Instant Feedback: Mah-na Mah-na

What does one get when good wrestling, awesome nostalgia with a milquetoast, lame ending? It's the Halloween edition of RAW, of course. Truth be told, it wasn't a bad show at all. In fact, it was one of the best flowing ones of the last couple of months. I loved all the Muppet segments to death. The best was when Sheamus and Beaker had a family reunion moment. For a second, WWE found a pop culture vein that was smart and made sense and struck it pitch-perfectly. Kermit the Frog getting bagged by Cody Rhodes and implying that Vickie Guerrero was Jack Swagger's mother was almost as great. Gonzo getting his arms all tied up was a nice, cartoon-violence-tinged visual. My one complaint would have to be that there wasn't enough Statler and Waldorf. I kinda wanted to see them get one match to call on their own rather than just getting a few cut-away segments. Nothing's perfect though.

While it took about 35 minutes for the wrestling to really get started, I really dug the matches on the show. Alberto del Rio/Big Show was a sneaky good match. I thought it could have been cut a bit shorter and it probably didn't need to span a commercial break. That being said, it was a very smartly booked match up until the finish, which I still am not crazy about. A guy has the strap, he shouldn't be losing willy nilly, but given the circumstances, I can live with it I guess. The post-match on that was great. For those complaining that CM Punk forcing a "yes" out of del Rio was bullying, consider the character. CM Punk is still a ruthless, amoral prick, just one that the fans cheer, just like Randy Orton is. I could see him (or Orton) doing something shitheel like that. The real problem is that WWE, a company based in the business of bullying and counterbullying, is so hard in on an anti-bullying campaign. The Dolph Ziggler/Zack Ryder match was really, really good too. Ryder got the loudest reactions from the crowd and held up his end of the bargain, but Ziggler busted his ass to make the match look worthy of a pay-per-view main event. Again, the finish was wonky for me here. Why have a Dusty-esque finish with a match restart only to have the same result, the Champion losing a non-title match? It's baffling.

But the biggest baffle of the night was the main event. They're trying to tell a story where John Cena is being harangued by this force of the Awesome Truth, right? Well, they were on their way to really hammering that point home, that The Rock needed to be in John Cena's corner when R-Truth in the Scream mask interfered from the crowd. But then that led into Cena summarily dispatching Miz and then taking out Truth like it was nothing? Why does Cena need The Rock again? And why does WWE insist on showing pretaped Rock promos? I just don't know, it's a morass.

But hey, at least the Muppets were cool and the wrestling was on point. Those are two big pluses for a show that is built traditionally on matches and for this night only on the nostalgia value of the former.

Shaking My Damn Head

Photo found by Progressive Boink user Pronounced Bran-dun Ky-la

Someone actually mailed this letter to Dave Prazak. Just in case the picture isn't clear, here's the text in transcript. I don't apologize for the grammar, because the writer clearly deserves ridicule:

Dear Dave,

I've always been a big fan of women's pro wrestling and I appreciated SHIMMER's more sensible approach to matches, although I dislike tag team and multi-woman matches, which SHIMMER emphasized.

After purchasing volumes 1-30 I had to drop SHIMMER because its roster degenerated into all blah brunettes and Japanese clad in pants and leotards. You lost all your big beautiful blondes to other leagues and you didn't replenish them.

If the women aren't attractive and compelling other factors don't make any difference.

It's impossible to make something like that up. Fans like this just prove that the WWE can change all they want, but if society and the fanbase doesn't change to respect women more, then it'll be harder for legitimate women's wrestling to catch on. I'm not saying that it's an endorsement for WWE's blatant mistreatment of women's wrestling. I'm saying more than WWE is going to have to change.

The Young Bucks: An Appreciation

Pictured: Heels extraordinaire

Matt and Nick Jackson, known in most indie wrestling circles as the Young Bucks, have had quite a rough year if the mainstream is the only thing looked upon. They were misused in Impact Wrestling to the point where they jobbed clean in a tag match against Eric Bischoff and Matt Hardy with the former getting the actual fall in the match. They were bashed by Rob Van Dam for not being "respectful" in a public interview. When they asked for their releases and got them, they embarked on a journey that took them to getting a tryout with WWE. For whatever reason, that "lack of respect" reared its ugly head again when Booker T (a real life friend of RVD's) and Goldust went on a Twitter campaign decrying the fact that the Bucks didn't shake hands in the locker room. On the surface, things couldn't be any worse for the brothers Jackson. Then again, the surface is rarely where the whole story takes place. All one would need to do is scratch the surface and go into the year Pro Wrestling Guerrilla is having and they'd see that the Bucks not only are doing okay, but they're actually one of the most underrated acts of the year.

To know PWG, especially in recent years, is to realize that it's not a wrestling promotion like any other mainstream or close-to-mainstream-indie promotion is. It basically exists now to provide dream matches each month using marquee indie talent, ex-WWE and TNA wrestlers and local SoCal guys who are trying to make names for themselves. They don't really run a whole lot of angles and long term feuds anymore, and a lot of their matches often contain dueling chants for each competitor. Even Kevin Steen, a guy who makes a name for himself by doing every heinous thing in the book short of using children as international objects in his matches, is over as fuck as a superhero there. Almost everyone is a fan favorite to some degree. That's why it's impressive as all get out that the Bucks are over as heels in a way that would make Alberto del Rio's reactions in larger, non-Mexican arenas look sheepish and dead.

The reason for this groundswell of in-character hate is because the Bucks are damn good at acting the part. If there's something they can do to piss the crowd off during the match, whether it's pose, troll popular wrestlers in PWG or other companies, stall or cheat their asses off, they'll do it. Every movement is used to maximize getting crowds to hate them. They're dedicated to the craft. I can also say that through my limited exposure to them in person and on Twitter, that it is all an act, a very well-done act. They both seem like really nice guys who appreciate their fans and any attention they get. And boy, are they going to get some attention on December 10. I'd imagine that the brightest spotlights of the indie world are going to be shining on Reseda as the Bucks go into a Guerrilla Warfare match (read: no holds barred) against Steen and Super Dragon. Most of the attention is going to be on the returning Dragon, but would he have had to return if the circumstances with the Bucks running so much amok over the last year weren't so damn dire? Not a chance. His return would have been buzzworthy and a special event, but I doubt it would have been this amazing and special.

PWG isn't the only place where they've been plying their wares either. ROH has gotten a good dose of the Bucks, and Chikara has seen the team grace their halls a couple of times this year. They're also looking to figure into the final weekend of the Chikara season, sitting at two points and trying to earn a third for a Campeonatos de Parejas shot. Nick Jackson even said as much in a blog recently. Again, the dick tactics at play here are phenomenal. Jigsaw asks for a three-quarters strength return match from the seminal Rey de Voladores qualifier at King of Trios '09, one that was considered to be one of Chikara's finest matches ever. Jackson shot him down, instead looking to go after that third point. It was brilliant.

The Bucks are a team that definitely is dedicated to the art of pro wrestling. TO me, that's special. Yeah, they probably would at least want a shot at making some big money and getting the big exposure in WWE, and yeah, I don't purport to know anything about what they make on the indies or how solvent PWG is. However, wrestling isn't just about what makes money, no matter who tries to tell anyone otherwise. The artistic merit, to me at least, is as important as the box office, because good wrestling sometimes isn't just what makes money. All I know is whatever the Bucks are doing in PWG deserves to make money, because it's among the best villainous portrayals that I've seen ever. While they may have gotten a bad rap for the hands that they may or may not have shaken, it's the work they've done in the ring and on the stick that makes them worth appreciating.

And I know that if they do appear at High Noon as a team, I'll throatily be booing them and their antics. It's the highest praise I could possibly give them.

Photo Credit: Scott Finkelstein - Please visit his site to view the plentiful amounts of pictures he's taken for DGUSA, Chikara and other indie feds: Get Lost Photography

If You'd Shown Me This in 1999, I'd Have Agreed the Guy Belonged in Jail

Found via @RealBradWard

Apparently, when the Winnipeg Sun puts a face on crime, it's that of former ECW and current ROH wrestler Rhino. Yeah, I dislike the guy too, but c'mon, I don't think he should go to jail. That's reserved for Triple H and other equivalent wrestling war criminals.

Wrestler Halloween Costumes

Photo Credit: @TheRock

It's Halloween, which means candy for little kids, showing off above-average amounts of cleavage and skin for women and believing that people actually put razor blades in candy for paranoid parents. The universal language of Halloween, however, is definitely dressing up in costume. Children and adults of all ages get to vicariously assume another identity for one night in an attempt to garner candy from neighbors (children) or to party down with other like-minded guys and gals (adults). Wrestlers aren't immune to that urge to get down on the costume craze. The Rock, for example, is Fred Flintstone today. In a TWB EXCLUSIVE, here are some other wrestler Halloween costumes.

