May 12, 1997
- So last week, when hyping up Monday's post, I forgot that today is Labor Day. So I'm off work and chillin' and suddenly remember, "Oh shit, it's Monday!" I thought about just scrapping the Rewind for today since I know a lot of you are off work also but I know a lot of people in other countries read this (which is still surreal to me) so let's do this!
- FMW has had meetings with both WWF and ECW this week, to attempt to put together a big joint show in November in Japan. Antsushi Onita and several other FMW officials had a 3-hour meeting with Vince McMahon, Bruce Prichard, and Jim Ross in Stamford to discuss plans. Onita wants to have an exploding ring barbed wire match at Madison Square Garden and wants WWF to help promote it. Dave says it wouldn't draw (no one in America knows Onita enough to fill an arena) and it makes no sense for WWF to promote something like that. As of now, no deal has been reached to promote a joint show but WWF hasn't said no either. They also want to get EMLL in on the deal and a working agreement between WWF and EMLL was discussed as well. So far, the WWF/AAA relationship seems to pretty much be dead, due to disorganization on AAA's part, although AAA is still claiming they have big name WWF stars coming to Mexico soon. WCW has also had dealings with EMLL so this whole thing could get interesting politically.
- Speaking of, there's some interesting WWF/WCW drama with Michinoku Pro in Japan. The Michinoku Pro promotion has a working relationship with NJPW, who in turn has a relationship with WCW. So WCW wasn't thrilled when they saw the Michinoku Pro guys working ECW's PPV last month and they also weren't happy to hear that they had meetings with WWF. So WCW has put pressure on NJPW to get Michinoku Pro to fall in line. NJPW has since told Michinoku Pro that if any of their guys work with WWF, it will cut off their relationship with Michinoku Pro.
- WWF has started to locally promote the upcoming King of the Ring PPV in Providence, RI and in local advertisements, they've announced several matches. Most notably, the long-awaited rematch between Shawn Michaels vs. Bret Hart is scheduled for the show, along with Steve Austin vs. Brian Pillman (obviously neither of those happened).
- WWF beat WCW in the ratings the last 2 weeks, but only because Raw aired unopposed. Nitro had its time slot moved around due to the NBA playoffs. But for what it's worth, the same thing happened last year, but this year, the gap between the ratings was considerably smaller, with WCW still doing a strong rating despite the different time slot.
- Jake Roberts is doing some of the booking in AAA.
- Riki Choshu and Akira Maeda are talking about doing a big match in NJPW playing off a shoot incident from 1987 that, in hindsight, totally changed the entire face of pro wrestling at the time. Back in 87, Choshu and Maeda had heat between them for some reason and they were on opposite teams in a tag match. During the match, Choshu had a hold on someone when Maeda came up and gave him a full, unprotected kick to the face as hard as he could, on purpose. Choshu suffered a broken orbital bone and was seriously injured. NJPW planned to severely punish Maeda for the incident, but instead, Maeda quit the company and formed his own shoot-style wrestling promotion called UWF, with matches that were worked but were booked and designed to look like shoots. UWF quickly became the hottest promotion in the world and paved the way for shoot-style matches that NJPW and AJPW both quickly copied. It's also what promotions like R*INGS and UWFI were based on. Pancrase and UFC took that style a few steps further and thus, modern MMA was formed. Anyway, it seems they've buried the hatchet enough to work together. Choshu and Maeda hadn't spoken since the incident until last week, when both men met face-to-face for an interview that is believed to be building up to a long-awaited one-on-one match between them.
- Terry Funk did a moonsault to the outside of the ring at an FMW show and cracked his head on the floor and suffered a concussion. Funk was hospitalized but still flew back to the U.S. and worked the next ECW show, with a huge lump on his head still showing.
- Rickson Gracie and Nobuhiro Takada are finally having their long-awaited shoot fight in a few months at a show in the Tokyo Dome (ended up being the first Pride show ever). Gracie will allegedly make $1 million for the fight. Gracie has repeatedly turned down million dollar offers to do worked matches so this will be a full shoot. Last year, Royce Gracie also turned down $1 million to do a worked match with Antonio Inoki because the Gracies refuse to take the fights unless they are 100% shoots.
- The identity of the caller on the Howard Stern show who claimed to be an indie wrestler who also wanted to be a serial killer was Frank Iadevia, who is an indie promoter for Jersey All Pro Wrestling. Iadevia runs the company and also wrestles as Adorable Anthony. Turns out the call was a publicity stunt on his part, but the Stern crew didn't know about it ahead of time so there was legit concern that they were talking to a potential serial killer (Iadevia passed away in 2015. Jersey All Pro Wrestling still exists and over the years, guys like AJ Styles, Kevin Owens, Sami Zayn, Kenny Omega, Jay Lethal, Low Ki, Kassius Ohno, Homicide, and dozens more have worked there and worked for Iadevia. As for the phone call on Stern, listen for yourself. I dunno man, this guy is quick on the draw with very specific replies to certain fucked up things...)
- Despite denials on both sides, Dave keeps hearing rumors that Disco Inferno is negotiating with WWF. He still has a non-compete clause in his WCW contract and with tensions between WWF and WCW being so high right now, it's possible WWF doesn't want to risk any accusations of contract tampering, so that may be why they're denying even talking with him.
