Mid-Week Report
Mid-Week Report
By Bill
From Issue 1 of WCW Comics, 1991
- Trivia Question: Which wrestler inspired U.S. Heavyweight Champion Chris Benoit to become a professional wrestler? (answer at the end of the report)
- The mailbag:
- DDT Digest Emeritus Chan writes in with his mini-review of the Nitro Girls PPV:
I am shocked and dismayed that there was no Nitro Girls PPV Report. I saw about two minutes of it. I had forgotten it was on and was flipping through the channels. I noticed a girl in a bathing suit and stopped (hey I'm a guy, it's natural). Anyway, I tried to watch it but in my opinion it was just so bad that I couldn't watch. The parts I saw were hosted by Spice and Chae and were just horrible. They were trying to be seductive I guess and give out biographical information simultaneously and it did not really work. As you
know, no one on the face of planet earth enjoys useless wrestling facts as much as me, but even I could not stand it. I just do not have any interest in the women of wrestling. As an aside (and I am sure you know), Spice looks so much better in person than on TV, it's not even funny. That just should not be the case. I think she is one of the best looking girls I have ever seen, but on the PPV she was just average.
- John sends in an interesting indy report:
Last week I had the opportunity to go see Maryland Championship Wrestling at the Ocean City (MD) Convention Center. For $13, I got to see a collection of marginal stars up close. Among them were the Bushwackers, Blue Meanie, Gillberg (boo), and Stevie Richards.
However, there were also two wrestlers who recently signed with WCW to developmental contracts. The
first one was Christian York, who told everyone that it was his last match in MCW, which basically meant he lost. But he did call out Chastity as his manager for the night, and she made the three-way match for the #1
cruiserweight title contender much more fun. As she was leaving, a fan in the audience behind me shouted "Live Bait!", which got a turn of the head and a smile from her. The other guy who signed with WCW was Joey "The Future" Matthews. This guy is the real deal. He's another lightweight who pulled off some incredible moves in his match, which was booked just between the tag titles match, and the main event. If WCW was smart, he would eventually see himself as a contender for the cruiserweight belt. I guess we'll see him jobbing to Horace and David Flair, when not working 6-man meaningless matches with luchadores that get interrupted to get Macho and Sid over, huh?
- This is probably going to be a really unpopular opinion, but I must say for the record that I really didn't think Chris Jericho's debut was very good. As I was watching it, I was totally bored. I was thinking it was going to get completely panned by all of the pundits on the Web. However, they're all treating as if it were the Second Coming.
Either I just missed the point, or I was expecting too much, but I thought it was no big deal. I guess I'm from the old school...where a debut is made by a run-in or a mask being pulled off, not with a microphone.
- On the subject of nostalgia, I thought there was good nostalgia and bad nostalgia bad on Monday night.
On the plus side, when I flipped to RAW and heard Jesse Ventura's voice, just hearing it made me smile. I didn't really appreciate him all that much back when he was first announcing. I mean, back then, by definition you kind of had to find the heel announcer annoying. But he wound up really paving the way and I've really come to appreciate him since then. So, it was definitely "old home night" hearing his voice.
On the flip side, sorry, I didn't "mark out" for Hogan. Personally, I thought it was somewhat pitiful. For me, to "mark out", I've got to "believe", even if it's only for a fraction of a second. In the pre-Internet days, it was easier to believe that Hulk Hogan was deep-down a really nice guy that wanted kids to say their prayers, etc., etc. You could believe that all the heel wrestlers that were jealous of Hogan were really bad guys that weren't up to his level. Of course, now, if you believe the Internet, any move by Hogan is just him masturbating his ego. So, it was hard to "mark out" for him showing up in the yellow and red.
The best analogy I have for it is that Hogan now showing up in the yellow and red is like a 47-year-old guy hanging out a disco with hip clothes (from when he was 20) and lots of gold chains trying to pick up young girls. Yeah, Hogan got cheers on Monday, and that guy in the disco gets girls to dance with him, but in both cases it's out of pity, not desire.
- On the continuity front, did anybody else find it ridiculous that Hogan was putting his belt and his career on the line at Road Wild? It makes no sense. Matches like that are always a quid pro quo thing. It's always "mask vs. mask" or "mask vs. title" or "career vs. career". I mean, it's dumb enough to put something huge on the line when the other guy is not putting anything on the line, but putting two huge things on the line when the other guy is putting nothing up at all? It makes no sense, whatsoever.
Yeah, I know Nash's career is now on the line, too, but originally it was not.
- I'm still way behind on the house show reports and other mail. Sorry, work's been crazy. I will get to it all...eventually.
- There's a new poll on the main page. (Thanks to KP for this one.)
- Trivia Answer: The Dynamite Kid