Triple H - Ric Flair

Ric Flair - Triple H's son

Jerry Lawler - Wooderson from Dazed and Confused

John Morrison - John Henry Carpenter

Jim Ross and Vince McMahon - Charlie Brown and Lucy

Kevin Steen - Patrick Bateman

Dolph Ziggler - Joe Hennig

Michael "Joe Hennig" McGillicutty - PN News

Matt Hardy - Super Dragon

Super Dragon - A Guy Who Beats Up Wrestling Bloggers For Suggesting Matt Hardy Dressing Up as Super Dragon

Hulk Hogan - Himself from 1985

Shawn Michaels - Ted Nugent

Shane Helms - Dudley Moore

Steve Austin - Oscar Madison

CM Punk - Felix Ungar

Michael Cole - Napoleon Bonaparte (post Waterloo)

Beth Phoenix and Nattie Neidhart - Amazonians from Futurama

Kurt Angle - A Sad Clown

Davey Richards - Mario with Starman

Eric Bischoff - Gerald Broflovski

and finally...

Dixie Carter - Herself

Weekend Wrap-Up: The Countdown Showdown Is CURSED! CURSED I SAY!

Your 2012 JPC Tourney Champ

- For the second time in the last three months, weather forced a cancellation of a Chikara show. Saturday night's No Safety in Numbers in Reading was 86ed after a freak October snowstorm caused widespread power outages and road closures, inhibiting the arrival of wrestlers (like Sugar Dunkerton, who was stuck in Hartford) and fans alike. The Countdown Showdown was a part of this card, which is notable because it was also part of the Young Lions Cup Weekend that saw show cancellations thanks to Hurricane Irene. Someone upstairs just doesn't want that battle royale to happen, do they? Either that, or Vince McMahon (or last year's CS winner Johnny Gargano?) has built a weather machine just to fuck with anyone trying to put on a match coming anywhere close to what the Royal Rumble looks like. Ah well, maybe we'll get the big melee at High Noon as an impromptu thing, just so Ma Nature doesn't have the advance warning to put the kibosh on it.

Anyway, the results were a bit shocking, if only because Eddie Kingston tapped out to the STF. No, he wasn't facing John Cena, but Vin Gerard. I'm as shocked as you are, although I get the feeling that this match was never meant to be the blowoff to their "feud" from over the summer, and that the real story will be beginning after Kingston dispatches Mike Quackenbush at High Noon for the Grand Championship (OR WILL HE? *cue ominous music*). Also on the card, the Throwbacks' quest to gain the Campeonatos de Parejas ended in failure as they fell to Chuck Taylor and Icarus of FIST. I know what folks may be thinking here. Icarus isn't the co-holder of the belts with Taylor, Johnny Gargano is. Well, Gargano couldn't make it there due "unforeseen circumstances" (more on that later), so the Worst in the World was a fill-in. It didn't seem to affect the Champs, as they won two falls to one. There was a lot of table-setting for High Noon, mainly involving BDK vs. the World matches. Sara del Rey defeated Tursas by DQ, but was laid out for her troubles by the Finnish behemoth, Tim Donst and Jakob Hammermeir. Afterwards, she laid out a challenge to Hammermeir for a match at the iPPV event. Speaking of Donst, he got a tainted win over Green Ant thanks to interference from Tursas. This didn't set well with the resilient rookie of the Colony, as he went ape-poop on Tursas afterwards. The main event was the Spectral Envoy team of UltraMantis Black and Hallowicked taking on Hammermeir and Delirious. Mantis got the pin after some miscommuncation between the BDK team, which probably furthers the fact that the Germanic invaders are losing their grip on Delirious. One can only hope there's a solution in place at High Noon.

- Full Impact Pro down in Florida held its annual Jeff Peterson Memorial Cup Tournament. This year's tilt was won by AR Fox, who defeated Johnny Gargano in the finals. Said finals were on Saturday, so Gargano must have had weather related travel woes that caused him not to make it back in time for the Chikara card. Sucks for him. Other familiar names in the tournament were Pinkie Sanchez, Lince Dorado, Bobby Fish, Jonathan Gresham, both members of Aeroform and the "Man Scout" Jake Manning, who was talked up as having one of the most insanely entertaining gimmicks ever by Dylan Hales on his episode of TWP (LISTEN TO IT DAMMIT LISTEN TO IT NOW IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY).

Photo Credit: Scott Finkelstein - Please visit his site to view the plentiful amounts of pictures he's taken for DGUSA, Chikara and other indie feds: Get Lost Photography

I'm at Cageside Seats Now

The Indie Corner: Why Indie Wrestling Matters

Much like I discussed with Sergio Hernandez on the podcast this week (you listen yet? WHY NOT?), I'm gonna be writing for Cageside Seats now. Much like my contributions to Camel Clutch Blog and Fair to Flair, this will more be an occasional feature type deal rather than superseding what I'm doing here. That being said, my writing for CSS will be more thematic than for the other two. My feature will be called "The Indie Corner", which I'll focus in on independent wrestling (duh). Check it out.

Jew Fro Jo Mo? Jew Fro Jo Mo.

Screen Grab Credit: 30FPS

When one thinks about fans of U. of Miami football, they OBVIOUSLY think about a guy with a Jew fro, wearing John Morrison sunglasses, shirtless, wearing a jacket and holding a replica spinner belt. OBVIOUSLY. Honestly though, I salute this kid. He also is probably less likely to botch his finisher than Morrison, but then again that's not saying much.

Also, this will probably be the closest John Morrison will EVER get to the WWE Championship...

Future Endeavors 10/28 Power Poll: Is There a Higher Ranking Than 1?

Photo Credit: ImpactWrestling.com

Welcome to yet another edition of the Future Endeavors Power Poll, a poll ranking wrestlers on a weekly basis based on how awesomely they performed or were portrayed on a Tuesday-to-Monday cycle. It is voted by a who's-who of wrestling bloggers, including my blogging Bro-digal Son PizzaBodySlam. I will list the top ten, and then post and comment on my ballot. Here goes:

1. Alberto Del Rio (Last week: 2)
2. Mark Henry (1)
3. Awesome Truth (R-Truth and The Miz) (7)
4. Dolph Ziggler (NR)
5. Randy Orton (4)
6. James Storm (NR)
7. Kevin Nash (NR)
8. Sheamus (6)
9. The Ghan-Am Connection (Kofi Kingston and Evan Bourne) (8)
10. CM Punk (3)

And now, my ballot

1. James Storm - I'd have voted him higher if he drank something other than Budweiser. Wait, I ranked him number one? Uh, then, well... sorry about my damn luck? I got nothin'.

2. Super Dragon - Lots of people are making the "Matt Hardy's back in PWG" jokes because Super Dragon is a little chunky. Well, when a guy's not a grape-eating Youtube-whoring, drug-gobbling douchebag and actually have talent and shit, he's allowed to be fat. What am I saying? I want to go to Del Taco with Super Dragon.

3. El Generico - So, you think Steen, Generico, Frankie the Mobster and a bunch of other Montreal indie guys just got completely baked out of their minds when they came up with El G's gimmick? I'd like to think that's what happened at least.

4. Alberto del Rio - I have to wonder, does Alberto del Rio have a non-union American counterpart in CMLL?

5. Mark Henry - Next week on Smackdown, Mark Henry will split someone's wig so bad it will open a rift in the space-time continuum, from which will emerge the MIGHTY CTHULHU! The two will wage war in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, ending when Henry gives the Ancient Old One the World's Strongest Slam onto Mauna Kea and then a swirlie in the Marianas Trench.

6. CM Punk - Imagine if Johnny Ace was actually well known and people actually were familiar with his dipshit Dynamic Dude gimmick?

7. Ricochet - I'm drawing a blank on a witty entry for Ricochet, so here's a picture of a dog in a costume:

Photo Credit: Poopster Tumblr Page

8. The Awesome Truth - If WWE was an e-fed, and promos decided who won their match at Survivor Series, all the Awesome Truth would have to do to get over huge on Rocky and Cena would be to show a double feature of The Tooth Fairy and 12 Rounds and snicker the whole way through.

9. The Young Bucks - In the only serious note of this whole entry, Matt Jackson's wife gave birth to a child today. No BS, my warmest congratulations go out to the new daddy and uncle. That's awesome.

10. Rachel Summerlyn - I wonder if what she does at ACW shows counts as fetish porn? Sure she doesn't get naked, but I'm sure folks out there get off on chicks beating dudes bloody. Then again, people get off on some pretty fucked up shit. Like there's "crushing", which is as cruel as it is strange (look it up if you have the stomach), and there's scat porn, and then there's the fetish that I'm almost certain Ron Washington and Tony LaRussa have over bunting when they get a guy on first... sorry, I wrote this while watching the World Series. I'll stop now.

