February 07, 1994
- The rumor mill has been going nuts this week about the possibility of Hulk Hogan coming to WCW later this year for a match against Ric Flair. At this point, there's no contract between Hogan and WCW and while some within the company think it's a sure thing, others are extremely skeptical that it will ever happen. WCW has reportedly made Hogan an offer which would call for him to receive a percentage of the PPV buys. Flair has always wanted to do a major storyline with Hogan and they never really got the chance in WWF. Many feel that WWF dropped the ball in promoting Flair when he first arrived (by making him just another guy instead of promoting him as an outsider from WCW challenging Hogan) and that's why the Hogan/Flair matches didn't do the kind of business they should have. Hogan is currently filming Thunder In Paradise at Disney Studios in Orlando, in the studio right next door to where WCW is taping the next four months of TV.
- Meanwhile, Hogan is seemingly giving serious consideration to running his own shows, most likely in Europe because it's considered the most fertile ground for a "Hogan Fan Appreciation Tour" (his words). Hogan has even purchased his own world championship belt, which seems to indicate that he is planning to start promoting shows on his own. The idea seems to be something like the Ice Capades tour, with big special effects and a rock concert (featuring Hogan, Jimmy Hart, and others) before the wrestling show takes place. (Belt afficianados: anyone got pics of this belt Hogan made for himself?)
- The main event for Wrestlemania X was made official on Raw this week with a coin toss angle. Bret Hart will face Owen Hart while Yokozuna defends the title against Lex Luger. The main event will be whoever wins the Luger/Yoko match then facing Bret Hart. Selling the show based on the intrigue of what might happen is probably the smart idea because none of the potential title matches are big draws on their own. No one is really clamoring to see Yoko/Luger or Yoko/Bret again. And doing Bret/Luger will just expose how much more popular Bret is after all the work they've put in to making Roman Re....sorry....Luger the top guy.
- WWF officially announced their upcoming Japanese tour at a press conference in Tokyo last week. Interestingly enough, they specified that the shows will be specifically catered to Japanese fans, rather than just throwing the usual WWF house shows out there. Expect both Genichiro Tenryu and Atsushi Onita to work the shows. Of the current WWF roster, the Undertaker is the only wrestler with any significant following in Japan and even he doesn't crack the top 10 most popular foreigners working there.
- AAA announced Triplemania II taking place in April and named 10 different cities as potential hosts, including Los Angeles and New York. There's no way New York will happen because it's too risky and they already have a major show booked in L.A. the month before and it's a little risky to come back so soon after. Most likely the show will be held in Puebla, Mexico (nope).
- WCW's latest Clash of the Champions featured the debut of Bobby Heenan and was the final show of the Dusty Rhodes booking era. Overall, it was mostly uneventful, aside from Heenan. Dave believes that Bobby Heenan is the most significant on-camera personality to have jumped ship in the war between the two companies. Coming so soon after his departure from WWF and given how great Heenan is on camera, it's a huge plus for WCW. Heenan easily outclassed the work Jesse Ventura has done the last 2 years and should absolutely be calling all PPVs and major events from now on. Also of note, Tony Schiovone worked the show while seriously ill and also has a neck injury that will require surgery. He was so ill that Gordon Solie called two matches on the show just to give Tony a break.
- Jerry Lawler still expects the charges against him to be dismissed at the next hearing on Feb. 23rd but if that doesn't happen, the case will go to trial on April 5th. The alleged victim apparently named 5 different men in the case, claiming she had slept with them, but Lawler has been the only one charged, which he claims is evidence that he's being targeted because of his celebrity status. The girl has since recanted her story and Lawler's attorney claims that they have over a dozen affidavits from friends of the girl who say she was lying. Dave says, as we have learned from the potential prosecution of Michael Jackson, without victim testimony and without physical evidence, it's pretty much impossible to get a conviction, so Dave is perplexed as to why the charges haven't already been dropped. The prosecution simply doesn't have a case.
- In the lawsuit he filed against Sid Vicious last week, Arn Anderson gave his version of the stabbing incident for the first time. He claims they got into an argument in the hotel bar and WCW director of security Doug Dillinger intervened and escorted Anderson and Vicious back to their rooms, while Vicious continued to insult and threaten Arn. After he was back in his room, Anderson heard Sid beating and kicking his door. When Anderson went to the door to confront Sid, he saw no one in the hallway. When he stepped out, Sid, who had been hiding off to the side, struck Anderson with the leg of a chair. Arn claims that Sid continued to attack him with the chair leg and then with a pair of scissors, as well as punching and kicking him. Anderson suffered serious injuries and the complaint states, "the actions of the defendant were intentional, wanton, willful, and malicious and were done with the intent to seriously injure or perhaps even kill the plaintiff."
