January 12, 2004
- The most competitive ratings battle in Japanese television history was a win for K-1. The TV ratings are in for the 3 big MMA shows from New Year's Eve and hoooooly shit. The annual Kōhaku show, which is a popular variety show that is always the highest rated event of the year, ended up briefly losing the ratings battle when going head-to-head with the Bob Sapp vs. Akebono match. Some 54 million people tuned in to watch Sapp knock out Akebono in the first round, the largest pro wrestling/MMA audience since Inoki vs. Ali in 1976. News coverage of the fight was broadcast around the world, and even in the United States, it got more mainstream publicity than anything since Hogan vs. Rock back in 2002. To put this into American perspective, this would be like WWE running against the SuperBowl and actually winning for a bit.
- It wasn't just K-1 who had a big night though, since everyone was flipping channels between the shows. The minute-by-minute numbers are fascinating because it shows huge swaths of people, tens of millions at a time, changing channels and jumping to different shows for marquee matches at different times. PRIDE's Royce Gracie vs. Hidehiko Yoshida fight peaked at 31 million viewers. Antonio Inoki's show, however, flopped and placed 5th in the overall ratings. The variety show, K-1, and PRIDE all beat it and there was another show, not even a special event, just a regularly scheduled show, that also did better ratings. Inoki's show was a disaster going into it, with the card falling apart in the days beforehand, and most of the matches not even finalized until showtime. The bad rating seems to have killed NTV's plans to fund a future Inoki-ran MMA promotion (indeed, after 4 years, this was the final Inoki Bom Ba Ye show).
- K-1 is now hoping to book another show later this year in America with even bigger goals: a double main event of Bob Sapp vs. Mike Tyson and Akebono vs. George Foreman. Let's take a quick look at the problems here. Mike Tyson is not going to agree to an MMA fight, which means it'd most likely be under some form of boxing rules, which means Bob Sapp is going to explode into dust as soon as Tyson lands a punch. The other issue is basically the same: Akebono is not going to stand a chance against George Foreman in anything other than a sumo match, even though Foreman is in his mid-50s. So the likely result of a show like this, if it somehow happened (and it won't) is that the top 2 biggest draws in Japan would almost certainly get humiliated and destroyed on the same night by American boxers. It would do HUGE numbers for one night, but it would be horrible for K-1 in the long-term. But Dave doesn't believe there's a chance in hell of this happening, so it's a moot point anyway.
- Observer Hall of Fame voting is complete and votes are being tallied. Next week is the awards issue. But for this week, Dave is looking at the top candidates for the Wrestler of the Year awards, with his own opinions. This award hasn't really been separated from MMA yet so he ponders a bunch of those guys in this discussion as well. I won't go into all the details but it's Angle, Guerrero, Lesnar, Nagata, and Kobashi on the purely pro wrestling side. Then you got Takayama and Sapp, who do both wrestling and MMA, and then there's Cro Cop, Silva, and Couture for purely MMA. Dave breaks this down by different criteria and assigns point totals for 1st, 2nd, 3rd place, etc. In-ring ability, drawing power, value to their company, title reigns and consistency, etc. Once Dave's math is finished, his personal pick for Wrestler of the Year goes to Kenta Kobashi (with Cro Cop, Angle, Silva, and Sapp rounding out the top 5). We'll see if the voters next week agree (spoiler: yes).
- NJPW's Jan. 4 Tokyo Dome show is in the books. And HUSTLE, the new promotion run by Nobuhiko Takada and owned by PRIDE, also had its debut show at the same time. Lots of head-to-head wrestling and MMA battles for supremacy happening in Japan right now. Anyway, NJPW easily slaughtered the HUSTLE show, so let's start with NJPW first. They announced 53,000 attendance, but it was actually closer to 40,000. The main event was 23-year-old super rookie Shinsuke Nakamura unifying the IWGP and NWF titles by defeating Yoshihiro Takayama. Afterward, Nakamura announced the NWF title is dead and the IWGP title is the only world title. You might recall, however, that Nakamura got blasted in the face with a brutal knee during the New Year's K-1 show. Well, he came into this NJPW match with a broken nose and broken orbital bone, neither of which was diagnosed beforehand because Nakamura refused to have it examined for fear of being pulled from the main event of this show. And sure enough, the next day, doctors took one look and said, "Bro your face is shattered, we never would have let you work a match if we'd known" and now he's expected to miss an indefinite amount of time. It's unclear if Nakamura will be stripped of the title or not, and it sounds like NJPW will be crowning an "interim" champion in the same way PRIDE and UFC have done in the past (nah, they eventually came to their senses and just stripped him of the title).
