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Watched it last night and thought it was just ok. It's kind of meta-weird that Flair's "proudest moment" was seeing his daughter win the title (considering how things are choreographed).

I remember the 20/20 that GD mentioned. The wrestler (Dr. D?) slapped Stossel in the ear and said, "is that real?"

It was kind of sad that Flair's parents never gave him any credit for what he achieved...but on the other hand, he was admittedly a bad father and husband, so they probably weren't impressed with the money.

I also like how they discussed Flair's ability to enhance his opponent's offensive abilities through the writhing and whining and screaming, even on things like the "test of strength."

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Doesn't Bernstein do the same thing, just in a much more subtle way?

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

Stealing it would have required running 30 miles of cable.

So, probably not everyone.

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You know me like that.

How else are we going to watch the Drederick Tatum fight?

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

That was one of the best episodes ever...the Southern Dandy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3vnR_pFTNY

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No, those are two separate Drederick Tatum episodes! And while "The Homer They Fall" is a good one like pretty much all Simpsons episodes from that time, "Lisa v. the 8th Commandment" is a great one.

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Still the myth that Hogan couldn't work a lick lives on. He wasn't Dean Malenko obviously, but he also wasn't remotely awful.

Quick example ... Hogan vs. Muta from 93 (making Hogan 40 years old at the time). He just wasn't "allowed" to put on that kind of match in WWF - completely different styles and audience expectations for pace and movesets and storytelling.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x5i7i6

As an aside, if you want to see one of the most peculiar 3-man tag teams ever assembled, look no further than this one: Hogan, Bret Hart, & Iron Mike Sharpe.

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

Man, you guys who appreciate the actual wrestling are interesting. I was raised by the WWF storyline driven stuff.



Dean Malenko is like a less exciting version of Bert Hart (Bert fits him better than Bret)

Yeah it has to be a mix of character and work.

I think it was Tully in the Flair documentary that said the NWA was more realistic and marketed towards adults while WWF was over-the-top and marketed towards kids. I agree. I enjoyed WWF and Hulkamania as a kid (like eveyone else) but the Dusty/Magnum TA/Horsemen stuff seemed more legit. Loved it.

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Yea, I get it. It's just interesting because I didnt really know that stuff existed when I was a kid. The other promotions were just minor league wrestling to me.

Like when someone mentions the greatness of Greg Valentine. Im like...they tag team guy who later died his hair black to fit in with the Honky Tonk man?

I saw Greg Valentine at the DuPage County All Night Flea Market back in August. Dude looked like a walking corpse. Not good.

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I think he lives next to Keeping Score now.

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80's Wrestling power rankings from each of the top promotions if you had to rank them.

For me it would be.

1. NWA
2. UWF/Mid South
3. WWF
4. WCCW
5. AWA

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What made WCW so weird was its attempts to have it both ways, mostly after they landed Hulk Hogan but certainly before that as well. For the most part, WCW was presented as an athletic competition where the best wrestlers who established themselves around the world came to perform, and Mike Tenay would talk about how impressive all these Mexican and Japanese guys were. Also, there were Mortal Kombat knockoffs fighting each other and Hulk Hogan feuded with an evil leprechaun.

I felt like WCW usually treated the audience with some sort of respect, as if to say that it may be fake but you and I will agree to pretend it isn't, but also insulted its audience more deeply than the WWF ever could, which operated at a near-constant hum of BUY ALL OUR CRAP.

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Conversely, I hated it when the Undertaker abandoned all the Old West/Goth/literally the undead trappings and was just like "uh I like motorcycles n shit and also I'm really into MMA now"

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IMO WCW was better because they tended to be more wrestling oriented. Their matches were also longer and tended to be more technical. You didn't have to have textbook mic skills in order to get a push. Their best wrestlers would also wrestle on TV. That rarely if ever happened in the WWF. Hogan would cut promos on TV and that was about it. Piper would do Pipers pit and that was about it.

