June 16, 2003
- Hey, let's look at what an abysmal clusterfuck of failure this Goldberg run in WWE has been, shall we? Hell yeah we shall! To say WWE has fumbled this is an understatement. Goldberg came in the door with several potential dream match opponents that they could have done huge business with. WWE took the most talked-about non-WWE star in years and almost immediately stripped him of his aura and mystique. The increased buyrate of his first match alone should have covered however much extra his contract cost, but they fumbled it from day one and now he's getting booed on TV and the buyrate for that first match came in as a disappointment.
- It all came to a head this week with Vince and Goldberg. Over the weekend, WWE made last minute changes and planned to add Goldberg to the Insurrextion PPV in the UK. The idea was for Goldberg to team with Kevin Nash against Triple H & Chris Jericho. Goldberg, who is dealing with some nagging injuries, agreed to go even though it would have put him above his allotted dates-per-month on his contract. But then someone from WWE called back and said, "Nevermind, don't worry about it." So no Goldberg. Then plans changed again and they called him back again to ask him to go. At this point, Goldberg was understandably like, "Get your shit together guys." In the end, he did not go.
- At Raw this week during a production meeting, Vince McMahon buried Goldberg in front of everyone and the script for the 6/9 Raw was changed to essentially bury him on TV. They wrote up a storyline where Jericho would injure Goldberg, who would follow doctor's advice and leave to go to the hospital rather than stay and seek revenge. Of course, he would come back later in the show. But they had him booked to return and get laid out by Jericho again to end the show. Goldberg arrived at the arena, saw the script, and refused. Vince, Goldberg, and Jericho all sat down and re-wrote it so that they basically eliminated the injury angle entirely and what you saw on Raw was what they settled on. Dave says, for what it's worth, this worked WAAAAY better than what they had planned would have and he gives kudos to Goldberg for standing up to bullshit booking. The plan is still for Goldberg to go on to challenge Triple H for the title at Summerslam, although it's by no means a certainty anymore that he will win. WWE seems to have already given up on the Goldberg experiment and it's kind of unfair, because Goldberg is still Goldberg and he's trying to do his part. Almost the entire blame on this falls squarely on WWE creative.
- Finally, there's also some tension between Goldberg and Jericho over the planned Badd Blood PPV match. Goldberg is obviously going to win and Jericho is fine with that, but he pitched an idea of kicking out of the 1st spear before losing to a 2nd spear followed by the jackhammer. Jericho argued that Rock kicked out of the spear and Goldberg essentially responded with, "You're not the Rock." Ouch.
- You want another 8,500 word obituary for Freddie Blassie? Better subscribe and read it your damn self. Want my VERY brief synopsis? Let's do this shit: actually, this is mostly just a better written (he had an extra week) version of last week's obituary, featuring lots of quotes from people like Dick Beyer, musician Johnny Legend, Mike Tenay, Billy Graham, John Tolos, Pedro Morales, etc. Muhammad Ali always claimed he was inspired by Gorgeous George, but a lot of his stories of growing up watching wrestling lead Dave to think he may have gotten George mixed up with Blassie on occasion. This obituary doesn't so much cover all the big hits of his career rather than lots of little in between stories. Just so much good stuff here. I know I sarcastically make jokes about how long and in-depth these pieces are, but they really are fantastic.
- I don't usually delve into MMA stuff in here, but this one is pretty historically important: Chuck Liddell was defeated by Randy Couture at UFC 43 this past week. It wasn't supposed to go this way. UFC desperately wanted to book Liddell vs. Tito Ortiz, but Ortiz (the light heavyweight champion) is currently in a contract dispute with the company and/or may be ducking Chuck Liddell. To try and force his hand, UFC booked Liddell vs. Couture as an interim title match, with the idea that Liddell would win and have a legitimate and credible claim as champion since Ortiz wouldn't fight. But real life has a funny way of not going as planned and Couture cut weight, dropped a weight class, and proceeded to beat the brakes off Liddell to become the first man to win titles in 2 weight classes and totally scuttled UFC's well-laid plans. Whoops. Elsewhere on the show, Tank Abbott returned and got obliterated, while Ken Shamrock cut a promo promising to fight again after tearing his ACL. Also, Undertaker was in attendance at the show and Dave notes that Taker is becoming a regular at UFC events.