Follow Friday: Time's Yours Podcast

Yeah, so this week's Follow Friday is very much a local Philly thing. However, that doesn't mean the guys I'm about to pimp out should be ignored. See, Philly fans get a bad rap for being boorish, idiotic, provincial and loutish. I'm not gonna lie; there are a bunch of people here who fit that description. I could talk about how it's true for any city with diehard fans, but that'll just make me blue in the face for no reason. That being said, there are a lot of really good sports fans here too, guys who are reasonable and who know what they're talking about. Spike Eskin (@SpikeEskin) is one of them, and he's got a podcast called Time's Yours. The podcast name is based off what Eagles' coach Andy Reid says during pressers when he opens the floor to the media for questions, a rib if you will. There is a definite local stamp on the show, which is why I gave it a shot. I've been dying to find one that covers the local stuff. Talk radio in this town is so insipid and reactionary, and I need to hear about my teams. It's not that I don't love national stuff like House of PUNTE and the Grantland podcasts because I do. But I gotta keep it local too. If the name sounds familiar, then yeah, he's the son of local talk radio icon Howard Eskin. I don't blame folks if that name conjures up negative connotations, but Spike, while inheriting his broadcasting charisma from dad, is much more engaging and reasonable.

Eskin really excels at bringing intelligent and reasoned discussion to Philly sports. It gives a good insight into the people who know what they're talking about here. Plus, there's some national talk mixed in. Last week's 'cast was all about LeBron James. This week's had some good talk about Tim Tebow, the World Series and the NBA lockout. From what I gathered, his guest would be come his regular cohost, and that was Pat Gallen (@PatGallen_PN). He writes Phillies Nation and has radio experience as well.

Follow them on Twitter and at least try the podcast. If it's too "Philly" for anyone, I won't begrudge them, but hey, the quality plays well for any audience.

Au Revoir, Maryse

Bye bye
Photo Credit: WWE.com

Via WWE.com

Maryse Ouellet has been given the future endeavored treatment. It's unknown for what right now, but she was just coming back from an injury. I don't know if that's the reason, but I'm not sure it matters. Not sure if she was fired or quit either, but either way, it kinda sucks since of all the "model" types, she seemed to have the best handle on how to wrestle a match. But hey, when Kelly Kelly's there showing everyone how to run ropes without fucking up... wait, that's the OPPOSITE of what happens? Oh shit then, we're all fucked.

UltraMantis Black Rules the Playground (Or, Follow Heck Yeah! Chikara on Tumblr)

GIF Credit: Vince Morales

Chikara's so old-school, they take the fight to the schoolyard. Seriously, there's a reason why I own t-shirts from both guys in this .gif. Remember, you'll get this plus a whole lot more animated pics, videos, fan postings and what not if you follow Heck Yeah! Chikara on Tumblr. DO IT.

The Home Stretch: October Chikara Weekend Preview

Making His Chikara Debut This Weekend...

The 2011 year has been eventful for Chikara, just for the sheer amount of things that happened. The guest star honor roll has been numerous and diverse, the 12 Large Summit has provided great native action, the company lost a couple of big names to both injury and the WWE, but in their stead, they've also created three new bright stars to go with the cast of elites that already exists. All of it has been leading up to High Noon on November 13th on iPPV, but there are still three shows left on the docket before we get to what promises to be the company's seminal event in its nearly-decade long history. Two of those live shows take place this weekend in suburban areas of Pennsylvania, and to overlook them would be a HUGE error in my opinion, especially given some of the people and events lined up to take place on these two cards. Saturday, October 29th, the action will be at the Goodwill Beneficial Association Hall in Reading, PA, doors opening at 6:30 PM for No Safety in Numbers. Sunday, October 30th, the promotion will head to the Campbell Street Center in Williamsport, PA with doors opening at 3:30 PM for Maiden Flight of the Great Condor.

Obviously, the star attraction this weekend for most independent wrestling fans will be Eddie "Eddie Edwards" Edwards (credit to @typicalROHfan for that nickname). He'll be wrestling Jigsaw in Reading, and as is the custom for most guest stars as they make their way through Chikara, he'll go up against the War King, Eddie Kingston, in Williamsport. At first, I thought this was an odd choice for a guest star because he's so ingrained in the ZOMG SRS BSNSS milieu of ROH. Much like his tag team partner Davey Richards, Edwards has an affinity towards hard-hitting matches with lots of near falls and big spots. But then I started thinking. One, if Edwards agreed to do Chikara, he has to have some sense of humor. Two, it's not like Chikara is all joke matches either. Kingston and Jigsaw both have great pedigrees for working great matches, both with each other and against other opponents. Plus, I feel like Edwards isn't as stiff or serious-seeming about his matches; I've enjoyed a HELL of a lot more of his singles matches over the last two years than I have of Richards'. I always keep an open mind, but with this appearance, I feel like I'm excited to see what Die Hard can do in a Chikara ring. I'm getting the feeling that it could be one of the best guest appearances of the year in terms of straight-up match quality.

There are two other guest stars making their way to Reading for No Safety in Numbers. Sadly, Serena Deeb was supposed to be there, but she got a concussion and had to take some time off from the ring. I wish her the best in recovery, but I'm still a bit bummed that she wasn't able to debut for Chikara here. That being said, the two that Chikara did get to wrestle here are Ohio indie standout Marion Fontaine and former WWF Intercontinental and Tag Champion Marty Jannetty. Fontaine has made a name for himself in promotions like Pro Wrestling Ohio and Absolute Intense Wrestling by being flashy, cocky and a bit of a high-flyer. I'll be interested to see how he meshes in a Chikara ring, especially since his first match, against Archibald Peck, will more than likely be a yukfest. That's not a bad thing, by the way, and if he can be entertaining as a personality in a wholly comedic setting, then he'll already be in good with the Chikara faithful. Jannetty hardly needs any introduction to longtime wrestling fans, although younger fans may see the old-looking guy in a mullet and ask what he's doing being served up to Tursas. That being said, I feel like that tilt will be really fun as long as Jannetty doesn't show up all coked out of his bleepin' mind.

One of the big criticisms of Chikara in 2011 is that the promotion leans too much on guest stars. I feel like this is ludicrous since they've run two really big elevating storylines (Green Ant vs. Tursas and Sara del Rey breaking from the BDK), had another really cool year-long feud (Spectral Envoy vs. the unholy alliance between the BDK and the Batiri) and placed the sole interest of the promotion on a round robin tournament seeking to crown their first ever Grand Champion. This weekend continues the heavy focus on internal storylines, with the most hyped match for me being Sugar Dunkerton taking on Ophidian. In the last year, the Osirian Portal has seen a lot of shakeup, with Amasis getting injured to the point of potential retirement in a car accident and more recently, Ophidian having injury woes this year. His most major injury, a broken jaw, came at the hands of Dunkerton on July 8th. He's been showing a lot more frustration and anger lately, including lashing out at Director of Fun Wink Vavasseur and dusting up with the Colony. Could this be the onset of a rudo turn for the venomous and vile serpent from the Nile?

The other really big match happening in Reading is literally the biggest match on the card. The Countdown Showdown, a thirty-wrestler battle royale which in no way shape or form resembles any match in wrestling AT ALL (Royal Rumble? What's a Royal Rumble?), will take place here. Bumped from Young Lions Cup weekend thanks to Hurricane Irene, the big battle already has 22 names announced (Mike Quackenbush, Fire Ant, Green Ant, Soldier Ant, Shane Matthews, Scott Parker, UltraMantis Black, Crossbones, Hallowicked, Sara del Rey, Dasher Hatfield, Gregory Iron, Cheech Hernandez, Obaryion, Kodama, Kobold, Icarus, Chuck Taylor, Jakob Hammermeir, Tim Donst, Delirious and... DRAGONFLY???). One might be able to guess who the last eight entrants might be, but then again, there's always room for surprise. I don't know what the bounty is for winning this, but then again, the aforementioned Grand Championship is on the horizon, and a banked shot at said title might look pretty tempting as a prize for winning. Last year, Johnny Gargano won and banked a Young Lions Cup shot at Frightmare, but then again, there are quite a few people in the tournament who just annihilate the 25 year old age ceiling.

