While it may not yet be official it would seem with all the recent cancelations and the rumors of bad checks that AWA/SCW/WHATEVER will become next in a long of promotions who come in with big dreams and promises only to crash and burn in short order. I called this right off the bat to the people I talked to when they were first getting started. This cycle repeats itself over there, time and time again. Some money mark decides he wants to run a rasslin show and comes out the gate running big shows with costly names with no build up and little advertising and loses his ass on his first few shows and dissappears. Some last longer than others, but in the end it all turns out the same. It just proves what I've been saying forever, the people with the money to run big shows don't have enough sense to know how and the people with the know how, don't have the money. This guy could have made a go at this if he had been smart but right out of the gate he runs at show in Birmingham at the Civic Center with little or no advertising. I live an hour from Birmingham and the only way I knew they were having that show is because Neil Taylor told me a few days before the show on the phone. I asked around through email to some of the people who I know are regulars at the WrestleBirmingham shows who live over there and NONE of them knew about it either. Why run a show if you are not going to advertise it and build it up. Then they go to Florence which I heard had a good crowd (around 400 or so) but when your running a coliseum and an expensive card, plus loses on previous shows to recoop 400 doesn't cut it. If you want to do it right and try to have some longevity, go into one or two towns and find a smaller venue, advertise, and build a following, you can't just start running random shows all over Alabama and expect them to draw just because your having a show. Alabama, like Mississippi (or perhaps worse) is flooded with pathetic podunk wrestling shows that have killed off a lot of the towns in the state that used to draw, which means it will take work for someone to rebuild them. But it doesn't matter, the next one will come along soon enough, or hell this guy may still have some money to burn but they'll never get it, the only good thing is it gets some of the local guys a decent payoff for a change and a chance to work in some nicer buildings. Meanwhile I know of people off the top of my head who could build a successful long term promotion over there but just don't have the money to do it with. That's really a shame.
MORE BAD LUCK FOR THE ROCK & ROLL EXPRESS
Well after all the hoopla over "poor" Ricky Morton a few weeks back being back in jail over child
support it seemed at the time at least his partner Robert Gibson was more fortunate, however that changed this week. Gibson who had been working as a trainer in OVW was released this week by the WWE. Some say it stems from the much talked about Tony Atlas/CM Punk altercation at the OVW tv tapings last week. Whatever the case may be Gibson who apparently sold his gym in Nettleton, Mississippi when he got hired by WWE will be back on the indies soon and won't have Ricky to tag with. It will be interesting to see if he heads back to Mississippi now, I never really heard how he ended up there in the first place.(VERY) RANDOM TNA THOUGHTS
Let's see Bound for Glory last Sunday..........In a match that also included Traci Brooks, Christy Hemme, Gail Kim, etc.. Awesome Kong is whose tits pop out, who says God doesn't have a sense of humor?........Joey Mer...uh..Matthews has arrived......to team with........JOHNNY SWINGER..hmmm, that could go either way......LAX and Triple X had a good match......I F'N HATE the reverse battle royal concept.....I was shocked that Butters (Eric Young) won it, nice swerve............Styles/Tomko make good tag champs, let's hope that's the end of the Pacman Jones fiasco, surely they wouldn't re-sign a guy whose not allowed to wrestle. Isn't that great a former tag champion who never actually worked a match, hell even David Arquette TRIED to wrestle.......Hmm, I wonder if Nash is returning to the ring?? (their forshadowing is like a brick to the head sometimes)..........Glad they kept the X-Division belt on Black Macho Man, although I think they need to move away from that gimmick over time, I was worried they'd have him drop it to Daniels already.........Steiners vs. Team 3-D...again....10 years too late...........Wow, they really put over Nash's bad knees tonight.......Samoa Joe vs. Christian Cage.....props to these two on a tremendous match, crowd was way into it......hope they keep it up......Abyss wins a 'Monster's Ball'.....well wooptie shit.....same match we've seen a hundred times....NEXT.......Angle vs. Sting.....pretty good match, perhaps Sting winning the title is gonna be the yearly theme for this event......or perhaps this is the beginning of a nice title run that will help restablish Sting as a champion and a major player in wrestling........or maybe he'll just drop it back to Angle on Impact in two weeks......Well reading the spoilers from the Impact tapings Sting indeed does drop the belt back to Angle......which leads to Cornette making a TAG MATCH with Angle and Nash vs. Sting and a mystery partner and one who scores the pinfall is the new TNA Champion......Now this is something that bugs me, TNA has WAY too many match where singles titles are decided in tag matches and tag titles are decided in Singles matches or all the belts are on the line in one match.......what's the point of the different titles if they are gonna be thrown into these odd situations??.....why not have a triangle match with Sting/Angle/Nash at the very least????.....Oh yeah, now I remember why I don't watch..
