I'm asking a legit question to those on here that are more tuned in than me. I have read some things saying the 'Taker is a broken down old man yet he's coming back for Cena?

Is the WWE lacking today in actual stars that they have to dig back in their past?

I miss the early '90's when the WWE/WCW were in their golden ages.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

It doesn't.

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It might be his ego?

I am not sure why he left his gloves in the ring last year if he is gonna wrestle again.

This. You have a plenty of guys that are/could be stars now but you have to drag out the old retired guy because....reasons.

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Don't get me started on this. For years they've conditioned fans to see that the guys there everyday are good and all, but the real stars show up at Mania.

They did it to pop a Mania number but then wondered why their guys weren't gettng over in June or July.

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I remember a Paul London shoot where he said Taker went to everyone in the back asking them to let him know he didn't have it anymore as a way of getting sympathy. And London wanted to say he'd lost it years ago.

I love how "An End of an Era" was now 7 years ago now and yet both Trips and Undertaker have continued to self-indulgently dominate the Wrestlemania cards regardless.

ummm what? The Early 90s?

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Because he's going to wrestle as his American Badass gimmick ... at least, that's my assumption. That way Taker is still retired but Mark gets one more match and one more payday. It's been a long damned time since there was a WM w/out him there, so even though he can't work really well, it'll be in the 'will never happen again' side of the ledger soon enough, so I'm going to try to enjoy it as much as I am able, and will presume those two can put on a story match rather than a spotfest. Hell, maybe they'll have some color ... what's the office gonna do, fire 'em?

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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

It's scripted n staged for 10 year old boys and bi curious adults..what more do ta want? WTF

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You seem mad they won't have you.

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It's sad. Although, it's starting to seem like it's more the entertainer being wanted, instead of the company needing him. Still, time for everyone to move on and be healthy.

Glad you're alive again JP!

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i had this theory awhile back..... what main-event-level stars has the WWE come up with since cena? cynically you could blame cena for this, but if you look all the guys who come back and headline big4 PPVs are all guys who got over before cena did, so this is part and parcel for there being no bigger names than john felix anthony cena in the wrestling biz since ~2005 or thereabouts.

ergo, if you wanna have a spectacle / buzzworthy match you gotta go back to b4 cena, and seeing as they ran the oldturd/goldberg angle last year (in a match where it was like watching a wrestling video game cuz nobody wanted to punch/grapple, it was like all special moves... a surprisingly long match for goldberg, who can't work. then they had the orton/bray match where the damn ring looked like a video game with the maggot graphics and whatnot on it. lol) it's like.... what else is left for the biggest spectacle of them all? getting hogan back to lace up the boots and everyone closes their eyes and squints and hopes they can see 1988 again?

so yeah, i reckon that it's a thing where out of all the previous super-over stars b4 cena undertaker's the one most associated with wrestlemania and like.... shit, who's he gonna face now?

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They had CM Punk, and fucked that up. Could of ended Taker's streak with him, but they didn't...

Don't any of you watch the show? CENA NEEDS A ROAD TO WRESTLEMANIA!!!!!

Will he come back next year as Mean Mark Callous for his 3rd retirement?

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Team him up with Dangerous Dan Spivey and now we're talking....



Holla Holla Holla

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Piss break match

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I see Cena on my TV & my bowels start to rumble.

It didn't lead to anything but imo he and Kane had a pretty decent match tonight.

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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

Yeah, that was entertaining enough...

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"Need" is not really the point. Booking is everything, and I don't think anyone is happy with how last year ended. Roman beat the Undertaker in a match that featured some botches and another viewing of old, dad-bod taker likely getting concussed. He left his gear in the ring in a gesture that felt like the end.

There's only so many goodbyes fans will tolerate, especially for a guy who wrestles once a year and clearly can't keep up. Cena and Taker can and arguably should have a good match (let alone a match), but the story being told has to be right, and I'm not sure how they're going about this so far. Essentially it's Cena being an asshole, calling an old man a coward, all in what feels like a vain, sad attempt to shoehorn two old guys into the final match of the night who otherwise had no real business being there otherwise.

It's only fair to assume that next week the Undertaker will finally show up, do a chokeslam or three, and Michael Cole will sell the thing like he's edging out a fake orgasm with a fat woman. That's still shitty booking. If this is goodbye, which it pretty much has to be (how many years we've said THAT I can't count; we're entering Funk territory), book it as such. Tell us it's the last ride. Make it matter. Build some excitement. Take a stance.

Instead what we get is this sad annual reminder that the Undertaker officially doesn't know when to say when, and considering that Vince was willing to put a stroke-impaired half-crippled Bret Hart in a WrestleMania ring to hobble sadly around in jorts for 45 minutes, I wouldn't be surprised if the Undertaker is literally wheeled out to the ring here in a few years, emaciated with age and his eyes bleary with cataracts.

They'll have a couple toughs drag him into the ring and plop him into a lame overdone throne while Heath Slater rambles on for a few minutes about how he's going to put the "20" in "23-20." The blue-ish, crinkled arm of the Dead Man will slowly shake a line across his throat while he whispers "rrhest in *hack* peeeaaccee." Cue Kid Rock.

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As long as they are bringing old guys back,Dan Severn and Ken Shamrock would be on my list.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

Maybe he can partner with Bryan since Shane has his intestines coming out of his belly button at the moment.

Alright, since you posted that ...

During the morning constitutional, I booked the last parts of WM ... Taker never responds on Raw ... not a peep.

Cena shows up to WM "in the crowd as a fan" ... DB asks him to be his tag partner from in the ring to him out in the crowd (fortunately he's in the front row at that time by pure chance of course) ... Cena gets in and the match doesn't go too long (~10-12 minutes) ... I don't know John's cardio level but I suspect he can still go ... match ends, DB & Cena go over (obviously).

During the celebration, the ring and house lights cut out, blue lights come up(but no bell toiling, just the visual), Cole and the other idiots speculating for 20 seconds, then in an instant the stage and Titantron light up, "Keep Rollin'" fires out of the sound system, and there's the American Badass on his bike at the top of the ramp. No real break between the matches (besides the few minutes' celebration), just morph the two into one long segment essentially. Needless to say the celebration and what would assuredly be a long Taker entrance will give John more than enough time to get his breath back if he needs it (though it's not like it's going to be a Guerrero/Malenko technical masterpiece).

That would be interesting and novel, imo.

Therefore they wouldn't do it .... gotta be sure to waste 4 minutes on a Cena video package throwing a fit about Undertaker)

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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

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Why are you convinced its the American Badass version? He showed up to the Raw 25th show dressed traditional.

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I enjoyed it. It was worth it just to see Cena try to do the throat slash and eye roll at the very end of the show.

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Hope more than anything else. It's not often somebody had not one but two super-over gimmicks, particularly in the same fed ... a retirement match for the Badass gimmick isn't really altogether kayfabe crazy. They could say that's why Taker wasn't responding because Taker is gone. Look, I'm trying to make what appears to be a shitshow making a headlong run at WM IX at least somewhat interesting.

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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

Just make the Undertaker go away forever. The guy hasn't worked a good match in nearly a decade.

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Also I think the general consensus at the time was that the American Badass gimmick sucked. I think it's only become romanticized in the last few years because the few highs are much more remembered than how boring it quickly became.