October 06, 2003
- The main story this week is a deep-dive into the history of UFC as it approaches its 10-year anniversary. Which leads to questions about who the best fighter in UFC history is so far. It used to be between Royce Gracie and Tito Ortiz, but then UFC 44 happened last week and now you have to add Randy Couture into the conversation after he decimated Ortiz, including literally spanking him like a child during the final seconds. There was also a lot of inter-promotional material with PRIDE on the show (with Dave noting that WWE would love PRIDE's Quinton "Rampage" Jackson and says they're missing the boat on trying to sign him). Also, during the undercard dark matches, Nick Diaz debuted, defeating Jeremy Jackson. Anyway, there's a ton more here but maybe I need to start an MMA Rewind some day or something. Moving on!
- The Rock's newest film "The Rundown" opened this week as the #1 movie in America, pulling in more than $18 million and getting pretty great reviews and because of that, you can probably scrap any hopes of Rock coming back to wrestling. The $18 million was enough to get it to #1 but still below expectations (they were hoping for $25 million). The total budget was around $110 million and its expected the film will probably have a long shelf-life and end up being profitable once it hits the home video market. Rock isn't being blamed for the movie falling below opening weekend expectations, as most blame seems to be falling to the marketing and promotion people. In other words, the movie is good, people that see it have enjoyed it, so why the hell didn't we promote this more??? Rock is being offered movie after movie after movie right now, for tens of millions of dollars each, and a New Line Cinema source told Dave it's highly unlikely Rock is going to be wrestling again anytime soon. He makes roughly triple the amount of money from 1 movie than he would earn in a full year of being on the road for WWE if business was booming. And it's not booming.
- Rock has also signed on for the lead in a movie called "Spy Hunter" which is expected to be filming in the spring and would eliminate him from being able to work Wrestlemania 20. (Nah, this one gets stuck in developmental hell, but Rock ends up being a big part of the "Spy Hunter" video game that was released without the accompanying movie.) Rock was on David Letterman's show and implied that he had burned himself out trying to do both careers and said he'd only return to wrestling if he could fully commit to it. And given his exploding movie schedule, that isn't going to be happening anytime soon. If this does end up being the true end of Rock's wrestling career, he is the biggest star in the history of the business to walk away in his prime. In only 5 years as a full-time active wrestler, Rock headlined the 4 biggest PPVs in wrestling history (don't let the Triple H/Jericho match placement fool you, Rock/Hogan was what sold WM18). Tied with Triple H for most world title reigns in WWE history (seven) plus 2 more if you wanna count their version of the WCW title. And as it stands now, his final match was putting over Goldberg in his WWE debut at Backlash. Rock's next movie, "Walking Tall" is scheduled for release in April.
- Former ECW wrestler Putbull II (Anthony Durante) passed away of an apparent drug overdose this past week and it's an even more tragic situation than most wrestler deaths. Full warning now: this is going to get REALLY dark. In this case, Durante's wife also overdosed and died with him at the same time. As a result, their two children, ages 21-months and 8-months, were left alone in the house with their bodies for as long as 2 days. Police found a ton of prescription drugs and needles and both parents had needle marks. Police also found the drug Oxycontin near their bodies, which is a drug said to be more addictive than heroin and has gained popularity in recent years (ah, yes, the early days of the opioid epidemic). When Durante didn't show up to his job for a couple days and hadn't answered calls, a relative went to check on them and found them. The 21-month old boy had apparently managed to open the refrigerator and left a trail of crumbs and spilled food all over the house. The 8-month daughter was alone in her crib the entire time and was later treated for dehydration.