- Eric Bischoff and Paul Heyman are still trying to negotiate a deal over Raven. WCW wants Raven to debut at the July PPV but Heyman wants Raven to stick around until ECW's August PPV so he can put over Tommy Dreamer. Raven is under ECW contract until October but Heyman is willing to let him out of the deal if WCW will make it worth his while. Speaking of contracts, Stevie Richards is working for ECW without a contract and could leave whenever he wants. Raven has reportedly talked to WCW about bringing Richards in with him, but there's no word either way on that.
- It seems the Rob Van Dam/WCW deal isn't happening anymore and Van Dam will be staying with ECW. There is also no truth to the rumors of The Gangstas going to WCW.
- Bam Bam Bigelow joined ECW, debuting as part of a new Triple Threat faction with Shane Douglas and Chris Candido at a show in his hometown of Asbury Park, NJ.
- At another ECW show, Rick Rude picked up Francine in a piledriver position, "and began sucking her buttcheek like he was giving her a hickey there."
- Paul Heyman is talking to WWF about them letting him bring in PG-13 to feud with The Eliminators. It wouldn't be the first time, since the two teams feuded in USWA a couple of years ago when The Eliminators were still new to the business.
- WCW and WWF will be going head-to-head in Los Angeles on June 28th, with both companies running house shows in the city that night. WCW is loading up their show, billing it "Saturday Nitro" and the main event is scheduled to be Hollywood Hogan vs. Sting (nope).
- WCW "stars" (used loosely) Alex Wright and Hard Body Harrison got into a backstage fight at the Saturday Night tapings. They got into some sort of argument about the plan for their match later that night. At one point, Harrison grabbed some kind of piece of exercise equipment. Alex Wright thought Harrison was about to hit him with it, so he struck first, punching Harrison in the eye and splitting his brow open. They fought for a moment until the fight was broken up and most people thought Wright was winning, which surprised some people. Also, since Harrison is a jobber, most of the blame and punishment was put on him.
- Sid had an MRI done on his back and it turns out he has a lower lumbar strain and not a herniated disc, as he claimed. It's an injury that a lot of weightlifters get and it's probably not a good idea to wrestle with it, but you could still show up to TV and cut promos or work angles as needed. There's tons of guys in the locker room with more serious injuries who still work every night. But not Sid! He has refused to come to work since the injury and his future with the company is in doubt.
- Some more details have come out on the Vader incident in Kuwait. Basically, Vader had been told to ham it up and act menacing and in character. Plus, ticket sales for the tour hadn't been going well so Vader took it upon himself to sorta work an angle on live TV to try and build up some of the shows. So when asked if wrestling was fake, he knocked over the table and grabbed the host. To Vader, it was apparently a work but no one told the host or the show, and police were called. Several days later, while not being allowed to leave the country, Vader went to the U.S. Embassy and then went and had a few drinks. When he got back to the hotel, he was arrested for being drunk in public and police came to drag him away.
- At a WWF house show in Fort Wayne, Steve Austin worked against Hunter Hearst Helmsley. After the match, Austin teased it for a moment and then hit Chyna with the stone cold stunner, getting the biggest pop of the show (I believe this is the first time we had the real man-on-woman violence that eventually became a staple of the Attitude Era. At least it's the first time I've seen Dave mention it).
- Someone writes in and basically shits on Shawn Michaels for faking an injury and refusing to put over Bret Hart at Wrestlemania and says that if Shawn's contract was up, he'd betray WWF in a heartbeat and jump to WCW. He says Shawn is jealous of Bret and predicts that 10 years from now, Michaels will be in WCW putting over Hogan at Starrcade.
- And finally, someone does the gimmick where they write in with questions and snarky Dave responds:
- Why....
- Is Wallstreet back after quitting the NWO?
- 2) Is the WWF embarrassing themselves by even thinking of hiring Disco Inferno?
- 3) Is Jesse Jammes signed to a long-term deal?
- 4) Did I waste $9.000 on the Ultimate Warrior hotline to hear Jim Hellwig curse and talk about someone stealing his spot on the weight bench when he momentarily walked away?
- 5) Do I get the feeling JYD, King Kong Bundy, Mr. T and Haiti Kid are next to join the NWO?
- 6) Is there a wrestling PPV every week?
- 7) Do I not believe Lee Marshall is where he says he is during those 1-800 collect calls?
- 8) Why didn't I dial 1-800 collect instead of the Warrior hotline?
- Vince Gagliardi
- Cranford, New Jersey
- DM: 1) Because nobody in WCW actually watches all their television shows. How could they? In the words of the great Ray Stevens, it would cut way too far down on drinking and women chasing time; 2) They say they aren't thinking--of hiring Disco Inferno, that is; 3) They say they aren't thinking--oh, that was the previous question, sorry; 4) After all these years you're willing to pay money just to find out if Jim Hellwig finally has something relevant to say. Do you still ave the video of Roddy Piper's current interviews also? 5) I have that nightmare sometimes as well. But then I wake up and realize it was only a dream and nothing like that happens in real life wrestling. Well, at least until the Hogan-Luger match; 6) Because there are more than 100,000 willing buyers every week; 7) Because you're being logical. It's obvious that Lee Marshall is the type of person that nobody would invite to a party; 8) Because you were afraid Lee Marshall would answer the phone and make a lousy weasel joke and you'd have to hear Mike Tenay and Tony Schiavone in the background laughing at it.