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Figure-4 Weekly Archive: One Year Ago... By Bryan Alvarez Starting every Wednesday, we will be posting archived editions of the Figure-Four Weekly on wrestlingobserver.com. Once you see some of the archived editions of the Figure-Four Weekly posted on the site, you will be able to have a better opinion as to the quality of work that is put into the sheet.
Ordering info for the newsletter is as follows:
Checks or money orders can be made payable to: Figure Four Weekly You can also order either the print or online editions on this website. To order HARDCOPY ONLY via credit card, you can also call 1-800-960-3366. If you have any comments, questions, or concerns, you can e-mail me at bryan@wrestlingobserver.com.
WWF stock on sale October 18th The World Wrestling Federation last week announced the filing of paperwork to the Security and Exchange Commission for an initial public offering of $172.5 million. The stock will be up for sale on the NASDAQ on October 18th under the symbol "WWFE". The stock will be underwritten by Bear, Stearns & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston, Merrill Lynch & Co. and Wit Capital Corp. The symbol "WWFE" stands for World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Inc., which replaces the now-defunct "Titan Sports" corporate name. The WWF issued a press release on August 3rd offering details of their filing. The release talked about the Hart family lawsuit and said the WWF planned on "vigorously" defending itself. It also stated that Vince McMahon earned just $250,000 as owner of the company last year and that Linda McMahon, as CEO, made only $190,000. The release claimed that Vince’s salary would be boosted to $1 million, Linda’s would be boosted to $750,000, and both would get a 100% performance bonus once the company goes public. The increased revenue from this offering will be used to expand current operations and "assist in attracting and retaining key employees, directors, consultants and performers." The World Wrestling Federation is coming off its absolute hottest year of business ever, having grossed $251 million in the fiscal year ending April 30th with $56 million of that being profit. The previous year the WWF grossed $126 million and profited just $8.5 million. There were a couple of years in the 1980s that the WWF grossed more money, but in terms of pure profit they made more in the last fiscal year than in all their previous years of operation put together. The McMahons will retain full control of the class B stock while putting an unspecified amount of class A stock on the market. Since class B stock offers ten votes for every one vote of class A stock, the McMahons will retain full voting control of the company. The filing also states that if any class B stock is attained by someone outside the immediate McMahon family, it automatically converts to class A stock. The way this is structured, the McMahons retain 80% ownership interest and 97.5% voting interest. But all is not completely happy in Vince McMahonland. The filing also disclosed the puzzling news that Vince took $32.2 million out of the company in order to pay off some accumulated back taxes, and also gave himself a $25 million performance bonus since the WWF did so well last year. So if Vince took out $32.2 million to pay taxes, and gave himself a $25 million bonus, that adds up to $57.2 million. The WWF only made $56 million in profits last year. So, all that profit is gone. In other words, the WWF needed to make some money, fast. Thus, they’re going public. The filing also details the many risk factors involved in buying WWF stock, including the possibility that the World Wildlife Fund, which owns the rights to the acronym "WWF", could request the World Wrestling Federation no longer use it. This, according to the filing, would have a "negative impact" on business. The WWF also claims that their current insurance plan may not be adequate, likely in reference to the Owen Hart lawsuit. Also of interest is the WWF’s claim that pending lawsuits could "threaten" the future of the WWF. Those lawsuits include the Hart filing; a suit filed by Bill Eadie and Randy Colley, formerly of Demolition; a $15 million suit filed by Jim Hellwig over ownership of the Ultimate Warrior gimmick; the trademark infringement suit against WCW in regards to the Outsiders from several years ago; and a "minor suit" against High Road Productions regarding an alleged contract breech. The prospectus, which appeared to be over a million pages long, revealed some other interesting facts. Dave Meltzer pointed