- Suicide has been ruled out and it seems like they just both accidentally OD'd on some shit they shouldn't have been messing with. Police said there likely wouldn't be any criminal investigation, even though there was some question about both of them dying at the same time, without one of them at least being able to call 911, seemed possibly suspicious. Both members of the Pitbulls were arrested back in 1997 on a pretty big steroid charge and got off extremely light at the time and there's rumors that Durante made some enemies because of that (in other words, he snitched on people to save his ass). So friends of his have always been worried someone might come after him, but this looks more likely to simply be a tragic accident. Prior to his death, he'd been getting back into shape and talking to his partner about reforming the Pitbulls for the 3PW promotion. Dave gives us a quick career bio on Pitbull II, in particular their famous double dog-collar match in ECW and how Durante basically disappeared from the business after ECW let him go. From there he spiraled, depression, drug issues, filed for bankruptcy, lost his house, and here we are.
- Another day, another national poll revealing pro wrestling as the 2nd most hated sport in America out of a list of more than 100 (what did we beat, you ask? Dog fighting, which apparently counts as a "sport" somehow). This poll was conducted by the Sports Marketing Group. The last time they did this survey was in 1993 and back then, wrestling was "hated" by 42.5% of voters. That number has now risen to 55.7% in the decade since. While this might sound like, "Who gives a shit about a dumb poll," this one actually matters. The SMG survey is used by ad agencies and others in the advertising business in making decisions about where to spend money. (Who is considering spending ad money on dog fighting?) And aside from PPV money, advertising income is WWE's primary source of revenue (TV contracts weren't worth billions of dollars yet in 2003). Dave isn't surprised by this. The Attitude Era hijinks, Vince McMahon's negative public image, high profile failures like the XFL, etc. have all contributed to make WWE a pariah to the mainstream world. This doesn't bode well for other companies (TNA) that are hoping to get on TV either.
- Riki Choshu's struggling WJ promotion continues to take damage. The main financial backer pulled out this week, finally throwing in the towel after investing tons of money into trying to get this promotion to thrive. Genichiro Tenryu and Choshu, who have been close friends for years, are doing a desperation angle where they break up their tag team to feud with each other, but Tenryu may be gone soon too. He's apparently lost confidence in Choshu to run the company while Choshu doesn't think Tenryu is a big draw anymore, so their real-life relationship is strained (yeah, Tenryu would be gone by November, never to return). Meanwhile, one of the bookers quit when he was asked to take a 40% paycut and many of the wrestlers have had their salaries cut in half, while some office employees are more than 2 months behind on pay (ECW 2000 vibes are strong with this one).
- But hey, at least AJPW isn't making any money either! The company plans to only run Budokan Hall 3 times in 2004 as a cost-saving measure and Keiji Muto announced they'd be making other cuts as well.
- Five years after his death, Giant Baba just landed a huge endorsement deal. His widow Motoko Baba announced the release of a Giant Baba branded beer, which has a photo of him on the can. I looked but couldn't find a picture of this. shout-out to u/Scorpi978a for finding this!
- Hogan is working the Tokyo Dome show as well and Dave is willing to bet Hogan is going to buddy right up to Sapp as quick as he can. Hogan has no formal agreement with NJPW beyond this show, but he's expected to have talks about working there more regularly. Hogan is also pushing Inoki to come out of retirement for a singles match. Dave thinks it would draw, but it's not the right long-term direction that NJPW needs right now.
- Photos of Great Sasuke's face were all over the media when his mask got ripped apart during a match with Atsushi Onita. The match already got a lot of mainstream coverage since it was 2 Japanese politicians facing off in an exploding barbed wire death match, but exposing Sasuke's face, even partially, got a lot more. Probably wasn't an accident. While we're on the subject, exploding barbed wire death matches between politicians is something America really needs to get on board with.
- Dave gives a partial review of a book called "Chokehold: Pro Wrestling's Real Mayhem Outside the Ring" by Jim Wilson and Weldon Johnson. It's an incredibly well-researched book all about the dark underbelly of the old territory NWA days. One of the authors is a criminology professor and much of the book is based on Justice Department investigation documents from an NWA investigation they did in the 50s while the other (Wilson) was a wrestler back in those days. So the book offers kind of a balanced perception of those days through wrestler and legal eyes. Dave loves this book and has learned a ton and will have more next week.
