WWE News and Notes
There is a minor TNA/WWE war that will take place next week. As mentioned last week, this coming Monday’s Raw (February 13th) will be pre-empted for the annual Westminster Dog Show and it was made official that TNA will be airing a two-hour best-of special on Spike TV in its place from 9:00 to 11:00 PM EST. Raw is being bumped to — yes — Thursday, meaning it’ll be Raw from 8:00 to 10:00 PM head-to-head with Impact from 9:00 to 10:00 PM. This will be the first-ever head-to-head first-run WWE vs. TNA battle in history. There will be another battle Saturday night with USA airing a Raw replay from 11:00 PM to 1:00 AM and TNA airing a replay from 11:00 PM to midnight. The Thursday battle in particular is intriguing and I don’t know what to expect. My gut tells me there will be little flipping back and forth, and that neither show will drastically hurt the rating of the other, but we shall see. Just because of the exposure of both groups, you’d think Raw would be more likely to hurt Impact than vice versa.
Major 180 in the office this week. WWE is now very concerned about the potential of WSX after just the first two shows. The irony is that the company they should be worried about, UFC, isn’t even on the radar. Now people will argue that WSX is fake and WWE is fake and thus WWE shouldn’t be worried about UFC, which is real, but the reality is that if you look at the ratings and how UFC built its audience, it built its audience by following Raw on Monday nights and drawing straight from the Raw audience. The UFC boom was created in large part by pro-wrestling fans, and UFC right now has several strong TV deals, they’re expanding internationally, they have strong video distribution, they just broke 1 million buys on PPV, and their low-level PPVs are blowing all WWE shows out of the water with the exception of shows like WrestleMania or Royal Rumble (and even those are trounced by higher-level UFC PPVs). WSX hasn’t run a PPV, they haven’t run a house show and they haven’t sold any merchandise, and the only one of the three they’ve ever talked seriously about at this point is the merchandise (they’ve discussed all three, but house shows and PPVs are a ways down the road). Not to mention the fact that although I’d rather watch 10 WSX shows than 1 show from ECW or TNA, the reality is that the first WSX show did an 0.4 rating, the Tuesday “debut” show did an 0.8, and the following Friday show did an 0.5. As usual, massively misplaced priorities within the company.
Regarding stories of a creative change, Dusty Rhodes has been moved from Smackdown to ECW to work with head writer David Lagana. This was a call by Lagana during a meeting with Vince and Stephanie about why ECW sucked so bad (seriously). Vince HATES ECW lately and is determined to either turn it around or put a bullet in it. I don’t know what it means other than the fact that I’m destined for madman status, but Vince hated the three-way with RVD, Test and Lashley just as much as I did, and perhaps more. He was IRATE. Lagana actually brought up WSX, saying they were going head-to-head now and he needed a good idea man. Michael Hayes, the Smackdown head writer, played it cool, but sources say he was NOT happy. For those that have loved Smackdown lately, we’re told the credit goes largely to the combination of Hayes and Rhodes, and that without Rhodes the quality of that show could potentially drop in coming months. Vince made the call that Smackdown should be different from Raw, more of an 80s-style wrestling show, and this was Dusty’s forte. Despite the long-running “Dusty Finish” joke, Dusty had been booking a ton of finishes on the show, and I think some people would be surprised to hear that. The belief is that he could actually help make ECW watchable again, which I’ll have to see to believe. The problem, obviously, is that he still works under Lagana, who also has to answer to Vince and Steph. Dusty and Hayes were on the same page and it may not be the same way in ECW. Unlike Smackdown, Dusty’s role will be to come up with ideas, and then Lagana will write the entire show, all the promos, all the finishes, etc. So we may ultimately not see much influence at all.
Some notes from Raw. Melina is in the doghouse, and since she’s dating Nitro and they’re together on TV, he had to do a clean pinfall job to Super Crazy. It’s not a total loss, though, because there are plans to give Crazy what I was told will be a “comedy push”. So maybe it is a total loss. At least Nitro didn’t lose to a guy who will be released the next day.
And, ah yes, the Ric Flair promo on Carlito which will become the stuff of legend. Basically, I guess I’m not the only one down on Carlito for being a lazy sack of crap. The office scripted Flair’s promo word-for-word, and it was what it appeared to be, a total burial of Carlito on national TV in front of five million viewers. I guess being lazy on TV is one thing, but Carlito was also getting buried in the agent reports as well (house shows). Most of the speech was taken from actual agent reports which head Raw writer Brian Gerwitz made “slightly more inflammatory”, and the end result was what we saw on TV. We get stuff like this because they’re not about to fire anyone in the mix, because they’re terrified of people going to TNA and are now worried about people going to WSX. Tuesday was quite the amusing day. Personally, I loved Flair’s promo. I’m sure Carlito is a nice guy. I’ve heard all the defenses in the world, such as that he’s a natural heel and they made him a babyface, or that he’s frustrated with his position and has no desire to give 100%. I don’t think it’s any coincidence that the guy who pinned him on Raw, Shelton Benjamin, was also the guy that the announcers were suddenly putting over like the best athlete there’s ever been. I suspect someone opened their eyes and realized, hey, Shelton Benjamin and Carlito are both pushed at the exact same level (and really, Carlito’s been pushed way harder than Shelton), and Shelton has still worked his ass off every time he’s been put in the ring whereas Carlito has gone out there and half-assed it. Hunter used to say that guys weren’t being held down, they just needed to make more of an effort to reach out and grab that top spot. Now, granted, he was full of crap and held plenty of guys down, but there is some truth to the statement. In WWE, in a company where there are only so many spots, if you aren’t being pushed as a main eventer and you’re upset about it, if your solution is to HALF-ASS IT, hey, wax off, you’re in for a short, crapty career. Guys need to understand that they need to put in 100% no matter where they are on the card, because the reality is that even though there is a glass ceiling (and there is far less of a glass ceiling nowadays than there has been in the past) and guys will be held back for political reasons, in the end, the cream usually does rise to the top. Carlito’s biggest problem is that for a period of time he showed people that he COULD work, and so this is not like a Great Khali where everyone knows he sucks and they know there is nothing that can be done about it, ever. People are AWARE that Carlito doesn’t care and isn’t trying, and that’s why he got humbled on live TV on Monday night, a hardcore no-lube asswaxing. Hopefully he learned something from it.