Also on the card in Reading, Eddie Kingston and Vin Gerard square off in a formality of a match in the 12 Large Summit, but with Kingston's spot in the High Noon final already secured, this is more of a blood feud match. I know they've been building this as a major feud this year, but it's been one of Chikara's rare misses in terms of story development. I'm not all that interested in this from a story standpoint, although it could be a cool match

The Maiden Flight of the Great Condor has a full, implication-laden lineup as well, headlined by Taylor and Gargano's second Campeonatos de Parejas defense against Dunkerton and Hatfield. The Throwbacks have had their growing pains as a team, but they've finally gained the requisite three points to challenge for the Tag Titles after about two years of teaming together. Will that moxie give them enough juice to push past FIST, looking to foster a long reign by any means necessary? I think the interesting wrinkle in this match will come with potential involvement from Ophidian. Depending on how the Dunkerton/Ophidian match in Reading goes, we could be seeing this as a continuation of a greater feud rather than having the Reading match be a resolution, as those first-match types rarely ever have those senses of finality. Either way, I'm not sure it looks good for the Throwbacks here, although the effort will most certainly be valiant.

Another huge match on the card is the next and possibly biggest stop on the Sara del Rey Breaks Up with the BDK by Breaking Their Faces Tour. Well, it's the biggest stop literally, given that Tursas by far is the girthiest wrestler on the roster. So far, she's cut through the ranks of her former running buddies like a hot knife through butter, but Tursas is not to be trifled with. Just ask Green Ant. Her failure to capture the Block A Championship in the 12 Large Summit might just drive the Queen's engine to take out the massive Viking Warrior and prove to the world that she deserves to be one of the first, if not THE first challenger to the winner of the Quack/Kingston affair at High Noon.

Another thing to watch on the card is the BDK's grip on Delirious. In a story that has been told for two years and counting now, the BDK's pet is showing signs of recognizing his former friends Hallowicked and Frightmare when they formed the stable Incoherence. The original babbling brawler of Chikara, through his journey, has made Mantis go on an amazing journey over the last two years, and it's made for some great times and low lights for the Dark Lord. It seems that Delirious is in a corner, as Mantis and Hallowicked will tag to take him on with his partner, Hammermeir. I expect shenanigans, but if any time was a good time for Mantis to complete his redemption and help bring Delirious back to the fold, it'd be when the BDK-chosen partner is the near-hapless ring announcer.

Also announced for Williamsport, Green Ant will battle Tim Donst in a tune-up match for Tursas at High Noon, although I'm sure the multi-talented Donst will have something to say about being labeled as such. All three Batiri will be in action, as Kodama takes on Ophidian in singles action, while Obariyon and Kobold will tangle with the crazed Canucks, 3.0. Finally, there'll be a four-corner tag match with points in play, as Fire and Soldier Ants look to get back on their path to the CdP. In one corner will stand Los Ice Creams. In another, it's Peck and Colt Cabunny. The fourth team as of right now is a mystery, although I'm sure it'll be someone good.

Tickets are still available for both shows, and having been to Reading this year for Chikarasaurus Rex Night 1, I can vouch for it as a venue. It's a great place to take in a wrestling show, although patience is needed for concessions, as the ladies behind the counter are surly. A small price to pay though. For those thinking that Chikara is in autopilot until the iPPV, think again. These two shows are shaping up to be pretty important and epic in their own rights, and hey, in addition to all the native stuff happening, it's a chance to see Eddie Edwards, Marion Fontaine and Marty Jannetty all in Chikara rings. That sounds like a good time to me.

Photo Credit: Scott Finkelstein - Please visit his site to view the plentiful amounts of pictures he's taken for DGUSA, Chikara and other indie feds: Get Lost Photography

Friday Five: Swerves

SWEEEEEERRRRRRRRRVVVVVVVVVVVVVE

1. What was the best swerve you ever saw in wrestling?

2. Buy or sell: The Attitude Era has conditioned wrestling fans of a certain age always to expect a swerve.

3. When is the best time for a swerve to happen, on PPV or on the flagship TV show?

4. What's the most overused type of swerve right now?

5. What was the worst swerve you ever saw in wrestling?

The Ten Percenters, The Apologists and Common Sense

The center of the controversy
Photo Credit: ImpactWrestling.com

Ever since Eric Bischoff first took to Twitter to blast those criticizing his product as "Ten Percenters", those fans have taken to the term as a unifying label. These fans have stood by their right to vocalize their displeasure for Impact Wrestling's product, despite the shouting down by Bischoff, Hulk Hogan and other various people within the company who haven't taken well to the criticism. However, what happens when Impact Wrestling becomes a good product? We're beginning to see that right now, at least I am. Personally, I've enjoyed Impact in the last month, and like I wrote earlier this week, James Storm winning the World Championship was a legitimate feelgood moment. Even though Bobby Roode had failed in his attempt to win the Championship at Bound for Glory, there was reason to believe that the Ten Percenters were being given some attention.

TWIOT: Food Power Poll, Vegetable Edition

The Food Power Poll is an occasional poll, decided solely by noted wrestling blogger and fatass food aficianado TH.

The Food Power Poll returns again, this time getting into the theme portion. Last time was just a warm-up, an introduction if you will. This time, we start getting specific, and out first actual theme is for all the vegetarians, Vegans, hipster kids and people don't mind eating healthy every once in awhile. This is the list of the top ten vegetables out there. A couple of notes first. I'm not including starches like the potato family or corn, since they ought to be a family unto themselves, technicalities be damned. Secondly, even though I could include the tomato because it's one savory-ass fruit, I might as well not start mixing because then I have to start including bananas because they taste delicious in savory applications, and apples get put in salad and the whole thing goes pear-shaped... DAMMIT I DIDN'T WANT TO MAKE A PUN. Also, mushroom is a fungus, not a vegetable... fuck it, I don't need to explain myself. Here we go:

10. Onions

Perhaps the most polarizing vegetable out there, onions get a bad rap because they're quite pungent as a raw ingredient. Truth be told though, I like raw onions, especially on chili, hot dogs and especially in salsa. Obviously, as a cooked food, their versatility is almost unmatched. People take the stinky bulb for granted, but it's used as a building block in so many dishes and sauces. Onions and beef go together like peanut butter and tuna fish peas and carrots. Who doesn't love onion rings? Communists. That's who.

9. Red Bell Peppers

Green peppers are way too bitter most of the time, but whatever balance of chlorophyll or whatever other pigments or natural, organic chemicals that make red peppers that much milder is definitely a miracle of nature. The fact that red peppers can be eaten raw without facial contortions is proof enough for me at their superiority. They can be stuffed with bread or with some kind of meat (stuffed peppers with turkey are surprisingly delicious and super healthy), but I prefer to roast them on the grill and marinate them in olive oil, garlic and some salt and parsley.

8. Celery

Celery? Celery?! CELERY?!?!?!?! Yes, celery is on here at #8. One might ask why, as in its raw form, it's kind of flavorless and that one can actually burn off more calories than a stalk contains by eating said singular stalk. However, one might be surprised at how well it works both raw and cooked. Raw, it's refreshing and crisp in salads, providing a nice, subtle flavor along with its more textural role. It's a total blank canvas when it comes to filling its valley... heh heh, filling its valley. Anyway, cream cheese, peanut butter and my personal favorite, Nutella, all go well with celery providing an inoffensive crunch in the background. Where it shines brightest though is in soups though. The way it tenderizes, almost caramelizes, is just fantastic. It's just a nice contrasting texture to its raw state. Plus the flavor gets skipped up a bit too. It's weird, but it's wonderful.

7. Jalapeno Peppers

Obviously, they're not the hottest peppers in the lot, but that's okay. I mean, the Thai chili, habanero pepper and the indomitable ghost chili all have places in the pantheon, but sometimes, I just want some flavor and flexibility to go with my capsacin. I mean, everyone compares peppers to the jalapeno like it's this base thing and like only heat matters. It's a maligned pepper. Not to me though. Stuffing a habanero with cream or cheddar cheese and deep frying it is some Adam Richman shit (no disrespect, love Man Vs. Food), but if I want to eat a pepper popper and not spew fire out both ends for days on end, I'm going to use a jalapeno. It's also great for flavorful salsa with a kick or just for sauteing with egg whites (or eggs if you're not like me and have an aversion to yolks most of the time). It's a great signpost pepper.

6. Cauliflower

It's funny, for foods that look similar, no two vegetables could be further apart on the taste scale than broccoli and cauliflower. Broccoli is on the bitter side, needs cheese or other kind of fat to make it taste good. Not that cauliflower doesn't taste good with all that stuff, but raw it's got a great, mild taste. What shoots cauliflower up the list though is the potential to mash it as a faux-potato. If anyone has ever had mashed cauliflower, they'd know what I'm talking about here. It's like a mashed potato, but it's creamy and cheese integrates better into it. Plus, it's way lighter. It's good in all other applications, but mashed cauliflower is the real all-star application.

