May 24, 1993
- With just days to go until WCW's Slamboree PPV, less than 1,000 tickets have been sold so far. The show is marketed around being an old-timers show, but most modern day wrestling fans have no sense of the history of the business and the average WCW fan has no idea who Lou Thesz or Wahoo McDaniel are and have no interest in seeing a reunion show with a bunch of guys from the 1960s and 70s. As for the modern day wrestlers, none of the matches on the card are anything to be excited about. The hottest angle in the company was Vader/Cactus Jack, however with Jack out injured, WCW is unable to take advantage of it and the heat from that is pretty much already gone away.
- The Four Horsemen are expected to be reunited at the show, minus Tully Blanchard who couldn't come to an agreement with the company. A new Horseman is expected to be brought in and Dave says it will likely be "an ex-WWF midcard performer who has never gotten a major push before, but has talent." I mean, I guess that's one way to describe him...
- Marty Jannetty made his return to WWF on Raw this week and captured the IC title from Shawn Michaels in a 4-star match. Dave says Shawn, "who is, by a significant margin, the best worker in the United States" carried the match while Marty looked rusty. This is Marty's 4th time with the company, having been fired 3 times before. On the same show, Lightning Kid, this time wrestling as "The Kid" scored the first jobber upset in WWF history by pinning Razor Ramon (Dave says he's been waiting 7 years to see someone introduce a new star like this). Dave says the reason for Raw's ratings success has been the unstructured and unpredictable feel of the show, giving it a classic Memphis-wrestling vibe (man, what I wouldn't give to go back to feeling that sort of excitement for Raw these days).
- Stan Lane lost a loser leaves town match in SMW. The real reason is because he's had some disagreements with Jim Cornette and had been planning to leave months ago. He didn't want to move to Knoxville (SMW's primary city) and was tired of travelling every week from his home in Charlotte to get to SMW shows. He also didn't want to do blade jobs, which is expected in all of SMW's crazy matches. He chose to stay for as long as he did in order to help the company and give them a big storyline for him to go out on and put someone over. A+ professionalism from Stan Lane.
- At an ECW show in Philadelphia, there's been a lot of talk about a crazy spot where JT Smith and Doug Gilbert both ended up jumping off a large interview platform (I think this might have happened at the ECW Arena but I can't find video of it). Both men were limping afterward and Smith reportedly injured his knees pretty badly on the bump.
- The Warlord appeared in court on a steroid possession charge this week from an arrest back in November that Dave is just learning of. Nothing newsworthy from that, but he'll be back in court next month where he has to enter a plea. He faces a maximum year in prison. Warlord parted ways with WWF last year, amid rumors that he was clearly the heaviest steroid user in the company and wouldn't stop using them.
- A Current Affair aired its story on the Von Erich family. It's gotten a lot of negative reviews due to all the stuff that was left out that should have been included. Dave also gripes about the claim that Kerry vs. Flair drew 43,000 people, which has never been true and he wishes people would stop spreading the lie. He also finds it inexcusable that they act like Kerry's prosthetic foot was a big secret, when literally everyone in the business knew. And he's particularly upset at the closing line about Kevin Von Erich still being an international superstar who only works charity shows in America. Dave says yes, the producers were aware that Kevin held up the promoter for $1,000 at his own brother's benefit show. And classifying Kevin Von Erich today as anything but a non-entity in the business is wrong. Dave basically writes off the whole story as garbage (there might be a few factual errors, but I actually thought it was really well done).
- More April 92 vs. April 93 business comparisons. WWF is down across the board, but not significantly less than the year before. WCW though...whew. 35% drop in house show attendance compared to last year. 32% drop in live gate dollars. 9% drop in TV ratings.
- In EMLL, newcomer Corazon de Leon (better known as "Chris Jericho from Calgary".....dammit, Dave) is said to already be the most popular wrestler in the promotion.
- Besides suing UWFI, New Japan is also suing Big Van Vader directly. Vader's defense is that NJPW didn't hold up their end of their deal by paying for his knee surgery (the injury was suffered in Japan) and that they haven't booked him in nearly a year, so as far as he's concerned, they voided the contract.