- Elsewhere on the NJPW show, AJPW's Keiji Muto returned to a NJPW ring for the first time in a couple of years, teaming with Bob Sapp to beat Chono & Tenzan. This was pushed heavily on NJPW TV as the biggest match on the show, even ahead of the Nakamura/Takayama main event. Despite leaving NJPW to jump ship to AJPW (and taking rising star Satoshi Kojima with him), Muto was still greeted like a returning hero by NJPW fans. Jushin Liger pinned NOAH's Takashi Sugirua to win the NOAH junior heavyweight title and now Liger is expected to spend some time in NOAH defending it. And U-30 champion Hiroshi Tanahashi challenged the winner of the main event, which seemingly sets up a Tanahashi vs. Nakamura match whenever his face heals.
- One more note on the Nakamura/K-1/broken face deal. During the NJPW Tokyo Dome show, K-1 president Sadaharu Tanigawa came out and announced that Nakamura's KO loss on the New Year's Eve show has been changed to a no-contest. He said that the referee stoppage was premature and apologized to Nakamura and NJPW and said he'd like to see a rematch. Soooo yeah, if you're ever looking at Nakamura's MMA record, that's the reason for the 3-1-1 record. Dave notes that this was basically a political move and that NJPW essentially threatened not to work with K-1 anymore if they didn't overturn Nakamura's loss. Maybe don't put your world champion into shoot fights in the first place? Just a thought...
- Abdullah the Butcher won the WWC Universal title, beating Carly Colon. This makes Abdullah (who is either 62 or 67 depending on various sources) the oldest champ in the history of the promotion. Meanwhile, Colon is headed back to OVW to resume getting ready for the WWE main roster.
- IWA, meanwhile, had a show get out of hand when there was a major fight that turned into something of a riot and had fans running out of the arena in fear. Seems to have happened when wrestler Richard Rondon was in the crowd and started arguing with fans. Chairs were thrown, which led to more chairs being thrown and several fans were injured and a security guard was knocked flat out unconscious. Several children in the crowd were also injured. Fans in the upper decks began throwing stuff down and several people pulled knives and guns. Reportedly there were no stabbings or shootings and the show was suspended until everything was under control. They finally got the show resumed, with significantly less fans in the arena.
- Katsuhiko Nakajima, aged 15, became the youngest Japanese wrestler to work a main event match, losing to Tomohiro Ishii at Korakuen Hall for Riki Choshu's WJ promotion (things worked out alright for the kid. He's now a former GHC and AJPW Triple Crown champion, among many other accolades).
- More details on the attempted murder charges that Dick Slater is facing from last week. He's currently still being held in jail. That's.....all he has. Cool. Thanks Dave.
- Jacques Rougeau held another one of his shows in Montreal recently, mostly locals and his trainees. There was a battle royal, which featured an 8-year-old boy. Dave notes that two of Jacques' sons have also worked his shows and both of them started as pre-teens as well. Dave isn't a fan of this, saying that the wrestling world is a really dark, kinda fucked up place, and probably not something children should be involved in. And he doesn't mean the injuries, he's talking about the backstage atmosphere. He remembers being backstage at some old World Class shows back in the day and seeing a 12-year-old Chris Von Erich being involved in the business and says it's just no place for a child.