these facts out to me, since despite having even less spare time than myself he actually read most of this thing. Apparently, whenever the WWF claimed to have pulled in "between 800,000 and 950,000 buys" for a pay-per-view, the real number was always closer to 800,000 and was usually inflated between 10% and 15%. Also, the prospectus mentions the upcoming sale of the Debbie Reynolds Hotel, but makes no mention of buying another hotel "in a better location". If you’ll remember, the WWF claimed they were putting the Debbie Reynolds Hotel back up on the market because it was in a bad location and they wanted to find another hotel in a better part of town. Apparently, the real story is that they have decided against opening a hotel at this time in Vegas, and didn’t want to admit they made a stupid purchasing decision. Also, the WWF has signed a deal to pay $25 million for the WrestleMania Cafe in Times Square, but have not paid any of the money yet. Since they don’t have $25 million to spend right now, they are hoping for a big influx of cash from the stock sale to pay off some of these bills. In other interesting news, Vince McMahon apparently will be off TV for a long time. About a month ago, the WWF announced some stipulations for the Steve Austin vs. Undertaker WWF Title Match at Fully Loaded. If Undertaker won, Austin would never, ever get another title shot again. If Austin won, Vince would leave WWF TV forever. Pretty much everyone assumed that the chances of Vince leaving TV for more than a week were pretty slim, and found it strange why the WWF was trying so hard to convince people that these stipulations were real. Apparently there was a very good reason they booked this angle and a very good reason why we won’t see Vince on TV for at least the next several months. SEC rules state that neither the owner of a company nor anyone on its Board of Directors can make any public statements about the company for 25 days after filing and 25 days after the company actually goes public. In addition, the company is not allowed to release any business information whatsoever, including attendance figures, buyrate numbers, ratings, etc., during that period. Of course, there are numerous other outlets where a publication such as this can obtain that information, but the fact is that neither Vince nor Linda McMahon can make any public statements until at least mid-November of this year. Both Shane and Stephanie McMahon, however, are simply employees with various duties in the company and not on the Board of Directors, so they can remain on television and shoot angles during this quiet period. In regards to whether or not this is a good investment decision, it is generally believed that the WWF stock will sell for a vastly inflated price and probably jump quickly due to the novelty aspect of fans being able to own a piece of the Rock and Steve Austin. However, history has shown that novelty stocks such as this usually cool off within a few months and fall back to what would be considered normal levels for a business of that type. I am no Warren Buffet, and this is not the Kiplinger Washington Letter, but if you were to ask me I’d tell you to buy a bunch when it first goes on sale and sell it after a few months. The long-term problem is that Vince seems set on expanding into
different business ventures such as record labels and casinos
and other such nonsense. Vince tried to promote rock concerts
once. He failed. He tried to sell bodybuilding supplements once.
He failed. He tried to destroy Joe Weider and the Mr. Olympia
once. He failed. He failed at almost every single one of his outside
ventures. Even if I were to give Vince the benefit of the doubt
and say he might have learned from his past mistakes and could
go on to be a very successful businessman outside wrestling, the
fact is that I still would not count on the long-term future of
"World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Inc." until I had seen
at least a few non-wrestling success stories. Internet Quote of the Week "Is Undertaker losing weight? Oh, I forgot, he’s hanging around
fat people to improve his appearance." Special Thanks I would like to thank the following individuals for their help
in putting Figure Four Weekly together: Gladys Gibson, Carlos
and Valerie Alvarez, Craig Proper, Brent Kremen, Mike Rodgers,
Natina Schulz, Koji Yamamoto, Peter Stein, Mike Lorefice, Carlos
Loera, John Courville, Brian Schenk, Dave Meltzer, Bruce Mitchell,
Mike Mooneyham, Bob Barnett, Georgiann Makropolous, Rick Scaia,
Vincent Verhei, David McCutcheon, and the astute reader who pointed