- Atsushi Onita is scheduled for several big inter-promotional matches this year in Japan against Genichiro Tenryu, Antonio Inoki, and Yoshiaki Fujiwara. There are two reasons that they're pushing for all these big dream matches within the year. The first reason is that Onita has been making noise about retiring soon and he apparently wants to go out with a bang. And secondly, there's a belief that the boom in Japanese wrestling won't last forever. There are more than a dozen promotions running regular shows in the small country and the fanbase can't realistically support that much wrestling forever. The business is already starting to show cracks, with some of the shows that used to be automatic easy sellouts not drawing like they did even a year ago. So the idea seems to be for everyone to get all these big inter-promotional dream matches done ASAP and make big money while they still can.
- Lucha Libre star Anibal has been in a coma for over a month after suffering a brain hemorrhage due to a brain tumor (he died a month later).
- A promotion called Pro Wrestling Crusaders in Japan had what Dave calls "one of the craziest matches of all time." The main event was a double barricade nails match, which means they had 2 barricades loaded with nails and the object was to get the opponent between the barricades and crush them on both sides with the nails or something? It isn't very clear from his description and I can't find anything about it online.
- Yoshiaki Fujiwara had a shoot match in Canada against an untamed bear (as opposed to the old tamed bears they used to use when they did this gimmick back in the old days). Dave says that Fujiwara's knowledge of submissions didn't help him at all, as the bear made short work of him and it was momentarily very dangerous and scary. My favorite part of this is that Dave specifies that it was a shoot match. As opposed to he and the bear working out spots ahead of time or something. Anyway, here you go. Sadly, it's not the mat-classic that was Bryan vs. Bear, but what can ya do?
- In SMW, the ongoing Tammy Sytch vs. Dirty White Girl feud may be cut short because there is legit heat between the two women. In an unrelated note, Dave also says that the original plan was for Sytch to manage Tony Atlas, because a white woman and a black man together would generate surefire heat among the SMW fanbase. But Atlas ended up not coming to work for them, so Sytch was put with Brian Lee instead.
- Chris Jericho and Lance Storm are in Knoxville this week, having music videos done for them for their upcoming SMW debut. But they aren't going to be working yet because all the immigration paperwork and work permits for them haven't been finalized yet (they're both Canadian, perhaps you've heard).
- Dave finally got to see some tapes of the last few weeks of ECW TV. He says at almost 50 years old, Terry Funk is still one of the five or six best workers in the country. His matches with Shane Douglas (45 minute classic wrestling draw) and with Sabu (insane brawl) were both excellent. As for the TV show itself, ECW announcer Joey Styles reminds Dave of a younger Jim Ross without the accent. He does a great job of getting all the key points across, but he's so intense for the entire hour that it feels like he's banging you over the head with a hammer to get those points across. The production value is minor league, but that's to be expected. The character development is great. Shane Douglas, nicknamed "The Franchise" is treated like a legit main eventer and Sabu is basically a modern day Jimmy Snuka.
- AAA had one of the hottest shows in their history in Veracruz, Mexico. The 10,000 seat arena was sold out and they showed shots of the windows and there were people outside the arena literally crawling all over each other and climbing the sides of the building trying to watch the matches through the second story windows.
- Kevin Sullivan returned to WCW at the latest tapings and formed a team with the Equalizer.
- Ted Turner is scheduled to do a live interview on the WCW TV tapings next month.
- Sting was nearly seriously injured in a boating accident while filming Thunder In Paradise but luckily escaped with just a cut on his head. Sting is in the first two episodes in a heel role.
- Michael Hayes quit WCW this week after being offered a $75,000 per year deal.
- Tony Schiavone will need surgery for a disc injury in his neck and will be out for at least a month. Gordon Solie will likely be the temporary fill-in for Tony on commentary while he's recovering.
- Earthquake made his return to WWF at the Raw taping this week as a babyface.
- Mr. Perfect has been contacted about returning at Wrestlemania but so far, he hasn't accepted the offer.
- The letters section is full of people writing in about Royal Rumble. Most people hated it and are just shitting all over the absurdity of the Undertaker/Yokozuna finish.