- Harley Race was in attendance at a recent NOAH show in Japan and at age 60, it was painful watching him hobble to the ring. Dave says this should be a warning to wrestlers of today. Harley worked a ferocious schedule and was one of the big bump-takers of his day, but the style he wrestled was nowhere near as dangerous as the style that today's stars work. Dave thinks all modern wrestlers should attend the Cauliflower Alley banquet at least once, just to see the realities of what a career of taking bumps does to people when you get older.
- Scott Hall was arrested this week for a probation violation related to drinking. It's his 3rd violation of his probation. That's all Dave knows right now.
- Dave starts this next story by saying, "I actually had an over/under on how long it would be before Roddy Piper threatened to burn down Johnny Fairplay's house." So this should be good. There's a bit of backstory behind that comment actually, for those who don't listen to WOR regularly....apparently not too long prior to this, Piper had cornered Bryan Alvarez backstage at an indie show and was trying to get Dave's address from him because he swore he was going to burn down Dave's house over something he wrote. Like, legit had Alvarez in a dark room, flicking a lighter and shit. Bryan's telling of the story is hilarious.
- Anyway, Piper hasn't actually threatened to burn Fairplay's house down yet, but evidently the war of words between the two has gotten so personal that Piper kept calling up CBS and made enough of a stink that someone from CBS had to reach out to Fairplay and tell him to cool it. Fairplay's season of "Survivor" is already taped and reportedly he heels it up to an insane degree and made enemies of everyone on the show, apparently in an attempt to get over as a wrestling personality and get a WWE gig. Dave isn't holding his breath that they'll be interested.
- Allan Funk (former WCW wrestler Kwee-wee) suffered a horrible injury at an indie show when Sonny Siaki landed on his head hard with his knee. It broke Funk's orbital bone, broke his jaw in 2 places, broke his nose, and ruptured his eardrum, and his eyeball was basically hanging out. Funk, understandably, freaked out and sprinted from the ring and went backstage covered in blood and was having a hard time breathing in the locker room. He's still hospitalized as of press time and is probably lucky to be alive (he would eventually need 4 surgeries to recover from this and is still 100% deaf in his left ear because of it. He was out of action for a year and eventually came back, but never really resumed a full-time career. Here he is talking about it. Sounds terrifying).
- WATCH: Allan Funk details maybe the worst wrestling injury I've ever heard
- President George W. Bush did an interview with Sports Illustrated and talked about going to elementary school across from the stadium where Wahoo McDaniel used to play football and talked about being a fan of his. He didn't mention that his dad used to be Wahoo's little league baseball coach, which is somehow a fact Dave knows.
- Bret Hart wrote in the Calgary Sun to respond to Kurt Angle's comments last week, very appreciative that Angle called him the best of the 20th century, but humbly listed about 20 others he thinks were better than he was. However, he's flattered nonetheless and says he thinks Angle is the best wrestler in the business today and said that yes, if he could come out of retirement for one more match, it would absolutely be with Angle. But he says the doctors have told him that can never happen. Damn what a match that would have been with both in their primes.
- ROH announced their next Philadelphia show will take place at the 3,000-seat National Guard Armory. They were running the 400-seat Murphy Rec Center but had been going over capacity and the fire marshal is enforcing that now, so they had to move. ECW ran this venue a couple times and did ok. You can curtain it off so it looks full with 500 or so. Other venues in the area were booked up by 3PW and CZW so this was really the only option available to them if they want to grow their crowds.
- Juventud Guerrera hasn't been booked on recent TNA shows because of visa issues. He has a tourist visa, which means he's not allowed to work, but of course, he has been. Apparently, border officials found out and warned him that if he tries again, he'll be permitted from re-entering the U.S. so now TNA is trying to get him a work visa, but that's a whole process that can take months.