We’ll have more next week once the financial figures come out, but WWE is really heating up going into 2007, largely built around the popularity of Cena and Batista (seriously, as much as Big Dave sucks, he’s over as a ticket seller and ratings draw) and the Michaels/Orton/Edge dynamic. The company sold out the Royal Rumble with 14,500 tickets, sold out Raw the next night at the American Airlines Arena (over 14,000), and then sold out the Smackdown tapings the following night at the Toyota Center in Houston (12,400).
RVD gave his notice this week. I still think he’ll end up staying. Giving his notice doesn’t guarantee he’s leaving, only ensures that his contract will not roll over again. Part of me thinks Vince will work harder than ever to sign him now. Until he signs, though, he’ll be doing more jobs for Bob Holly on ECW.
JR in his blog wrote last week: “It has been brought to my attention that the reason I did not handle the play by play of the Royal Rumble match this past Sunday was because of a decision made by my friend and fellow Oklahoma Sooner football fan WWE Executive Producer/Executive Vice President Kevin Dunn. This is categorically false. I am not blaming any internet sites for reporting this as I am sure their ‘sources’ provided them the info but the ‘sources’ are wrong on this one. Imagine that. It is actually much to do about nothing, even though I find it flattering that some fans would have liked for me to have called the match. I do sincerely appreciate that I can assure you. I was fine with the decision when I was told a few days before the Rumble, I was fine with it on Sunday and I am fine with it today. At the end of the day I felt Michael Cole, The King, and JBL handled the match well and certainly got the job done.” So who made the decision?.
Foley’s Hardcore Diaries, featuring tons of stories from his career, is out March 6th, which likely also means an imminent return to TV.
The McMahon/Trump deal got press on CNN Showbiz Tonight. It was during a segment entitled “THAT’S RIDICULOUS”. They buried the whole thing. It also got some press on Pardon the Interruption during the Big Finish segment. They didn’t bury it quite as bad as the Showbiz people did, and were more amazed that WWE had actually dropped real money on people.
Donald Trump vs. Rosie O’Donnell and Cena vs. Federline are extras on the New Year’s Revolution DVD.
Eric Bischoff, 52, did a radio publicity stunt in Salt Lake City where he challenged anyone in the city to beat him at arm wrestling. He beat the first dude but then in the middle of the second match his arm just snapped. It ended up being a radial fracture that will require surgery and a titanium plate.
Hogan on the Main Event radio show said people thought Shawn Michaels was a good worker only because he “flops around and flips around”, and that Shawn should have done the interview the night after SummerSlam and put Hogan over instead of making fun of him. He said this showed you what kind of businessman Michaels was. Oh Christ. Since this has been discussed on our board this week, the reality is that whether you thought Michaels flipped and flopped around at SummerSlam or not, that was the best Hulk Hogan match in forever, at least since his match with Kurt Angle (who is, I should note, KURT ANGLE). The extra flip-flopping around during the match and the promo the next night was done because the idea going in was that there were going to be two matches, one that Shawn won and one that Hulk won. Hogan basically said no, I’m winning both matches, and if you don’t like it too bad because I have full creative control. This is the kind of businessman Hulk Hogan is. And as far as the promo goes, if you think Shawn went into business for himself on Raw, think again, as the whole promo was OK’d by Vince McMahon. Hogan on the radio show also said no match with Big Show at WrestleMania because Show was retired and not coming back. Well, I have heard that same story, but it’s hard to believe anything Hogan says. For example, he claimed in 2003 he was going to go to TNA after they did the angle where Jarrett hit him with the guitar in Japan, but then he injured his leg while there, and when he got home he found he’d blown his hip out as well. He said he really was getting ready to go to TNA to help give Vince a run for his money one more time. Ok, so if that’s the case, when he healed up from these supposed injuries, why didn’t he go to TNA? Why did he go to WWE instead? Three guesses.
There are rumors that WWE wants to get Mistico and Shocker (he speaks English) to work the four WWE dates in March.
credit: F4W newsletter
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@ Bischoff breaking his arm while arm wrestling.