out that "the Big Show is no longer the Giant". WWF News and Notes • I think it is safe to say that it took the WWF a total of one day to make Chris Jericho into a genuine superstar. • Although it was among the best Monday Night Wars ever, Raw still whupped Nitro again this week. Raw scored a 6.35 rating off hourly numbers of 6.2 and 6.5. Nitro scored a 3.0 off hourly numbers of 3.7 and 2.5 and 2.9. Head-to-head Raw won 6.35 to 2.7. Raw peaked at a 6.9 for both the Ventura interview and the Chyna vs. Helmsely vs. Undertaker overrun. The lowest Raw quarter was a 5.2 for the angle at the beginning of the show with Rock, Undertaker and Giant. WCW peaked at a 4.4 for the overrun period, although for the regular three-hour block, the highest number was a 3.5 for the Benoit title win over David Flair, which beat both the Savage/Rodman interview segment and the Goldberg & Hogan & Sting vs. Nash & Sid & Rick Steiner main event. • As is usually the case this time of year, Raw will be pre-empted on August 30th and September 6th. However, unlike in years past, the show will not air the following Saturday but rather that same evening at 11:00 PM. So Nitro will go unopposed at 8:00 PM and Raw will air as soon as they go off the air. I know this sounds incredible, but I would not be surprised in the slightest if Raw still kicked their ass despite airing so late at night. History and the demographic ratings have shown that the little children will stay up as late as they need to in order to catch the whole show. If that’s the case, it’s really time for WCW to throw in the towel. We’ll see if WCW packs Nitro or if they just go on stand-by and figure fans will tune in because there’s nothing else to watch. The word is that they will pack the show, but who knows what that means. • The WWF website has an ad banner up for Universal Soldier II, which features a very prominent photo of Goldberg. • Jerry Lawler spoke before a Frayser Exchange Club meeting in Memphis last Tuesday and talked about some of his ideas should he be elected Mayor of Memphis. One of his ideas was to bring WWF superstars to Memphis City Schools so that the kids would have an incentive to show up there and not play hooky or drop out. "If I’m elected mayor," Lawler began, due to governmental regulations that all mayoral candidates must begin speeches this way, "[the WWF] has agreed to help adopt the Memphis City Schools and use their wrestling superstars to come to Memphis to work with the kids of the city schools, to do anything from videos to actual live events, to make themselves accessible and to make it exciting for the kids to go to Memphis City Schools. We want to make it to where the kids in the county are looking at their parents and saying, ‘I wish I went to Frayser school. Stone Cold Steve Austin is going to be there speaking to the kids tomorrow.’ You can chuckle about that if you want to, but we’ve got to get a message across to these kids that school is the place to be. Because if we don’t educate our kids here in Memphis our future is hopeless." Many teachers, including Bruce Mitchell on the Observer Hotline, took offense to this comment since it indicates that teachers are boring and lame and that the only way kids will stay excited about learning is to have famous celebrities, some of which portray porn stars or pimps, come to the schools and make it fun. The other idea which drew some fire was the one in which Lawler suggested he had a solution to the problem of gangs. "Lawler also noted that gangs are an increasing problem in Memphis," the Memphis Commercial Appeal proclaimed. "He proposed letting the gangs fight it out in the ring rather than in the streets." The newspaper had quotes from Lawler about how he felt he could channel some of the gang violence into sometime more productive. "They could still have a gang and still have a fight with a gang from another neighborhood, but we’ll do it in a ring, and we’ll give the winner a trophy instead of a tombstone," Lawler said. The article concluded with a statement by former state representative Elbert Gill, described by the newspaper as "the dean of legislature", who was so inspired by these ideas that he said he would probably vote for Lawler in the election, which takes place October 7th. Lawler’s campaign was also endorsed by Memphis Online Magazine last week. They claim the other candidates have resorted to mudslinging whereas Lawler has talked only about the issues; that Lawler supports the Wheel Tax (used to pay for air conditioning at area schools) by asking for the air conditioning at City Hall to be shut off until all school are air conditioned; that