad guy Stone Cold atttacked Michaels in the process.

After a few moves, Michaels yet again went to the security and told them all to leave him alone. Once they did he walked him towards the backstage area. To make matter worse the special olympian tripped over the camera wires and immediately waved the camera man away.

Michaels’ walk back included a well diserved applause.

Judging by Michaels’ reaction, I have to believe that he had met the fan before the show and knew about his condition, which is why he wasn’t afraid to walk up to him and escort him out of the area. It was a strange situation, but sometimes that happens and you can’t really blame anybody.

Jay Smith has two questions…

With the induction of Ric Flair into the HOF, I was wondering why there hasn’t been any mention of the fact that Jack Nicholson’s dream is to induct him? I mean, he is one of the biggest movie stars of all-time, and this does seem to be common knowledge, so is there a chance suprise? And if he isn’t involved, why the hell not?

I had no idea that Jack Nicholson wanted to induct Ric Flair into the WWE Hall of Fame. I’m not surprised that it didn’t happen, because everybody on the WWE payroll was lining up to do it, and Flair was going to get whoever he wanted to do it. If Flair wanted Nicholson, he would have got him. If Flair wanted George W. Bush, somebody would have placed a call to the White House and asked the President if he wanted in. But he wanted Triple H. Me, I’d go with Nicholson.

My second question is, what the hell is up with every WWE superstar suddenly using the “viscious” kick to the head? I don’t recall this being used, if but sporadically even just 2 years ago, and now, everyone uses this fricking move. What gives?

It’s easy to do, doesn’t hurt too much as long as you know what you’re doing, and Randy Orton actually got it over with the people.

Can anyone tell me at what point the WWE began using the WWF scratch logo, / “Attitude” logo?
I know it’s at some point in 1997 because it’s used at the end of one of those “you think this isn’t real?” trailers they used at the time. In fact it crops up on the Survivor Series 97/98 Tagged Classics DVD, but they’d been using it for a while before then. I ask because the scratch logo wasn’t being used on screen at Survivor Series 97, they were still using the old blue and yellow blocky logo, but it IS on this trailer. If you don’t remember it, the trailer features HBK, Bret Hart, Undertaker, Austin, Faarooq, Ahmed Johnson, repeating their sporting achievements / injuries to prove how “real” wrestling is, and after Bret tells us to “try lacing my boots”, the scratch logo with “attitude” on a black screen. I was surprised to see it, because I don’t remember it being used until 1998, but obviously had been used for a while before then. – Rich from the UK

I don’t remember them doing the complete switchover until after WrestleMania XIV. I remember the scratch logo appearing on some stuff before then, but the block logo still appeared on PPVs, television shows and magazines until after WM, then the Attitude logo took everything over. And count me as a person that still doesn’t understand why they didn’t completely change the logo after switching the name to WWE. If anybody remembers the exact date they started using the Attitude logo, feel free to chime in.

How do you chime in? It’s pretty simple, actually. You can send me an e-mail at [email protected], or you can comment down in the comment section. Until next time, boooooooooooooohica!