- In GWF, there was a match between Chris Adams and Rod Price. Adams ripped Price's "surgically implanted hair weave" out of his head, causing an incredible amount of blood and pain. Gobs of flesh came out with the hair and Price needed over 100 stitches after. Adams claims it was an accident, but Price is said to be furious and claims the effort it took to rip it out couldn't have been an accident. I wish I could find video of this.
- The recent indie tour that Ultimate Warrior was part of could result in legal repercussions. The promoter says he will be filing civil and criminal charges against 2 wrestlers, Warrior and someone unnamed who he claims physically extorted money from him. As for Warrior, the promoter claims he had agreed to a certain amount for a certain number of shows, but when the time came, Warrior demanded (and received) another $67,500 before he would even get on the plane to Europe and then demanded another $35,000 upon arrival in Munich before he would go to the ring for the first show. And then demanded an additional $22,500 and $20,000 at two other shows before he would work them as well.
- Word is Ultimate Warrior was also negotiating with a different promoter for a Japan tour but they cancelled plans because Warrior kept changing things after they had been agreed to and kept asking for more money. So with Warrior's schedule now clear, he would be free to work the WCW PPV in July, but Dave doesn't know if they've re-opened talks on that yet or not.
- Jerry Lawler's son Kevin is working as referee "Kevin Christian" for ECW and has moved to Philadelphia with Eddie and Doug Gilbert to help handle office work.
- Bob Orton Jr's son Randy won the Missouri 13-and-under age group state amateur wrestling championship last week.
- Dave gives an update on the whereabouts of several former GLOW wrestlers: Matilda The Hun now appears on a TV show called Knights & Warriors. Chainsaw is a professional dancer (not stripper) and danced at the Oscars a few years ago. Tiffany Mellons is now a porno actress, using the name Tiffany Million. And finally, Tina Ferrari is in ads in bodybuilding magazines doing videotapes ("don't ask," Dave adds, which...wonder what that means?) Tina Ferrari is, of course, better known as Ivory. I'm pretty sure Ivory never did porn, so not sure what Dave was implying there.
- There's rumors of WWF and New Japan possibly beginning a business relationship. If true, it would be huge news. For starters, it would cut WCW out of the picture and cut off a huge revenue stream for them. Also, if it happened, it would allow guys like Great Muta and Jushin Liger to work big shows for WWF. Antonio Inoki used to have a long-time working agreement with Vince McMahon Sr., before Junior took over and put an end to it. But with WWF's business on a downswing, they may be rethinking that attitude. (Never happened, but man, can you imagine Liger or Muta in mid-90s WWF?)
- According to a Hollywood trade journal, Hogan will be starring in a movie called Bad Company, a $9 million film to be shot this summer. (Never happened. There was a movie called Bad Company that came out in 1995 starring Laurence Fishburne. Maybe it was that?)
- Razor Ramon has been teasing a face turn at house shows, but is still working heel on TV.
- A jobber named Scott Taylor worked with Tatanka on Raw and showed a lot of potential and took great bumps (of course, you now know him as Scotty 2 Hotty).
- On the 5/10 episode of Raw, there was a brawl between Mr. Perfect and Shawn Michaels that saw them go out to the parking lot and break a windshield on a car and dent it all up. Turns out the windshield wasn't gimmicked and the damage to the car was legit. As for the car? It was Howard Finkel's and they tore up the car as a rib on Finkel, who was not in on the "joke."
- Dave raves about the Flair For The Gold segment featuring the Hollywood Blondes and says it's amazing how they have bypassed everyone on the roster and it's doubly funny because they were never supposed to be a team. The initial idea was for Pillman and Chris Benoit to team up, but negotiations with Benoit kept falling through, so they just threw Austin in with him instead and now they're the best tag team in the world.
- WCW will begin taping their weekly World Wide show at Universal Studios in Orlando starting in July.
- Sabu has a tryout with WCW scheduled soon.