Lawler is most qualified because he is the only man CNBC has asked to do an interview; that "he is a good manager"; and several other issues where they supported Lawler because they thought everyone else currently in charge was stupid and doing a poor job. • There is talk that WWF performers could be invited into the Screen Actors Guild soon, which would place Raw, Smackdown, Heat, Shotgun, and all the other WWF Television programs under SAG jurisdiction. If such a move were to happen, the working conditions backstage at television tapings would become more stringently controlled and everyone in the company would automatically receive health insurance through the organization. One would think that the annual dues, which are around $1500, would be paid for by the WWF, but I’m told that may not necessarily be the case. The only problem is that once an individual is a member of SAG, they are not allowed to ever work in a non-union situation. Since WCW is not under SAG jurisdiction, if someone in the WWF became a member and then went to work for WCW, they’d be kicked out of SAG and never allowed back in. If they ever tried to go back to work for WWF, they would be denied the right since companies under SAG jurisdiction are not allowed to use non-union members. So this could end up being a pretty major story down the road. • Chris Jericho talked about his jump to the WWF in his latest website message. "Well I just returned from my first visit of Titan Towers in Stamford CN, aka headquarters of the WWF," Jericho wrote. "After one day, I am very excited about my upcoming tenure and I’ll tell ya exactly why. Organization. That’s it. That simple, that easy. From my photo shoot, to my dealings with the production crew, wrestling school staff, travel department, merchandising, to my meeting with JR and Mr. McMahon himself, the organization was incredible. Now I can see why WWF, my company, is destroying WCW in so many ways. These people were on the ball, professional to the T and most importantly knew what had to be done, when and how to do it and how much time it would take to get the optimum results." He said that no matter what Sid said, he was definitely NOT the Millennium Man. He talked about the Brian Hildebrand Tribute show and called it a great success. Jericho also wrote: "Is anybody else sick of seeing DDP plastered all over the television (Hollywood Squares, First Daughter, Craig ‘I like making fun of unfortunate deaths’ Kilborne)? Why doesn’t WCW spread the public relations wealth around a little bit?" This comment actually got Page’s dander up and he called Jericho to question why he wrote that. Jericho responded that he was in a bad mood when he wrote that because he’d heard some of the comments Page made about him on WCW Live a few weeks back. Apparently, they got everything ironed out during the phone call and Jericho removed the comments about DDP from his website the following day. • SuperAstros is dead. Well, it’s on life support, but the plug will be pulled next month. There are various reasons for this decision, not the least of which is that they were losing money on the show every week because Univision was only giving them approximately $17,000 for each show, which didn’t come close to paying expenses. Basically, the WWF asked for more money from the station, and Univision said "no", so the WWF responded with a vigorous "SUCK IT!" They taped the final shows at the Raw and Heat tapings this past week and after that, it’s all over. • Jim Ross had a lot of interesting things to say as usual in his Ross Report on WWF.com this week. He hyped up the August 9th Raw show like crazy. He said the WWF had plans of launching its own record label shortly and that Road Dogg would be part of an "exciting new project". Apparently, he will be putting together a CD which they will market towards younger kids. Ross talked about the verbal agreement with the Dudleys and said that contracts were expected to be signed within the next ten days. Ross said they would probably start after SummerSlam. Ross said A&E’s Biography would be doing a show on both Steve Austin and Mick Foley. "October’s edition of Talk magazine will feature a story on the McMahon family," Ross wrote. "I was interviewed for the piece and I feel the author will do a super job as he was well prepared and seemed to understand the business better than most." In other words, it may be a puff piece. Ross said several WWF superstars may appear on upcoming episodes of "Star Trek: Voyager". He said that the producers had already come up with a "solid concept" for a character played by Big Bossman. I know