General Pro Wrestling News and Discussion Thread Part Deux!

[Admiral_Young]

I'm back...computer died on me...this might surprise some people but I've been actually enjoying Raw the last few weeks. It's been better than usual...at least for my expectations. It's not the greatest, but they are doing a few entertaining things now. The AJ thing bugs me kind of though. Time to change her gimmick I think.

 

[Ghost Bones]

Hey GhostBones, I bet you LOVED this article on Bleacher Report:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...2-results-why-ryback-is-the-future-of-the-wwe

Dear Christ. If writing unjustified bollocks like that can make you a featured columnist, I should be able to walk it.

I've been think of writing a follow up to my original article answering some of the responses and looking closer at why it worked for Goldberg but won't work here.

 

[scnj]

Hey GhostBones, I bet you LOVED this article on Bleacher Report:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...2-results-why-ryback-is-the-future-of-the-wwe

That's a featured writer?! I'm pretty sure he wrote the same thing over and over again and just swapped out some words. He managed to write a whole "article" without really backing up the opinion stated in his headline.

 

[Sheep]

http://www.tmz.com/2012/05/24/chris-jericho-wwe-suspended-desecrating-brazilian-flag/

A WWE event in Brazil came to a screeching halt Thursday evening ... when local law enforcement stopped a live match and threatened to arrest Chris Jericho for desecrating the Brazilian flag.

It all went down during a match between Jericho and C.M. Punk -- who was proudly waving the flag in the ring. Jericho took the flag away, crumpled it up and kicked the flag out of the ring ... and that's when police stepped in and put a stop to the event.

We're told Jericho was informed that desecrating the national flag is a crime in Brazil ... punishable by incarceration.

Yikes. WWE has apparently suspended Jericho indefinitely (whatever that means in WWE-speak). I guess Jericho's latest run ends sooner than anyone wanted...

 

[Satyrquaze]

^Just in time for him to work his tour dates.

EDIT: wwe.com says he's suspended for 30 days.

 

[Caligula]

Too bad Shawn Michaels was never threatened with incarceration in Canada for all the things he did to the Maple Leaf. Crumpling that flag and kicking it out of the ring would have been one of the nicer insults out of what he came up with.

 

[Mr Silver]

A rather silly thing for anybody to do, considering Brazil is one of those countries where patriotism is still very conservative. If a Brazilian citizen did what Jericho did, you can bet they'd be thrown in jail.

Stuff like this has happened before in wrestling, where performers have seemingly got carried away whilst heat seeking. I think everyone remembers the JBL incident in Germany where he goose stepped around the ring and performed Nazi salutes. The difference is that in the last few years certain things have happened that have forced WWE to perform damage control and present a cleaner, more professional product.

The last couple of years have seen some harsh sanctions including:

- Daniel Bryan being released for "choking" Justin Roberts with a tie.
- Dave Finlay being released for booking Miz to interrupt the national anthem during an event in which the National Guard were in attendance.
- Randy Orton being axed from the lead role in The Marine 3 as the real life US Marines complained because Orton recieved a dishonourable discharge for going AWOL on two occasions when he was a member of the corps.

With Jericho being suspended indefinitely, it goes to show that seemingly no one is immune from consequences these days.

 

[Sheep]

^Just in time for him to work his tour dates.

EDIT: wwe.com says he's suspended for 30 days.

From what I've read, the police who confronted him were real officers, not the indy wrestlers dressed in police uniforms the WWE uses when someone gets arrested or escorted out of the building as part of an angle. This leads me to think the whole thing was real, and that it just happened to coincide with Jericho's planned leave to tour with Fozzy.

 

[Admiral_Young]

Jericho has been a bit of a disappointment for me. All the hype surrounding his return and we really don't have anything in terms of results. Did the feud with Punk elevate Punk any more? I don't think so. Punk was already super over and continues to be. Jericho/Orton would have been interesting, but I stopped marking out for Jeritroll after 28.

 

[Admiral_Young]

Raw is back to being meh for me again after Monday. I can't believe that Vince and company are expanding it another hour. Sometimes I feel like two hours is too much at times. Plus WWE has mentioned several times over the last few years on their panel shows that the three hour Nitro played a huge part in killing WCW. I really hope Vince knows what he is doing about this because I don't see this being a success at all.

Also, I saw that Brooke Hogan is joining TNA? I guess this was inevitable.

 

[Satyrquaze]

Jericho has been a bit of a disappointment for me. All the hype surrounding his return and we really don't have anything in terms of results. Did the feud with Punk elevate Punk any more? I don't think so. Punk was already super over and continues to be. Jericho/Orton would have been interesting, but I stopped marking out for Jeritroll after 28.

The completely unrepentant Jericholic in me would like to scream "YOU TAKE THAT BACK!" and explain to you that what you just said is 'Fightin' Words'. But, the fact of the matter is that you're 100% correct.