(EVEN MORE) RANDOM WWE THOUGHTS
Daivari has gotten his release.......AND?..............Booker T and Sharmell are gone.....hmm, that one might sting a bit, not like they are long on established stars these days......So how long before he's on Impact??...Teddy Hart gets released...still no details on the reason, it sucks cause he's talented in the ring but he's his own worst enemy when it comes to carrying himself outside the ring.....it has been said however that they are still moving forward with a Next Generation Hart Foundation with Harry Smith, Nattie Neidhart, Ted Dibease Jr, and possibly Smith's longtime 'Stampede Bulldogs' partner TJ Wilson.......So, is Jericho coming back or not?....is he the person behind the 'save_us_222' campaign??...who knows but I love reading all these hair brain theories people are reading into the stuff in those clips, you could put any random shit on the screen and some geek would find a way to tie it in.....priceless.......Looks like WWE is making preparations on the possibility of pulling the plug on ECW with the new storyline 'working agreement' between the two brands. Probaby wouldn't be a bad idea.......As strange as it may sound, Cena's injury may be a positive for him, after giving his character some time to cool off and let fans see life without him fans may have a whole new respect for him when he comes back......if handled correctly that is, I'm sure they will be sick of Triple H again by the time he's heeled up..........So they may be bringing back the Jackass angle for the Royal Rumble.....oh goody!!......Word has it that Mick Foley is heading down to OVW and FCW to help out the talent down there, that's certainly a positive, they need more of that going on.........So some people say Flair is officially done with WWE while others insist he will be back in some capacity, not real sure what to make of it but you can bet whether it's sooner.....or much later Flair will not let his career end on this note, he'll have another match somewhere, sometime.....you almost have to hope for his sake it's NOT in the WWE so maybe he can go out with some dignity....not meaning he has to win, just not retiring after a job to Big Daddy V or something.....Well that's enough on the WWE for this week....
ANOTHER SHOT
Well, after my not so kind review of Bert "Christopher Love" Prentice's USA Championship Wrestling tv show on CSS, at the urging of someone I got an email from I've continued to watch. The following week was pretty much more of the same I told you about before so we'll skip that (I can't remember if it was two weeks or not) Anyway, I watched this week's episode this morning and it's getting a little better. Rather than squash matches from St. Louis in 1981, we've got "Cadillac" Casey James (go figure) vs. Memphis' Own Dustin Starr from the Nashville Fairgrounds in 2003, I think they said. Pretty good match, major improvement. We did have one match from St Louis back in the day but rather than a clean shaven Ted Dibease beating a jobber, we get Bruiser Brody vs. Abdullah the Butcher....again major improvement. While the match wasn't anything special, it was still two legends doing what they do....punch.....and kick.....and punch......and kick......and BLEED! So no harm, no foul there. The 'main event' was another match from around 2003ish from the Nashville Fairgrounds with Abyss taking on 'Big' Bully Douglas (who is now the singing "Sweet" Teddy Tender, probably should have stuck with Douglas, IMHO) anyways, decent match with yet another appearence from "Cadillac" Casey James running in on the finish. A better show than the previous ones. The host Scott Barry is getting better he still gets a little tongue tied here and there but in his defense he is CONSTANTLY having to shill the website and the whole "bring us to your town", which is fine I know that's the whole point of the show. As for the negatives though. TOO MUCH Matt Boyce and Christopher Love. The show opens with a close up of Boyce, then Prentice shows up behind him telling him how good he looks (talk about art imitating life) and says the whole show is gonna be "Matty" looking into the camera, then later we get a promo from them as well, it's too much. How bout every other week. On a happier note, no Teddy Tender promo this week, just the Hawaiin/Island guy who talks like an 80's cliche WWF cartoon character and some other guy who had a cape, I don't know who he was I fast forwarded it. So there you go, it's getting better so we'll see how it goes, again glad to see they took my advice and started showing more recent matches. (j/k i know it's not because of me, unless they cut down on the Boyce/Love promos, then I'll have to wonder)
GENE