- Rob Black, porn peddler and promoter of XPW, is continuing to struggle amid his legal woes. He's got a bunch of obscenity charges pending from some pretty hardcore porn videos he released. Black is claiming that his losses from running XPW and from his legal battles, have drained his empire. In interviews, he specifically blamed XPW and said pursuing his wrestling dream cost him everything and advised people to stick to the businesses you know and to stay out of wrestling. In the porn world, Black was always shunned by others who felt his movies were so extreme that they would bring heat upon the entire industry. And indeed, that's what has happened. But now, the porn industry is feeling obligated to stick by Black and support him on the basis of free speech, because there's a fear that if he goes down, it will set a precedent for the government to continue going after other porn producers.
- Dave has a random story about a wrestling promotion/show called Los Titanes en el Ring which aired in Argentina during the 70s and 80s. Apparently it was a wacky Lucha Libre type product that used wrestlers dressed as Mummy, Wolfman, Invisible Man, etc. It aired on Spanish language stations across the U.S. in the 70s also, at least for awhile. Why did it go away, you ask? Vince McMahon Sr. hated it and felt it made a mockery of wrestling ("which it did" Dave admits) and Vince Sr. pulled strings and got it pulled off TV here. I found a little YouTube documentary about it for those of you who speak Spanish or just wanna see the footage of this:
- Vampiro did another interview on ICP's website and continued digging deeper holes. He talked about his divorce and said that he's losing contact with his daughter. Dave says Vampiro is a lot of things and you can say a lot about him, but Dave knows Vampiro well enough personally to say that the guy really does love the hell out of his daughter, and Dave feels bad for him. But at the same time, it's kinda easy to see why this guy might not be able to get custody right now. Anyway, in the last interview he did, Vampiro talked shit about Brian Pillman, apparently accusing him of being a rapist and cheating on his wife? Well this week, Vampiro apologized. "It was uncalled for me to talk shit about Brian Pillman, as he is dead and cannot defend himself. It was very wrong. I should not do interviews when I am on drugs, as you people get offended by what I say. Sometimes I don’t do things responsible enough. I never saw Brian rape anyone, so forgive me. I made a mistake of listening to hearsay. It was wrong. I’ve never seen him be unfaithful, but he was a real asshole to me, so for those comments, I’m not sorry." Well okay then.
- Vader has signed a 6-fight deal, worth $400,000, with PRIDE/HUSTLE parent company Dream Stage Entertainment. The deal is for Vader to do a few worked matches (the recent Jan. 4 HUSTLE show being one of them) but he's also expected to participate in several shoot fights, the first of which is scheduled for the Feb. 15th PRIDE show. This is a pretty bad idea, but Vader is 47 and badly out of shape and none of the big wrestling promotions are interested. Vader has no MMA, amateur wrestling, or submission experience. He was a sparring partner for a boxer many years ago but that's it. He was a good football player 25 years and 150 pounds ago. But he does have at least some name value, especially in Japan, so he might get some curiosity buys from fans for his first fight. But chances are, this is just gonna end with Vader getting fucked up (thankfully, this never happens and Vader doesn't appear to ever do anything with PRIDE).
- In a similar story, "Dr. Death" Steve Williams has said he's interested in an MMA fight with either Mike Tyson or Bob Sapp. Dave reminds us that Williams got knocked out by Bart Gunn in Brawl For All.
- Dos Caras Jr. (Alberto Del Rio) apparently got a $125,000 payday for his 46-second slaughtering at the hands of Mirko Cro Cop recently, which is more than many Lucha stars get paid during several years of pro wrestling.
- Maven has taken a leave of absence from WWE to care for his Aunt Sherma, who is in critical condition with bone marrow cancer. Sherma raised Maven and he sees her essentially as his mother. She's been battling cancer for awhile and there was an episode of Tough Enough 2 based around him going to visit her in the hospital.
- Notes from 1/2 Smackdown: the original main event of the show was Big Show vs. Hardcore Holly, since they're trying to build up Holly for his match against Lesnar at Royal Rumble. But Holly isn't even close to over and got such a flat reaction that this match, even though it was the main event live, was edited during the tapings and moved to earlier in the show before it aired. Dave can't recall them ever doing that in the history of Smackdown. Holly came out of the match looking like a geek who got dominated by Big Show, which isn't the vibe you wanna give for the guy who is challenging for the world title at the #2 PPV of the year in a couple weeks. They announced Chris Benoit entering the Rumble at #1 and Dave expects him to be the marathon man this year and even ponders the possibility that he might win. Naaaah, perish the thought.