Also the guy's in the WWF who got the biggest push tended to be their worst wrestlers i.e. Hogan and Piper.

NWA would have Flair wrestle for 60 minutes on television at times. If WWF had a match exceed 15 you'd damn near hold a parade.

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What a technical masterpiece! This Cruiserweight division is heating up!

And now....Robocop

Yea, that was ridiculous.


They may as well have gone the old route and given him a new name and pretended he was a different guy.

A pity Robocop never got to say "freeze, dirtbag" to Glacier.

One note on Dean Malenko. The battle royal where he pretended to be a luchador so he could kick Chris Jericho's ass must have gotten one of the best pops in '90s wrestling. I remember my friends and I watching it live and marking out HARD. There was just one problem: while conventional storytelling, especially in the wake of that MONSTER pop, would dictate that Malenko would go on to just completely beat the ever-loving shit out of Jericho, because they were Dean Malenko and Chris Jericho and it was in their DNA, they went on to have an exciting back-and-forth match that Malenko ultimately won after I dunno a long series of reversals or some shit. Then, because WCW was well into its fuck-up-a-wet-dream phase, Malenko was stripped of the title for identity theft and all the events of the pay-per-view were invalidated, then they ran out of ideas for Jericho and he left. Of course they went out of business.

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

One of the saddest but funniest things was one Royal Rumble after the motorcycle persona was pushed. Undertaker rides out to make his entrance. He sucked at the time and got tossed pretty quickly. Two minutes later when another wrestler is making his entrance, you see Undertaker along the walkway riding his motorcycle to the back, defeated. Way to save your dignity!

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Only one that was could be considered "SAD" was RR 2002, when Taker was eliminated by Maven; he then came back and beat the shit out of Maven.

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Sherman remarked, "Well, Grant, we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?" Grant looked up. "Yes," he replied, followed by a puff. "Yes. Lick 'em tomorrow, though."

You may be mashing some together, but the RR that comes to mind in his biker gimmick was when Maven shock eliminated him, which led to Taker damn near murdering him, and Scotty 2 Hotty...

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There were two biker Undertaker personas: there was the first I'M! AN! AMERICAN BADASS! one, which seemed kind of interesting at first because it was different, then there was the Undertaker when he shaved his head and was "Big Evil" and just seemed like a lazy piece of shit, and that was when I remember everyone being utterly sick to death of the guy. This was his theme music, which was basically jobber music but for one of the cornerstones of the company.

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Check out his fall 2003 matches with Lesnar; pretty darn good. Also Taker was all beat up and took time off after Survivor Series to return as the Deadman for WM 20.

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Sherman remarked, "Well, Grant, we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?" Grant looked up. "Yes," he replied, followed by a puff. "Yes. Lick 'em tomorrow, though."

Yeah, I was basically done with wrestling by 2002-2003.

I never understood Lesnar's push to the moon. I thought he was boring. I do remember his title win at WM19, to quote Jim Cornette, EXPOSED THE WHOLE FUCKIN' BUSINESS because he botched a spot about as badly as one can botch a spot, then still won the match. After Lesnar fell on his head and concussed himself, Angle should have pinned, kept the belt, and vacated the title the next night. But then I also think the main event at that show obviously should have been Hogan-Austin, so that was just one big night of getting it wrong.

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I could be. It's been a while. Maybe it was a Battle Royale. But I just remember him riding back on his motorcycle looking pathetic.

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Those two couldn't get together because I think neither one wanted to put the other one over in that initial match. I thought WM18 was set up perfectly for Hogan/Austin, but it turned out that having Rock worked out great. Austin really got screwed over in that 'Mania, working with Hall who seemed to be battling too many demons. I also would have liked to see a set of matches between Flair and Austin.

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Sherman remarked, "Well, Grant, we've had the devil's own day, haven't we?" Grant looked up. "Yes," he replied, followed by a puff. "Yes. Lick 'em tomorrow, though."