5. String Beans

Even as a young kid, I ate the crap out of string beans, despite the fact that I rarely ever had them fresh and usually ate them canned, supermarket-style, just heated up. That's the mark of a great veggie; it tastes righteous even in the most processed, preserved state. On the rare occurrence when we did eat them fresh, I always got the job of cleaning and snapping them, which for a little kid was really fun. Nowadays, it's basically sauteing them in olive oil and red pepper flake and using them as the go-to side dish for whatever main course is on the table. Tonight, in fact, we had them with a roast beef. Good eatin'. I'm also a huge fan of Chinese food restaurants doing them up in garlic sauce. As someone who distrusts most Chinese takeout's meat supplies, it's a great vegetarian option that keeps me filled up.

4. Raw Carrots

Very few vegetables have such a contrast in quality between their cooked and raw states. Raw carrots are crunchy, fresh-tasting and slightly sweet. Cooked carrots for the most part taste like a flavorless mush Jebediah Springfield likes to call root marm. The difference is that much different, although an exception is made for carrot cake, which is awesome. But this is a vegetable list, not a confectioner's list, and carrot cake is Sammy Sosa-and-Mark McGwire-taking-turns-injecting-each-other-in-the-ass-with-steroids-level cheating. The best development in the last 50 years has to have been baby carrots. It's carrot-eating for lazy people, but I'm pretty lazy. The perfect healthy snack food.

3. Spinach

I want to know where spinach got this terrible rap from. It was vilified, absolutely vilified by nearly everything marketed to kids with the exception of Popeye. Let's face it though, Popeye was an ugly sailor. Spinach, probably more than any vegetable other than broccoli, was portrayed as the poster child for kids not eating their vegetables. It's bullshit, really, because spinach is fucking delicious. It's versatile in that it's great from raw applications in salads to being absolutely cooked down and creamed. It's amenable to all kinds of different cooking techniques and ingredient combinations. It's not too strong, but it's not a pushover either. It's great in calzones, excellent wilted and sauteed in garlic and oil, but my favorite application is cooking it down until it's almost creamy in oil, garlic, Parmesan cheese and crushed red pepper flake, making almost a spread that goes great on cheesesteaks, chicken cutlet sandwiches and cheeseburgers.

2. Green Asparagus

Yes, it makes liquid emissions from the urethra smell bad. It's a small price to pay for the uniquely-flavored stalks of grass-looking vegetable. It comes thick or thin, and really, it tastes absolutely nothing like any other vegetable out there. This isn't a bad thing, because it's a great taste. Of all the green veggies, asparagus makes the best "cream of" soup, and for someone who digs his soup, that's not trivial. Surprisingly, I found out another great serving-style for the 'grass at Chima (the venue's not the surprise here). They have it blanched and shocked on their salad bar, and it's still amazing. It's also the fattest kind, which is a testament to the veggie altogether, as most people like it thin (I prefer it thin, but thick is good too).

1. Garlic

I needed a ruling on this, because I thought garlic would be too much of a runaway winner here. I thought it might have been an herb, but it's a member of the onion family, so I'm counting it here. If anyone knows me, they'll know that I'm a garlic fanatic. I use it in nearly every savory dish I make. IT just enhances the flavor of anything, from marinara sauce to taco meat to omelets and everything else. The best part about the stinky rose though? It's very underrated as a standalone ingredient/component. Now, I'm not saying it should be eaten raw; however, when it's roasted? It's FUCKING DIVINE. I love eating them by themselves, but they're great smeared on bread or, my favorite application, smeared on a hamburger bun as a topping for cheeseburgers. You're damn right.

Also receiving votes: Eggplant, Chinese Water Chestnut, Poblano Pepper

Mark Henry: Impressive Even to PWG Founders

Photo Credit: WWE.com
Manipulation: ME

Why am I posting a picture of Mark Henry lording over Sheamus from SummerSlam? Look in the red circle. Yep, that's PWG co-founder and all-around indie wrestling maven about Los Angeles Joey Ryan, marveling at the wig splitting that just happened before his eyes. In a way, this is cooler than Colt Cabana and Ace Steel in the front row at Money in the Bank, because who the fuck expected Joey Ryan to pop up on WWE.com in this capacity? Exhibit #348937 as to why wrestling is cool as fuck.

Heck Yeah! Chikara

Follow us!

Hey, you know all those "Fuck Yeah!" Tumblr pages that are all the rage? Of course you do, unless you don't know what Tumblr is, in which case you're either new to the Internet or are older than dirt. Anyway, Vince Morales started one up for Chikara, only because Chikara's a family friendly promotion, it has to be "Heck Yeah!" instead of the dirty F-word. OF COURSE WE PAY ATTENTION TO THAT KIND OF DETAIL.

Anyway, expect a lot of awesome pictures, a lot of cool videos and a lot of Chikara-centric news stuff. Give us a follow on Tumblr or in your Google Reader or other RSS reader. HECK YEAH! CHIKARA!

The Wrestling Podcast, Episode 25: Sergio Hernandez

Yeah, we definitely wax romantic about HOSS FIGHTS
Photo Credit: WWE.com

Episode 25: Nothing's Shockmaster

This week's guest is Sergio Hernandez of Cageside Seats. He wrote an article groaning about Kevin Nash, and that's where we start. We then go into the usual stuff, like CM Punk, Triple H, Mark Henry and the like. We also talk about whether fans not knowing old wrestlers is a fallacy, how wrestling promoters can be pretty sleazy, the indies and how they're the new territory system, Dolph Ziggler and WWE's midcard, patience in booking and the problem of criticism vs. enjoyment of wrestling. He's from Dallas, so we talk about a potential WrestleMania at JerryWorld as well as his Rangers in the World Series. Also, we give some love to Chikara, because Chikara rules, son.

Direct link for your downloading pleasure.

Not Good News for Barry Windham

Credit: Obsessed with Wrestling

Via PW Torch

Barry Windham, former WCW/NWA BAMF and multiple time holder of many titles, is in ICU in Florida after suffering a COMBINED stroke and heart attack. Either one by itself is nasty, so both combined is pretty serious business. Windham is 51. For the religious types, all prayers are welcome and encouraged. If not, then hey, good thoughts and vibes would be appreciated. Windham is pretty much in for the fight of his life here.

It's All True Too

Via my blogging The-Bro-Den, King of Bro-han, PizzaBodySlam

This silly picture is based in 100% truth. Kevin Steen, destroyer of worlds, killer of dreams, a guy who uses blood as warpaint, loves going to the zoo. It's all there, in his episode of the Art of Wrestling podcast. Maybe he should meet up with Philly baseball blogger Zoo with Roy while he's at the zoo with Roy Halladay?

Open Letter to Chikara: Please Stay Special

Dear Chikara,

Kingston

You may not know me, although according to people who work within your company like Bryce Remsburg, the Batiri and Jigsaw, you totally do, (and by the way, I'm flattered at the praise and feedback), but I am a fan of your work, a very big fan so to speak. Ever since King of Trios '09, I've been hooked on your brand of puroresu and indie wrestling influenced lucha libre to the point where other bloggers and wrestling writers have accused me of impropriety when it comes to coverage. You'll have to forgive them, because a lot of them seem to be jaded enough not to be able to enjoy what wrestling should be, but that's not the point of this letter. There are several things that make me a fan of your promotion. There are the colorful personalities, the high-quality wrestling matches, the guest stars, the fun atmosphere, the fan-friendliness, the affordable ticket prices, the masterful storytelling and merchandise that isn't embarrassing to wear. Trust me, that last one is a feat, because have you seen most WWE and Impact Wrestling apparel lately? Even ROH has a few garish tee-shirts on their slate.

One of the reasons why I'm so in love with your product is that every card has something different, something unique at the top of the slate. A promotion without a World-level Championship tends to have to be creative to produce main events that not only have great action but also have gravitas attached to them as well. To say that you've done that is an understatement. Whether the match is a defense of the Campeonatos de Parejas, a blood(less)-feud singles match, an atomicos match or a showcase between Eddie Kingston and whatever marquee guest star you've brought in, I've never felt like any main event match you've put on has felt like less than a main event.

That being said, you've decided to get with the times and crown a Grand Champion. This is not a bad thing. Quite to the contrary, I've enjoyed the heck out of the 12 Large Summit, and while I might seem to be in the minority, I am looking forward to Kingston taking on Mike Quackenbush to see who will get the honor of holding that prestigious Championship title for the first time. You guys don't know how excited I am to be a part of the event, even if I'm just there as a paying customer and amateur reviewer. With that in mind, don't take what I'm about to write the wrong way, please.

Most promotions nowadays, as good or bad as they are, leave a very predictable pattern for the main events of their big time events. Invariably, the main event gravitates towards being the World Championship match, and for good reason. The title should be held as the most prestigious thing in the company. That being said, in a perverse way, I always enjoyed Chikara not in spite of no World Title, but in part BECAUSE it had no World Title. There was variety, and in the back of my mind, I fear that variety is going to go the way of Private Eye and Worker Ant with the Grand Championship. I have no reason to believe that this variety will go away. Like I've said before, you guys have earned quarter with me that most wrestling companies can't even dream of attaining with your stellar track record of satisfaction.