there’s a "Civil War Bandit" joke here somewhere, but I don’t watch enough Star Trek to think of one. Ross said Stevie Richards had signed. He said Mark Henry has lost 15 of the "60 pounds he’s been asked to lose". He said Billy Gunn’s contract doesn’t expire until 2001. He said: "No new Doinks". That should be one of Lawler’s campaign slogans. He said the WWF was looking to sign several new women soon. Ross finished the column praising Test and saying he had tons of potential. • I incorrectly reported last week that Steve Austin injured his knee after Chyna gave him a low blow and he fell of the top rope after the main event of the Tuesday Raw tapings. That was the cover they used since the real incident took place after they turned the cameras off. He actually tried to put Helmsely through a table, but the table didn’t break and he zoinked his shin like crazy and was bleeding all over. The injury is said to be fairly severe, which is why he didn’t do much at Raw, and he’s still expected out until SummerSlam. • Although it hasn’t been explicitly stated, expect Ken Shamrock to be somewhat of a job boy until his contract expires in February of 2000. This past weekend on the road he did two jobs to Steve Blackman, one via knockout and one via submission. This is the same Ken Shamrock who they appeared to be protecting for months, since they wouldn’t even allow Jeff Jarrett to pin him in Intercontinental Title defenses at house shows. You’ll note that these frequent jobs by Shamrock came shortly after his decision to leave the WWF for a year and pursue another UFC career. The word is that he’ll be allowed to participate in the December 1999 UFC despite still being under WWF contract if such an event were to be put together. • Speaking of punishment, Vince Russo has an unintentionally humorous column in RAW Magazine this month where he claims that the wrestlers are the WWF’s babies and that they would never punish them for anything they did. I urge all readers to purchase this magazine because the famed columns by Russo will soon be a thing of the past. Because of his increased workload with Smackdown debuting later this month, Russo will be leaving the magazine and replaced by New York Daily Sports Editor Barry Werner. Truly the end of an era. • Shawn Michaels has been hired as a local sports reporter for KENS-TV in San Antonio starting Monday, August 16th. He will be logging reports three days per week. • Jericho was on WrestleTalk Radio on August 7th for an interview. He didn’t say much that we haven’t talked about here in the last several week. He did say that the WWF was different in how they used celebrities, noting that in the WWF Jarrett got the best of Ben Stiller, whereas in WCW the celebrities always ended up looking better than the wrestlers. It’s an interesting point, although the funny thing was that the very next day the WWF aired footage of Lawrence Taylor pinning Bam Bam Bigelow in the main event of WrestleMania XI, and that was the most extreme case ever of a celebrity getting the better of a wrestler. Jericho, who is very open about his Christian beliefs, was asked how he felt about some of the WWF characters like the Undertaker and Godfather. Jericho said there were definitely some things he would not be a part of in the WWF. He finished promising a big surprise on Raw. • Al Snow’s dog, Pepper, is now a regular on WWF television and will replace Head. Rumors that Pepper was a childhood friend of Shane McMahon appear to be false. So are the rumors that he is actually Pete Gas’ dog. • WWF The Music: Volume IV will hit stores in January 2000. • The ratings were down a bit last week due to — and this is
true — a golf show on ABC. Raw scored a 5.85 rating off hourly
numbers of 5.8 and 5.9. Nitro scored a 3.1 rating off hourly numbers
of 3.6 and 2.4 and 3.2. The 2.4 for Nitro’s second hour was the
lowest hourly number in God knows how long. Shane Douglas also
proved his worth to the company by helping to draw a 1.98 rating
for this tag match teaming with Dean Malenko vs. Hugh Morris &
Jerry Flynn. The 1.98 is the lowest quarter ever, beating even
the Megadeath concert. The highest number for Nitro was a 4.0
for the overrun featuring Sting & Goldberg vs. Sid & Rick
Steiner with Hogan and Nash doing their run-in. For Raw, Jeff
Jarrett vs. D-Lo Brown for both belts drew a 6.7, which was the
highest rated quarter of the evening and even beat the overrun
segment, which featured Steve Austin, Rock, Undertaker, Big Slow,
Bob Holly, Kane, Road Dogg, Billy Gunn and the Acolytes. The lowest-rated
quarter for Raw was a 4.9 for Acolytes vs. Bob Holly. To recap,