- Time Magazine ran a huge in-depth story on Bob Sapp. It talks about how Sapp was living in Atlanta 2 years ago calling help wanted ads for a job after WCW folded and now he's in Japan making more than $3 million per year, which makes him the highest paid athlete in all of professional wrestling, unless you count The Rock's recent movie money. In the story, Sapp admitted his fighting technique is terrible and attibuted his success to being a pop culture phenomenon in Japan. He noted he's done more than 1,000 interviews, 200+ TV appearances, and he has endorsement deals with more than 15 Japanese companies. Sapp admitted he doesn't love the attention, saying that people in Japan treat him like a circus animal instead of a human being. He always has to stay in his beast character and fans won't let him go out in public or finish his meals at restaurants. Sapp also expressed frustration at still being under contract to K-1 for 15 more fights but never having time to train because he spends so much time fulfulling other media obligations, but says K-1 is such an understaffed and disorganized mess than he feels they've left millions of dollars on the table in other things they passed up on. The article noted that even though Sapp says all the right things about being with K-1 for the long haul, it really seems like he's looking for a way out.
- Keiji Muto and Arashi won the AJPW tag titles and what a mess this is. The show where they won them drew a disasterously small crowd. The titles have been vacant since last year and prior to that, Kronik had them. Yes, Kronik from WCW. "Please don't ask, it was silly enough when it happened," Dave adds.
- Not great news over in NJPW either. With Yuji Nagata and Manabu Nakanishi currently working NOAH tours and Masahiro Chono out injured, they're trying to build the current tour around Hiroyoshi Tenzan as the top guy and it's not a booming success. The company is hoping to try and get Hiroshi Tanahashi over to the level that he can help carry things when the big names are out, but NJPW has a bad TV time slot and everything else about the company is down right now, so getting new stars over is difficult.
- Meanwhile, over in NOAH, Kenta Kobashi and Tamon Honda won the GHC tag titles before a sold out Budokan Hall, making Kobashi a double champion (he currently holds the GHC world title as well). Kenta 2 Belts!
- HBO show "Real Sports" is running a story later this month on deaths in the wrestling business. Vince McMahon has reportedly agreed to be interviewed but it hasn't taken place as of yet (I'm sure this interview will go just fine and there won't be any controversial fallout whatsoever from this episode).
- Jesse Ventura got into an argument with a frequent local critic and it resulted in police getting involved. Leslie Davis, a well-known Minneapolis environmentalist, was leading a protest outside the TV studio where Ventura was rehearsing for his new MSNBC show. As Ventura was leaving the building, he allegedly threatened the guy and snatched the sign out of his hand and ripped it up. Ventura allegedly told the man, "I'm not the governor anymore, I'm a former Navy SEAL so what do you want to do?" The man filed a police report but this is almost certainly going nowhere. This guy has tried to get Ventura prosecuted for other things when he was governor and just really doesn't like ol' Ventura and sounds like he follows him around trying to goad him into this kind of shit and Ventura almost took the bait this time. Speaking of, that MSNBC show of his was delayed. Allegedly due to boring scheduling issues but the word going around is that there's a ton of concern at the network that Ventura isn't cut out to host a show like this and, despite all the rehearsals, might never be and they're trying to figure out what they're going to do in order to make it watchable.
- Dave will have a full review of the WWA PPV next week but says the 4-way match with Kazarian/Lynn/Swinger/Sabin is one of the best matches of the year. Otherwise, it's interesting because it might be your last chance to see Bret Hart or Sting for awhile. Who knows what the Hart/WWE relationship is like these days and the Sting/WWE negotiations seem to be dead right now.
- Update on Magnum TA, who was groomed to be one of the biggest stars of the 80s and 90s, but a car wreck in 1986 ended his career before he could get there. It's a miracle he survived, much less was able to walk again. Anyway, he runs a company called Magnum Cellular Services which builds and maintains cell phone towers. He says just doing day-to-day activities today is as hard as wrestling used to be but considering that the accident should have killed him, he's thankful anyway.
- We're a week away from TNA's heavily-hyped 1-year anniversary show and.....we still don't have a main event. The original plan was Jeff Jarrett vs. Glen Gilberti vs. Raven for the title. At one point they changed it to have AJ Styles replace Gilberti but that's still up in the air.