- Notes from 1/5 Raw: Teddy Long was in charge of the show this week by decree of Eric Bischoff, and so they continued the storyline of Long accusing everyone of racism for the entire show. That included insisting on a black commentator, which meant they added Jonathan Coachman to the booth and Dave hates Coachman on commentary. He accused Lawler and JR of being old and racist and also repeated the same line 100 times about LSU beating Oklahoma, just to get a rise out of JR and Dave wants to jab his eardrums out. We got Mae Young jumping out of the shower to sexually harass Jericho. Austin beat up Teddy Long. Most of the matches were bad. And that's the show.
- Kevin Nash now has short blond hair, which he cut (after years of long hair) for a role in the upcoming Punisher movie.
- They have seemingly dropped an angle that was planned for Chavo Guerrero in which he had a knee injury. From what Dave has heard, the angle was supposed to be for Chavo to develop a painkiller addiction and he would hide it from Eddie, who would suspect something was up. Holy shit is this a real angle they thought about doing? Someone get Chavo on the phone, I need to know.
- WWE has signed Tucson, AZ local sports anchor Todd Grisham to a 2-year deal as an announcer. Word is he has the look they're after (basically a younger Joey Styles) and a WWE source tells Dave that he's "about as funny as Josh Matthews or Coachman," whatever that means.
- Lots of letters this week, starting with one from Dory Funk Jr. who writes in to publicly respond to Ole Anderson's recent book. Apparently, Ole wrote that Dory Funk was a flop as a booker and Dory disputes it. He basically just runs down his resume and doesn't really talk shit about Ole. He also praises the recent Triple H vs. Shawn Michaels match on Raw. This was interesting because I had no idea Terry and Dory were so heavily involved in AJPW booking during the 80s.
- Oh but that's not all. Bret Hart also writes in to talk some shit about Ole's book and he's far less cordial about it than Dory. Hart says Ole is a moron and "colossal liar who has taken too many whacks to the head." Ole claimed he fired Hart for missing 2 shows. Bret says he only missed one show ever during his 6 years in Stampede, never missed a booking for NJPW, and only missed 2 bookings during his entire 14-year career in WWF, and never missed any in WCW. In other words, suck it Ole. He talks about his brief period in 1979 working for Georgia Championship Wrestling and notes he missed one booking back then because "notorious dickhead" Buzz Sawyer purposely left him behind in another town without a ride. Soon after, Bret left the promotion on his own, giving notice to owner Jim Barnett in advance. He says the conversation Ole describes in his book where he fired Bret never took place and is a complete fabrication. He says Ole threw a fit when Bret chose to leave and Stu Hart told him to go fuck himself. Bret says those words are still appropriate today. "The pro wrestling business has rarely come across such a humongous jack off of the caliber of Ole Anderson. If anyone wants to look at my history of making my bookings, they can check with Vince McMahon, who I’m sure would be happy to verify by saying in the 14 years I worked for him, I missed two towns, and often worked more than 300 days a year with a schedule beyond anything Ole Anderson could imagine."
- Someone else writes in about K-1 New Year's Eve show and says Shinsuke Nakamura was robbed. Without question, he took a pretty brutal direct knee to the face, but he was only stunned briefly, wasn't cut or bleeding, and was already going for another takedown when the ref stepped in and stopped it. So while having the IWGP champion lose a major shoot fight in front of a record TV audience was bad, to be fair, Nakamura was on the bad end of a terrible early stoppage and had every right to be as pissed off as he was after. Prior to that, Nakamura was easily winning the fight and taking his opponent down at will (eh, considering how bad Nakamura's injuries were from that knee, I think the ref made the right call, even if it didn't look like it in the moment. That shit basically shattered Nakamura's face).