- Dave says that a lot of the wrestlers in WWE and TNA are friends and have been talking and says that at least some of the people who chose to sign those new TNA contracts actually had interest from WWE. But the word from so many people within WWE is that everyone there is miserable and morale is awful, and that played a role in at least some people choosing to sign with TNA. Former WWE stars like D-Lo, Raven, and others have all talked about being happier here than they were in WWE, which also played a role. Dave also notes how Justin Credible was recently on Observer Radio and talked about how making it to WWE is what every wrestler dreams of, but when you get there, most people realize it's not what they dreamed it was.
- Mirko Cro Cop's next opponent at the upcoming PRIDE show will be none other than Dos Caras Jr. If this goes Caras Jr's way, he could become a superstar in Japan. Dave does not think it will go his way. They wanted to book a Japanese wrestler against him (going back to Cro Cop's old "Pro Wrestler Hunter" gimmick) but none of Japan's stars were interested. Yoshihiro Takayama, Yuji Nagata, and Manabu Nakanishi all turned down the fight. So they're gonna feed Alberto Del Rio to him instead. Meanwhile, Canadian pro wrestling announcer Mauro Ranallo is being brought in to do commentary for the event, apparently as a one-time thing since the usual announcer couldn't do it.
- K-1 is still trying to figure out how to make this Mike Tyson vs. Bob Sapp fight happen. They really want it in Japan but because of Tyson's criminal history, he can't enter the country. K-1 officials are meeting with high ranking Japanese officials to try and get that ban lifted in this case, with hopes of booking the fight in the Osaka Dome on New Year's Eve, but no luck so far. Dave thinks it's funny that they put all this time and effort into planning this fight, even shooting the angle between them a couple months back, but nobody thought to find out if Tyson could even get into the country to work.
- Wrestlemania 20 tickets went on-sale and, as expected, sold out immediately. Pre-sale tickets were gone within 20 minutes while the public-on sale the next day went even faster. The live gate is already more than $2 million which would be a WWE record for an arena show (the stadium WMs obviously did bigger).
- Speaking of upcoming shows, apparently there was some mild discussion of booking the 2004 Royal Rumble in the Tokyo Dome and attempting to get Bob Sapp as a big attraction. But those discussions never really got past step one. But man that would have been cool.
- Eddie Guerrero got into it with a fan at a show in Winnipeg. Apparently some dude in the front row poured an entire beer on Eddie while he was outside the ring on the ground, leading to Eddie jumping the rail and swinging on the guy while the crowd went nuts. Security separated them and the guy was kicked out. After the match, Eddie grabbed the mic and spoke to the guy's friends. "Your friend disrespected me, pouring a beer on me, and then smiling. But I was raised as a Christian, and I didn’t act like a Christian. I apologize to God and I apologize to Winnipeg." According to fans there, Eddie absolutely pummeled the dude, getting in several punches to the dude's head while security didn't really try to stop him, to the delight of the entire arena.
- Notes from 9/29 Raw: Scott Steiner turned heel and formed a tag team with Test, attacking Stacy Keibler in the process. OVW wrestler John Heidenreich debuted and Dave feels terrible for Nick Dinsmore watching all these less talented guys beat him to the main roster (oh Dave, just you wait and see what's in store for Mr. Dinsmore). And RVD beat Christian in a fantastic 4-star ladder match to win the IC title.
- Steve Blackman was backstage at the WWE Unforgiven PPV, the first time he's been around in a year and a half. He's been out of action forever due to neck injuries and severe migraines due to spinal issues. He's considering undergoing a similar surgery to what Angle had and has talked about wanting to return to wrestling. Blackman was never an amazing wrestler to begin with and he's not remotely charismatic. Now at age 40, Dave has a hard time seeing where he'd fit into today's WWE.
- This is a sad story. William Doxie, now aged 31, was arrested on charges of sodomizing a 12-year-old boy. It's relevant because Doxie, back when he was underaged, was one of the ring boys at the center of the WWF's sexual abuse of ring boy scandal in the 1980s, working directly for Mel Phillips. At the time, Doxie was one of the people Tom Cole was urging to come forward as well, but he refused to go public with his story at the time. Stories from those days may leave people's minds, but the effects can last for generations, sadly. Might be a good time to go check that puppy gif again.