- This past week's PPV had the Jarrett vs. Gilberti singles match and the crowd just ain't buying Gilberti as a top guy to begin with. It was made worse by the fact that everything he did looked awful, as he clearly doesn't belong in the same ring as Jeff Jarrett in a main event match. Elsewhere on the show, they had Don Harris tell Ron Killings that he wasn't going to team "with your kind" just in case you thought TNA was done playing in the racism pool. Then Harris clarified that he didn't mean all black people, just ones like Killings. Why is this on a wrestling show?
- There are plans to turn Kane heel soon. This is all Dave says but little does he know we're also two weeks away from Kane unmasking after almost 6 years. Because WWE doesn't know they plan to do it yet either. Flying by the seat of their pants in this era.
- Notes from 6/5 Smackdown: good show, and Dave thinks this Zach Gowan kid is pretty great for being as young as he is, especially with his acting and facial expressions. "He sold that schoolyard shove better than anyone ever did at my elementary school, and we were the masters of that one," Dave says. Dave confirmed for schoolyard bully. They aired a great tribute on Freddie Blassie but it was almost all footage from the 80s. Dave is bummed that all the years of footage from his days in the Los Angeles territory are lost. But back then, they re-used the tapes after they aired on TV because VCRs didn't exist and nobody had the foresight to know there would be a market for that stuff decades later. The Bashams, only one week in, lost a match. Always a good way to get new acts over as soon as they arrive. And the return of Kurt Angle, which Dave felt was lackluster. They spent the whole show hyping Angle's "greatest moments" such as the milk truck thing and playing the ukulele with a little hat. This is a guy who won a gold medal with a broken neck and took Lesnar to his limit at Wrestlemania with another damn near broken neck. Kurt Angle is a legitimately lethal motherfucker and they spent the whole show hyping up his funny moments, and then had him get beat down and rescued by Lesnar to end the segment. Not the strongest return. Show ended with Rey Mysterio winning the cruiserweight title and wouldn't you know it, his family was at ringside. After the match, Rey brought his 6-year old son in the ring to celebrate while his wife cried at ringside. Pretty sad that this poor child has to go to his deadbeat dad's work just to spend a few minutes with him.
- Notes from 6/9 (nice) Raw: one of the only things to note here is an absolutely brutal line from Dave regarding the Test/Scott Steiner/Stacy Keibler storyline in which Test was abusing and harassing Stacy: "Test would be a great heel except for the fact he's Test and he can't be a great anything." Goddamn lol. Mick Foley came back, as everyone expected, announced as referee for the Hell in a Cell match at Bad Blood, cut some good promos, and got beat down by the end of the show in a good angle.
- Notes from next week's SD tapings: the Basham Brothers, who made an unexpected debut last week are now managed by Tough Enough winner Linda Miles, using the name Shaniqua. They announced they're bringing back the US title, which has been dead since it was merged with the IC title at the end of the Invasion storyline in 2001. Dave is unpleased by this turn of events. Team Angle split up now that Kurt Angle is a babyface. And they did a spot where Brock Lesnar superplexed Big Show and the ring collapsed, which people were reacting to as if it was the greatest spot in wrestling history. More on that next week.
- APA's return has been delayed because Bradshaw had to get hernia surgery. He'd been diagnosed by another doctor with a pulled groin but it wasn't healing and another doctor finally diagnosed what it actually was. When Bradshaw found out, he was furious with the original doctor because Bradshaw had suspected hernia all along but was assured by the first doctor that that it wasn't.
- Steve Austin did an interview talking about his neck. He says he has extensive nerve problems but actually isn't in any pain from it. The nerve issues cause problems with the reflexes in his legs. He's planning to see the same doctor Kurt Angle met with to see if there's anything that can be done but re-iterated that he is retired and plans to stay that way, except for a possible one-last-match situation if the right opportunity ever arises.
- Speaking of that Mysterio title win, it was done in Anaheim because they wanted to make sure Mysterio got a big reaction. Putting it in the main event slot was also a test, because there are people in the company (particularly Paul Heyman and Dave Lagana) who insist Mysterio can be a draw if he's booked correctly. The Mysterio/Hardy match did indeed do a strong rating, so that was good news.
- Jim Ross has been pushing to get WWE in talks with the National Football League Players Association (NFLPA) to set up an agreement to help funnel NFL players into wrestling once they are cut or retire from the NFL. Find you someone who loves you as much as JR loves football player wrestlers. Ross also said they would continue pursuing standout amateur stars like Angle and Lesnar. He also said he only wants to keep doing his current role as VP of talent relations for another 2-3 years and wants to move back to Oklahoma, but continue doing commentary (this is pretty much exactly what he did and if you read JR's book, it didn't go over too well. Vince likes people at his beck and call 24/7 and he wasn't happy when Ross moved away from Stamford and back to Oklahoma).