And believe me, I won't stop going to shows or buying DVDs or giving you guys top reviews if the only thing that changes is that every card is invariably headlined by a Grand Championship match. It's never a bad thing to have a concrete goal to build around, especially when as a tool, it can be used to enhance the stories of so many wrestlers on the roster, from the established like Kingston, Quack, Jigsaw and UltraMantis Black down to those who have mettle to prove like Sara del Rey, Green Ant, Tursas and Sugar Dunkerton. However, it is the variety at the top of the card that sets you apart from everyone else, almost literally. Yeah, PWG and ROH deviate from that norm every once in awhile (PWG moreso than ROH, but I hold PWG in almost the same regard as I do you... I'm sure you won't disagree). I'm not saying the Grand Championship shouldn't be defended on every card (although if that is in the cards and defenses will be a "special" thing, then hey, I'm all for that too), nor am I saying that it should be given the WWE/Impact treatment, but at the same time, you guys are really good at telling a story. You have been since before you even entertained the thought of having a Grand Championship, and just because that Grand Championship is coming doesn't mean that the stories you will tell in the next couple of years will be lesser because of its presence. That's what makes you special, that it doesn't matter what the stakes are, everything feels important.

That's why I'm writing this. Not that I think you will, but because it's in the back of my mind that it just might happen, that every card in 2012 and beyond will be Grand Championship-centric. That wouldn't be special. But mixing cards based around title defense main events in with the atomicos, the tag title bouts, the feud matches and the special dream matches? That would be special.

I have the feeling that you will, but I feel like I need to say it, just for my sanity. Please stay special.

Yours truly,
TH

PS, see you at High Noon. Let's go Green Ant!

Photo Credit: Scott Finkelstein - Please visit his site to view the plentiful amounts of pictures he's taken for DGUSA, Chikara and other indie feds: Get Lost Photography

Happy Birthday, CM Punk

Best in the world
Photo Credit: WWE.com

No links dump today, as I'm at my folks' house, still sans laptop and been busy all week long. Apologies to everyone I usually link, but hopefully, my lappy will be back next week and I'll be able to link it up real good.

Anyway, today is the birthday of one CM Punk. The Straight Edge Savior celebrates his birthday not on his couch in Chicago, but on the road with WWE as arguably its brightest new star, which is funny from the last couple of years since everyone swore up and down since he first got to OVW that he'd be back in the indies by December because WWE would misuse the shit out of him. I can't say with any certainty that WWE hasn't misused Punk (I mean, just watch any episode of RAW since SummerSlam), but at the same time, despite all that, everyone still loves him and he's a future big-timer for the company.

But as with any folk hero, he has a beginning that wasn't in the public eye. As a greenhorn in the business, he started out with his buddies Colt Cabana and Ace Steel in IWA-Mid South before working his way to Ring of Honor, where he'd craft the legend of the bleached blond dickhead who wore basketball shorts and made a living pissing everyone off. The ultimate fuck you was when he defeated Austin Aries for the ROH World Championship in what was his "last" night in the company, only to use the belt as a hard surface to sign his WWE Developmental contract on, ringing in the Summer of Punk. I really wanted to show a video of that, but when I say there's barely anything on Youtube worthwhile from Punk's ROH tenure, I am not lying. Just a bunch of videos wondering if Punk was going back to ROH after his initial pipebomb speech and even more vids that had his ROH theme song, "Miseria Cantare" by AFI, set to slideshows of various Punk pictures. I did find footage of his final ROH match against Colt Cabana, which ROH itself posted:



And just because it involves Nickelodeon and slime, here's a video of CM Punk's appearance for the Australian Kid's Choice Awards. For some reason, it also features people from the TV show iCarly talking about Punk. Take the good with the bad, I guess.



I know the guy is never going to read this, but hey, if he does, then happy birthday, CM Punk. One of my favorites of all-time and probably the only guy who could take an otherwise dreadful storyline and make it worth watching because the dude does nothing but excrete awesome from every one of his pores.

The Best Moves Ever: Spanish Fly

This is probably a controversial pick, because it's one of those ZOMG CONTRIVED moves that seems to need the guy taking it put in the same effort as the guy delivering it. When talking about the C4, I would agree. However, given that the Spanish Fly is performed from the top rope, it makes more sense that a guy would be able to deliver it without aid. More potential energy involved, more room to perform it without needing the victim to look as if he's giving the move to himself. At least that's how it looks to me. AR Fox gets bonus points here for pulling it off on a seated springboard without it looking like total tomfoolery.

Wrestling Six Packs: Comebacks I'd Like to See

Please come back! Please come back!
Photo Credit: WWE.com

Super Dragon returning this weekend was a welcome sight for indie wrestling fans everywhere. However, he's not the only guy who could come back and spark some interest. The following six guys are all folks who retired, secluded themselves from public eye or who are just not around any more for whatever reason, all of whom would be welcome back into a wrestling ring.

1. Mike Knox

OF all the WWE's future endeavorings in the last two years, the two I'm most bummed about are Knox's and Chris Masters'. Masters is in good spirits and has gigs lined up, most visibly in Jeff Katz's Wrestling Revolution Project. Knox... yeah, not so much. He's been pretty incognito, and reports are coming out that he's been depressed since being released from WWE. Yikes. The shame part is that the guy is legitimately talented. A year ago, I might have bristled at him being in TNA, but now that they seem to be at least on the same artistic level as WWE, hey, why not? ROH is stupid for not trying to pick him. Knox vs. Tursas in Chikara would be an automatic DVD buy for me (BEARD WARS 2K11). He's just too good to sit on the sidelines. Here's hoping he can sort out whatever mental issues he has and that some company, be it WWE or otherwise, realizes that this guy is pretty awesome.

2. Chris Bosh

No, I'm not talking about the softer-than-warm-butter forward for the Miami Heat, the least worthy player mentioned as part of their "big 3". I'm talking about one of PWG's OGs, a guy who was dazzling on the indie scene back when Daniel Bryan wasn't even Bryan Danielson yet, when Samoa Joe was Rubenesque with cool Elvis hair and when none of Low Ki's bridges were burnt yet. Injuries have forced him into retirement, but then again, so many guys have come back from being hurt, from Shawn Michaels all the way down to BJ Whitmer and the aforementioned Super Dragon, that there HAS to be hope for Bosh yet. Plus, he's the guy who gave us this:



Seriously, I don't mean to take the focus away from Bosh, but the way Kevin Steen sold that is one piece out of a hundred billion pieces of evidence as to why that dude rules your face and everyone else's face around him.

3. Scott Lost

Speaking of PWG OGs, Lost, Bosh's former tag partner, lasted in the biz all the way up until last year, when self-preservation and a budding career in comics called him out of the squared circle. I was kinda bummed to see him leave because his matches were always highlights of the PWG DVDs I was ordering. That being said, it seems like the PWG guys without fail take breaks and come back after they've healed/rested/got their fill of time away. Dragon, Scorpio Sky and Disco Machine are examples of this. I'm holding out hope that Lost joins that group eventually and makes one more run in the ring.

4. Monty Brown

He was the first guy TNA pushed as one of their own only to get fed to the rehash machine. Getting the NXT Name Generator treatment in WWE didn't help matters for him either. The guy had a charisma about him that was pretty surreal, and he pretty much stands as one of the biggest missed opportunities by both companies in the last decade. I mean, his Pounce could have been HUGE if he was given the proper amount of faith. That being said, no one is beyond salvage, and his talents are being wasted as a personal trainer. I imagine he'd make a great fit in Impact Wrestling today. I'd go for a feud between him and Joe. It'd definitely be an upgrade for Joe.

5. Worker Ant

I know he retired for health reasons, and his departure from Chikara got us not only Green Ant but Pinkie Sanchez as well. I still think that a Colony vs. Dark Colony feud would be all kinds of awesome. It would involve Chikara resurrecting the old Titanes en el Ring character La Hormiga Negra as the overlord of a new ant hill army, and Worker Ant would be his right hand man. Tell me that wouldn't be an awesome feud set up, especially if the third for the Dark Colony were Pinkie Sanchez as Pink Ant. Ah, the joys and perils of fantasy booking.