 

[Sheep]

As if the paper-thin WWE roster needed another top guy out of the picture...

http://www.wwe.com/inside/randy-orton-suspended-for-60-days

Let's hope they use this opportunity to push some of the new guys like Sandow or Cesaro. I'm not sold on Cesaro considering how little he's done in the WWE so far, but IMO Sandow has all the pieces to be an awesome heel.

More likely we'll see more of Tensai and Rylump, unfortunately.

 

[Admiral_Young]

I don't think this is much of a surprise and I think Admiral M might have mentioned this when Brock returned...but looks like the plans are indeed for Undertaker to face Brock at 29 next spring. Here's a link with the clip of 'Taker asking Brock "You wanna do this?".

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...s-undertaker-at-wrestlemania-initial-thoughts

There's also word that Tensei has failed to impress officials (not to mention fans) and maybe repackaged yet again.

 

[Satyrquaze]

^Man, if I had a penny for every time Prince Albert has been "repackaged"...

 

[Admiral_Young]

^ Yep. My thoughts exactly. A-Train!!!! So I watched a bit of Impact Wrestling tonight (not a lot, just a segment and the Daniels/Styles match) and what do I see? TNA having a Zack Ryder copy (Joey Ryan) and some story line that involves AJ Styles involved in an affair with Dixie. How long have these been going on?

 

[Mr Silver]

In reference to all the Ryback stuff going on recently,

It got me thinking about some dirt that an ex-WWE creative team member (John Piermarini) dished out last year about some of the opinions backstage. One of them was that Vince McMahon felt that Skip Sheffield (now Ryback) could be "the guy". Fast forward around 18 months and Ryback is suddenly recieving a push where he even gets to have his squash matches during PPV's - which isn't exactly normal practise (thus recieving a PPV bonus and air time for doing jack shit).

It seems WWE doesn't actually get that they can't re-write history and do the Goldberg thing, as the continued characterisation of Ryback as Goldberg demonstrates despite the audience immediately picking up on the resemblances and loudly chanting "Goldberg". It's pretty ludicrous, but if Piermarini is to believed then Vince feels that Ryback is worthy of being a main eventer and therefore a lazy suggestion such as "hey, let's have him squash his way to the top like Goldberg did, after all it's been more than seven years..." from a creative team member would probably provide Vince with the reassurances that his vision of a "Ryback era" could be a reality.

I'm not a fan of Wrestlezone, but this was the first complete set of John Piermarini "leaks" that I came across for those of you who are interested in checking them out.

 

[Admiral_Young]

Rybeck doesn't interest me in the least...and I'm not surprised the fans started chanting "Goldberg". I believe they started doing the Bastistia chants when Mason Ryan debuted. Vince and creative sometimes fail to see and understand that we're actually pretty intelligent and pick up quickly what they're trying to do, which is why most of it back fires on them.

The comments on Christian pretty much confirm my suspicions about how he's viewed by WWE creative. It amazes me that TNA were able to elevate him and use him better.

I'm not surprised by the Bella Twin/Daniel Bryan thing since I think Daniel is dating Niki Bella or has been.

 

[Sheep]

And in the pantheon of crappy Bleacher Report articles, we have a new king:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1198447-the-10-most-overrated-wrestlers-in-the-wwe

I'm pretty sure this dude doesn't know what "overrated" means or he's trolling for comments because a large majority of his list aren't overrated at all.

 

[Mr Silver]

And in the pantheon of crappy Bleacher Report articles, we have a new king:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1198447-the-10-most-overrated-wrestlers-in-the-wwe

I'm pretty sure this dude doesn't know what "overrated" means or he's trolling for comments because a large majority of his list aren't overrated at all.

I think his idea of "overrated" comes from what a lot of the more "IWC" fans have been going on about these past couple of years. Granted, the writer of that article probably visits the typical IWC forums and websites more often than any others, so his perspective is restricted to those names.

In the spirit of things, let's have a go at it (ten is too much IMO, so I'll do five), in no particular order:

- Sin Cara (everyone should know what I mean)

- John Cena (he's the top guy in the company and receives a tremendous amount of hype despite being a pretty average performer at his core)

- The Rock (he comes back for two matches and a handful of appearances yet recieves more attention and preferential treatment than 90% of the WWE roster!)

- Chris Jericho (he came back to great fanfare, excitement and the potential for so many feuds, great matches and the promise of doing something "never seen before" and then he... did the same thing again with a new jacket)

- Alberto Del Rio (anyone who says that he hasn't struggled is having a laugh, Del Rio bombed as WWE Champion (twice!) and was rushed into the main event scene before being ready)

 

[scnj]

So, I've never seen this Sin Cara guy before, but the commentators definitely seemed to be overselling him on Smackdown. They kept saying stuff like "you're in for a huge treat" etc, and he just struck me as a poor man's Rey Mysterio. Is there something more to him than was shown in his return match?