- The plan going forward is to put Mark Jindrak into the spot Batista was going to have in Evolution. Dave calls Jindrak the least over and least charismatic guy in OVW and thinks it sucks that he's leapfrogging everyone to the top of the card in a main event stable just because of his look (good news Dave! Triple H agreed with you and got Batista back in the spot).
- This leads Dave to saying if you took every top drawing star of the last 30 years and put them in today's OVW fresh off the block, most of them wouldn't even make it to the main roster because they don't have the right look. Billy Graham, Hogan, and Rock would have still made it (although they all would have been called up too soon). Bruiser Brody would have been told to get a haircut and shave and maybe would have a chance. Flair would have gotten there on pure ability no matter what, but he would have had to fight the "he's too small" battle. Andre The Giant? In a world where Big Show exists? Nah. Jerry Lawler with his look? Really? Dusty Rhodes might have gotten to be a midcard fat guy comedy act. Mick Foley wouldn't get through the door (he barely did anyway). On and on and on. But if you're tall and got muscles on top of muscles, cut the line and come right on in!
- WWE and the future of Monday Night Raw are in mortal jeopardy, as its possible that they may lose their television deal. Here's the story: film director Spike Lee recently filed an injunction against SpikeTV, claiming that the name of the network is clearly meant to piggyback off his name and he never gave them permission to use it. Needless to say, this ironclad case is sure to destroy the network, and who knows where that will leave the fate of WWE?
- Presuming the company does survive, La Resistance is expected to win the tag titles at Bad Blood.
- Marc Mero and Sable have reportedly separated. Apparently, he wasn't thrilled with the idea of her going back to WWE. Relax dude, it's not like she's gonna go back and start boning Brock Lesnar or something.
- Scott Steiner is dealing with more pain than people realize. On the flight back from the UK, he only sat in his seat for take-off and landing and had to lay on his back the rest of the flight and then needed help getting off the plane.
- A-Train was re-signed recently but for less money. That's been the routine for awhile now. When guys' contracts expire, WWE lowballs them with a lower guarantee. And most take it because where else are you gonna go? Ain't no WCW anymore. As you can imagine, morale in the company over this kind of stuff is pretty bad. Road expenses are higher than ever while guarantees are getting cut, ratings are falling, attendance is dropping, etc. So house payoffs, merch payoffs, all of this downturn is hitting wrestlers pocketbooks from multiple angles.
- Carly Colon has signed with WWE and is headed to OVW for a brief run. He's not "being assigned" there so much as spending a few weeks just so they can asses him and then get him on the main roster. He's expected to be on the Smackdown team ASAP. Also recently signed is indie wrestler Aaron Stevens, who is headed to OVW as well (later to be known as Damien Sandow).
- Well, Jim Cornette figured out a way to try and explain the Basham Brothers debuting together as a team on Smackdown while still embroiled in a blood feud with each other in OVW. And as far as explaining away impossible situations, this one wasn't bad. Damaja claimed he was at Smackdown and ordered by John Laurinitis to team with Basham, and Cornette read a portion from Damaja's "contract" in which it stated WWE has the right to put him in matches, choose his partners, his ring names, etc. and he'd be in breach of contract and couldn't wrestle anywhere. In other words, they basically made it like Basham and Lauranitis are in cahoots to try and force Damaja to quit. But he won't quit and said if he can basically cripple Basham here in OVW, then he won't have to worry about teaming with him in WWE anymore. So they're still scheduled for a big blow off match in OVW soon. Eh....I mean, it's not the best storyline but what the hell else can ya do? They put Cornette in an impossible spot there. Speaking of OVW, Dave raves about Mark Magnus, saying he seems like he has all the tools and a lot of potential. That would the future Muhammad Hassan.
- Edge, in his time off, was asked to send in reports after the TV shows with his feelings on what could be improved and just general critiques. This didn't last long. Edge kept asking all the obvious questions about why this or that doesn't make sense, continuity issues, etc. John Laurinaitis reached out to him and advised Edge to make his critiques "more positive." Edge pretty much said "fuck this" and just stopped doing them. Yeah, that tells you everything you need to know about this company.