6. Molly Holly

With there being a push to legitimize women's wrestling in the mainstream, I think now would be a good time for Nora Greenwald to make a comeback somewhere. Obviously, WWE isn't serious about this, or else the Divas of Doom would be dominant, not paper tigresses. However, wouldn't it be nice if they were serious about letting the women be more than just eye candy? If that were the case, then they'd sign Sara del Rey and Cheerleader Melissa. They'd push AJ and Naomi. Then, they'd bring back Molly Holly, apologize to her for making her "fat" ass as a point of ridicule and let her have some fun matches with Beth and Nattie. But alas, WWE is a fetid, sexist cesspool that doesn't care about anything but implants and platitudes, so she'd be better off (marginally) in Impact or (much better used) in SHIMMER.

Bring ACH to Beyond Wrestling

See this and a lot more if ACH comes to the East Coast
Photo Credit: Austin American-Statesman

Donate here

Who is ACH? To most, those three letters don't really mean a whole lot, but to a select few people who actually follow Anarchy Championship Wrestling, they stand for one of the most exciting young wrestlers in the whole country. Both Brandon Stroud and John Hyperion rave about this guy, saying he's one of the most naturally gifted athletes and exciting pro wrestlers ever to step into a ring. The problem with all that is that ACW gets scant little play outside of Texas and St. Louis, so in the monolithic wrestling scene where the biases towards the East Coast and Southern California are HUGE, that'd be like trying to get a singular voice to pay attention to a small hot dog stand over the cacophony of advertisements for Burger King and McDonald's. How does one go about putting the megaphone to mouth and getting the word out? Well, it takes an enterprising company to get the ball rolling.

Enter Beyond Wrestling.

The company, based solely on social media (Facebook, Twitter, Youtube), is somewhat of a "guerrilla" promotion in the truest sense of the word. They started out with a fight club type vibe, and since they've grown to start doing regular shows, based mostly out of New England and Ohio. They've set up shop at Chikara events at the ECW Arena, so folks may have seen them around. Anyway, ACH isn't the first guy that they're bringing to the masses, he won't be the last either, but he's a very important one. If half of the things that B and Hyperion are saying are true, and trust me, there are a scant few people in the wrestling blogosphere that I trust more about independent wrestling than those two, then this guy is going to turn the East Coast on its head. Any donation towards getting ACH to Boston is a donation towards furthering the art of professional wrestling and the movement of independent wrestling. If anyone has a few shekels, they'd be wise to toss 'em Beyond Wrestling's way. It'll be well worth the investment.

Who Is Super Dragon?

I made a big deal out of the return of Super Dragon Saturday in PWG, but it was for a good reason. The man pretty much was part of the definition of independent pro wrestling in Southern California (With help from his bros Joey Ryan, Scorpio Sky, Chris Bosh, Scott Lost and a couple of canucks named Steen and Generico, among others). He was a co-founder of PWG and has wrestled some of the most luminary names in all the land, including CM Punk, before he became the Cult of Personality on the big stage, back when he grappled in basketball shorts and had bleached blond hair. He's probably served as a template for every e-fed moveset after 2004. I'd say of anyone who could come back who's now since retired (not in WWE or Impact, but straight up retired or on hiatus), Super Dragon's probably the biggest name. Still, I can't help but think that to newer fans, he's a bit unknown. Hell, I'll admit that even I'm still getting to know the guy's history. However, that's what Youtube is for!

Super Dragon confronts an annoying fan (embedding disabled by request... I HATE IT WHEN THAT HAPPENS)

His top 20 moves according to The Suicidal Dragon


A Super Dragon double stomp causes a fan to break his chair


Curb Stomp montage! Including one where he grabs Samoa Joe by the nose


Showing no respect to Sabu


While that's not the complete Super Dragon compendium, I hope it's a good start.

John Laurinitis Has to Have an Endgame

Is he going somewhere?
Photo Credit: WWE.com

For those keeping count at home, and judging from Twitter and the message boards, there are quite a few who are, John Laurinitis appeared three times on the program last night in various capacities. His first two appearances were what we have come to love, a goofy ne'er-do-well bumbling, bungling and serving as a deus ex machina either to allow the "beloved" COO get sneak attacked or as a canvas for the burgeoning megastar to paint with his microphone-shaped paintbrush. It was, as Michael Cole would term it, vintage Johnny Ace. His third appearance is what had me scratching my head though. He interrupted a beatdown by The Awesome Truth on John Cena and ended up chastising the two men he hired back upon assuming the role of interim general manager, eventually allowing Cena to choose The Rock as a tag team partner for a match at Survivor Series.

I scratched my head. Unless I was watching the show wrong (the right way being as commenter JOutlaw suggested to watch through the lens of Cena as a mega heel), Laurinitis had just given a big mulligan to the biggest hero in the company. It was almost like he was a neutral arbiter of justice. No, that couldn't be right, because in wrestling, guys either have to be noble or evil, ESPECIALLY if they get THAT much screen time, right?

Well, yeah, I'd argue that there's no way that Laurinitis SHOULD be considered neutral. He's just been too meddling and presented too much as a corporate stooge for me or anyone to read too much into that last segment on RAW last night. That being said, this is the same company that has given us gems like Kevin Nash as the guy who sent a text to himself to interfere in a match at SummerSlam. Their creative staff may seem to get simple right at least off the bat, but when they try to start working in swerves, they get too cute, outsmart themselves, and the next thing we all know, Wade Barrett is getting buried under an avalanche of chairs after rapid time compression turned six months of storytelling into two. There's always the fear that Laurinitis is just a much goofier, much more everpresent version of Jack Tunney and that there's some higher swerve in the making, one that they even don't know yet.

I don't need to tell anyone that would be a disaster, because for as much time and characterization they've developed on the former Dynamic Dude, they had BETTER have some kind of endgame for him that isn't just him as a red herring. I mean, the guy comes out multiple times in a show, has tons of promo time and has this cache of being this guy who at best cannot be trusted. That emotional equity either needs to be paid off as him being a mastermind or at the very least a herald for the new lead bad guy, or it has to be a total misdirection in that he was the good guy all along and looking out for everyone's best interests. He can't be neutral. He just can't.

It's not that I think neutral authority figures are bad either. It's just that guys like Jack Tunney made sporadic appearances for a reason. Neutral characters aren't just so not part of the wrestling narrative, but they also tend to be boring, ESPECIALLY in the ham-hands of a creative staff that was given a golden ticket in CM Punk and screwed it up within two months. Asking anyone to trust that they'll pay off Johnny Ace is even a risky proposition, as sure a thing as he is. I fully expect them to give us a payoff for Laurinitis, but this is WWE Creative. Take nothing positive for granted with them.

Charles Darwin on Pro Wrestling

Via Boing Boing

The comic Brain Rot by Ed Piskor tackled pro wrestling in their strip this week. As a fan of 'rasslin', yeah, I nodded my head at a lot of it. The best comedy is full of truth. Take a look after the jump:

Instant Feedback: It Was Only a Dream, Right?

I thought I was having a terrible, terrible nightmare. I thought RAW started off with Triple H talking about broken hearts and then there was something about him still being COO even though he wasn't the RAW GM anymore and then Kevin Nash hit him with a sledgehammer a few times and everyone acted as if President Kennedy was shot in the head in Dallas or at least it was Nolan Ryan beating the shit out of Robin Ventura (Rangers/White Sox next year might have a redux of that, maybe). But no, RAW was in Austin, so it couldn't have been that. My dream improved when there was a pretty spiffy tag team match between Randy Orton and Sheamus against Christian and Cody Rhodes, and that's the last thing I remembered before what I thought was the real RAW open, John Laurinitis, Alberto del Rio, Ricardo Rodriguez and CM Punk absolutely nailing it in a segment where they let Punk be Punk, del Rio be arrogant, Rodriguez be smarmy and Ace be cluelessly doofish. Then I looked at the clock on my cable box, and it was in the 10 PM hour. It wasn't a dream. When I dozed off, it was only momentarily.

The good news is that that tag match was real, and it was really good. The bad news? RAW CENTERED AROUND TRIPLE H ACTING GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. Holy Christ, I thought this melodramatic bullshit was done and over with, but here we are again, Triple H and Kevin Nash being a thing. I guess I should be thankful that it's self-contained within itself and not infecting guys like Punk, del Rio, Miz, R-Truth and even John Cena. But it's still taking up time on my television. I thought wrestling was supposed to be cool again. Triple H is the opposite of cool. But I digress.

But let's get back to the other feuds going on, because hey, WWE seems to have found a groove again. The prospective WWE Championship feud again is awesome. Letting CM Punk be CM Punk? WHO'DA THUNK THAT'D HAVE WORKED? And hey, the Awesome Truth as the main heels by proxy for Johnny Ace (we think) is a damn good choice. I'm so digging their mic work, and they're money on beatdowns. The match with Cena was as well done as they could have done a handicap, and it set up Cena and Rocky teaming really, really well.

The wrestling all night was a plus, which on a wrestling show, needs to happen. I was most impressed with John Morrison actually throwing worked punches that looked like punches and not wild flailing. His clotheslines? Yeah, not so much. But hey, he bumped large for RED BELLY, but no one could ever say that JoMo was a bad bumper. As stated before, the tag match was really good too. Turns out I missed Santino taking on Dolph Ziggler during my involuntary nap, but I can catch that on demand. Decent RAW tonight that would have been fucking awesome if it weren't for Triple H and Kevin Nash.

But as ego and stupid corporate thought processes dictate, Kevin Nash and Triple H remain inexorably a part of the show, which will be a source of agita for me as long as this show is on Mondays in the foreseeable future.

Future Endeavors 10/20 Power Poll: Michael Cole Takes Over TWB

Not only does he give JR the what-for, he takes over my blog
Photo Credit: WWE.com

Welcome to yet another edition of the Future Endeavors Power Poll, a poll ranking wrestlers on a weekly basis based on how awesomely they performed or were portrayed on a Tuesday-to-Monday cycle. It is voted by a who's-who of wrestling bloggers, including my blogging Bro-nah Keri PizzaBodySlam. I will list the top ten, and then post and comment on my ballot. Here goes:

1. Mark Henry (Last week: 1)
2. Alberto Del Rio (7)
3. CM Punk (3)
4. Randy Orton (NR)
5. John Cena (NR)
6. Sheamus (9)
7. Awesome Truth (The Miz and R-Truth) (5)
8. Ghan-Am Connection (Kofi Kingston and Evan Bourne) (10)
9. Cody Rhodes (4)
10. Big Show (6)

And now, my ball...

MICHAEL COLE: Excuse me! I have an announcement from the Anonymous RAW General Manager...

TH: Hey, what's going on?

MC: I'm taking over this announcement, nerd. Go back to giving guided tours of the Liberty Bell with JR while you leave this to a REAL professional.

TH: Unbelievable! Hey wait a second, the Anonymous RAW General Manager isn't in charge anymore. It's John Laur...

MC: HAHA! NERRRRRD! You're concerned about continuity! What a maroon! Get out of here before I show you why I'm UNDEFEATED at WrestleMania!

Well, I've been told. Here goes, Michael Cole reading my ballot.

1. Dolph Ziggler - Hey, of COURSE he's going to be number one! He's managed by that cougar, Vickie Guerrero! With her guidance and his sharp in-ring skills, there's no way he shouldn't be at the top of everyone's ballots!

2. AJ Styles - Who? What, he probably wrestles in bingo halls and at car washes, because that's what nerdy Internet bloggers like!

3. Mark Henry - Did anyone ever notice how little his dick looks though his segment? Haha, no wonder he's beating everyone up! HE HAS TO OVERCOMPENSATE FOR HIS SMALL COCK! I love saying things like this here because this blog is OBVIOUSLY not PG rated!

4. Cody Rhodes - Cody Rhodes ought to put bags over everyone's heads who read this blog! Because you're all probably UGLY, unlike me, who should be modeling for GQ!

5. Austin Aries - This has got to be a joke, right? I mean, he sounds like someone who should be the lead singer in some shitty band that all those NERRRRRRDS like Daniel Bryan and AJ like!

6. CM Punk - CM Punk is a VOICE FOR THE VOICELESS! Just look at him there with his new best friend, Triple H, showing that! Hey, wait a second... HOLD ON, let's go to the next one before something bad happens...

7. The Miz - WHY IS THE MIZ NOT RANKED HIGHER YOU PEON? THE MIZ SHOULD BE NUMBER ONE IN OUR HEARTS AND MINDS ALL THE TIME GAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

8. Johnny Ace - Look at this nerd trying to suck up to the boss!

9. Daniel Bryan - HAHA WHAT A NERD THIS GUY IS PUTTING DANIEL BRYAN ON HIS BALLOT! NERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRD.

10. The Big Show - Yeah, Big Show is big and all, but what about this nerd having the NERVE to put DANIEL BRYAN on his ballot? Holy crap, I could go on for HOURS about how these stupid nerds stick together! Honestly, this person should have his blogging rights REVOKED!

Really, John?, Or, Why I Think Wrestling and Anti-Bullying Campaigns Go Poorly Together

Photo Credit: WWE.com

So, did John Cena decide to rise above hate before he launched an angry tirade at Alberto del Rio for cashing in his Money in the Bank briefcase in a totally legal manner, or was it after he beat the ever loving shit out of his ring announcer for making a face? Or was it after giving him a post match beatdown to announce the stipulation for the WWE Championship match? I wonder...

Anyway, yeah, I understand why WWE is partnering with the Be A Star Coalition. It's a noble cause, and I get that bullying (a problem old as time) needs to be abated, especially now in these times when differences are being celebrated more and more. That being said, has anyone really watched professional wrestling in the last fifty years or so? It's full of bullies, especially recently. It's not just the bad guys anymore. "Stone Cold" Steve Austin made bullying okay for good guys. If we didn't know that the guys The Rock was ridiculing in his prime were doofuses, villains and cads, then people might think he was a verbal aggressor. As much as I like to rag on Cena for his bullying ways, the fans do take to it.

So, how am I supposed to take these people (fuck, the heels are part of these PSAs too) seriously about not picking on other people when they take turns picking on each other for a living? It's not like these are actors playing roles in entirety. Kayfabe still exists, and the characters are married to the people.

Again, I like that WWE is taking a stand on something social, a good cause to speak. I like that Impact was doing it too (and presumably still does, although I don't recall seeing any PSAs from them lately), but at the same time, I'm not sure that bullying is the best thing for them to be doing publicly. It just doesn't feel right.

James Storm: An Appreciation

Someone's damn luck just went good
Photo Credit: ImpactWrestling.com

James Storm has seen it all. He's been in Impact Wrestling since before it was called TNA, when it was known as NWA: TNA officially and handily. He's seen two incarnations of Jeff Hardy, nine years of Jeff Jarrett pretending to be Triple H, a cavalcade of legends walking in and out, including the last ever in-ring appearance of one Randy Savage before heading into his self-imposed retirement that would last until his death. He's seen Samoa Joe come in like a house on fire and peter out thanks to shoddy booking. He's been there for Flying Elvises, Main Event Mafias, Kevin Nash doing shtick with Alex Shelley and Jay Lethal, for Destinations X and Bound for Glories and everything else. He's watched as men claimed to be King of the Mountain and wrestle in reverse battle royales. All the while, he watched and he wrestled as a good soldier in two legendary tag teams, getting passed by by everyone else coming through the ranks. Nevermind that both America's Most Wanted and Beer Money, Inc. were both among the most popular entities in TNA's history. Nevermind that when they went on the road for their first Impact tapings that didn't reside at the Nashville Fairgrounds or the Impact Zone, he and his partner Bobby Roode were greeted as kings among men, more so than anyone else on the roster. HE was just a tag wrestler.

Until Thursday (technically Tuesday actually, but bear with me here).

On that episode of Impact, James Storm captured the World Championship to a raucous reaction in the Impact Zone. Say what you want about how skewed the crowd is, and believe me, I have several times, but they get behind their own in ways that not many other crowds in history do, for better or worse. In this case, I'd say it was for the better. As he popped beers in the crowd and embraced with fans, I got a little something in my eye. Yeah, it was on DVR and I had already known the result before airtime, but I still got caught up in the moment. When he was spraying beers on his Fortune stablemates, I smiled just like the wrestlers in the ring were. Of all the title wins this year that meant something, Storm's arguably had the most organic goodwill behind it, edging Mark Henry's because Henry had been pushed as a mega heel and Storm as a conquering hero.

It doesn't matter if there wasn't as much a build behind it, that it happened on a "hotshot" on free TV rather than on pay-per-view. What matters is that James F'n Storm is the Impact Wrestling World Heavyweight Championship. A guy who toiled for nine years, bode his time and performed at perhaps the highest level of any wrestler who was there for as long as he was was finally rewarded. It shouldn't go without saying that Storm has consistently been hailed as not only one of the most charismatic guys on the roster but one of its best pure wrestlers. In a promotion that SHOULD be the logical successor to WCW and before it JCP/GCW/Mid-Atlantic as the classic Southern-style 'rasslin' company, there's no better good ol' boy babyface around than Storm. He's rough and tumble and knows how to mix in technical goodness with his natural beer-fueled brawling style.

I know that the good guy is hardly ever supposed to use the word "deserve" in regards to their own accomplishments, but at the same time, I can't help but think that there was no one in Impact who deserved this moment more than Storm, not Styles, not Joe, not Daniels, not even his tag partner Roode, whose payoff was expected to come days earlier at Bound for Glory. I for one am glad that Storm is getting his time in the sun now, and both Impact and the entire wrestling world is better for having this guy on the main stage.