the lowest-rated quarter of Raw beat the highest-rated quarter
of Nitro by almost a full point. Also, that means Bob Holly, Faarooq
and Bradshaw drew almost a million more viewers than Sting, Rick
Steiner, Sid, Hogan, Nash and Goldberg. WWF On Television Sunday Night Heat (August 8): Heat opened with Val Venis coming down to the ring for his match with D-Lo Brown. Before the match began, Jeff Jarrett came out with Debra to assist on commentary. Jarrett spent about 95% of his commentary time subtly dropping hints of an impending break-up between himself and Debra by repeatedly blaming her for his IC Title loss to D-Lo on Raw. Jarrett finally ran in and attacked Val for the DQ. D-Lo and Val both beat the crap out of Jarrett after the match. Jarrett needs to be nice to Debra, because the word is that when they break up, he’s going to be phased down... Al Snow came out with Pepper, who the commentators claimed was a dog, but I think is actually a shaved cat or small possum. Regardless, Pepper looked like he was going to have a heart attack at any time. Some of you may think I’m joking, but animals can really have heart attacks. Cats can for sure. I’m not so sure about dogs. Or possums. Anyway, Al challenged Bossman to a Hardcore Title match at SummerSlam. Bossman came out, accepted the challenge, and then threatened to actually eat Pepper like a corndog (really). Something is wrong with Bossman... Tori d. Lexi Fife. Where’s Bobby Heenan to make a Barney Fife joke? Match was horrible, but thankfully short. Ivory came out after this bout, beat up Tori and then, for the amusement of all the families watching at home, painted "SLUT" on her stomach and "SKANK" on her back... The Rescue of the Week segment was devoted to Kane roaring like a distraught grizzly bear after X-Pac got hurt last week... Acolytes came out to face Road Dogg & Kane. Kane didn’t show up so the Acolytes killed Dogg. Finally, Kane ran down, complete with the dimming of the house lights and the pyrotechnic explosion. I wonder if, when Kane comes home from work, the lights in his house dim and pyrotechnics go off in his living room. He beat up the Acolytes for awhile but they finally overpowered him. Bob Holly then walked out and stood on the apron as Kane’s partner. Once he got the tag he started beating up Kane. No DQ. Holly then attacked the Acolytes. No DQ. They cut to backstage where Giant and Undertaker were watching this match on a monitor. Giant wanted to run in, but Undertaker held him back. Suddenly, they cut to another clip of Rock walking around in a cross manner backstage. Then they cut to commercial. This Sports Entertainment bullshit can kiss my ass. I hope the WWF loses $50 million next year just because they didn’t give at least a half-assed finish for this particular match. I hate this crap... After a break, Terri was shown backstage putting a little blue pill in Meat’s drink. She told him he had a match soon, to which he replied: "You’ve got to be kidding me!" I love how Meat is always so surprised that he is going to have to wrestle. They fly him from his home to a far-off city, he is put up in a hotel room, he rents a car and drives to an arena, he puts on his wrestling boots and his gay tights, and then he acts perplexed when he’s told he has to actually wrestle... Godfather NC Prince Albert when Droz, the "White Guy" (Vic Grimes), Chaz and Val Venis all ran in... Backstage, Al Snow destroyed Blue Meanie for making fun of Pepper... Meat came down to the ring. They had his shorts stuffed so he looked like he had an erect penis. You see, Terri spiked his drink with a Viagra pill. I swear to God I’m not making any of this up. So add "erect penis" to the list of things the WWF somehow managed to get away with on a free TV show airing at 8:00 PM. I think this may have been the single stupidest thing I have ever seen on any pro-wrestling telecast in my whole life. What fantastic family fun. Bossman won... Rock came down to do commentary on the main event. Mr. Ass came out for his match with Undertaker, thankfully sporting a new pair of tights that aren’t see-through. Undertaker came down with Big Slow and Paul Bearer. It astounds me that Paul Bearer is literally almost as wide as Giant. Rock was hilarious on commentary. Match was OK. When the old, beaten-up, crippled Undertaker works circles around you, it’s time to call it a career. Rock finally went to attack Billy, but for some reason Giant made the save. Rock hit Bearer and then turned around into a CLOTHESLINE FROM HIZZELL from Big Slow. I mean, he killed him. Undertaker tombstoned Billy for the pin. After the match, Giant destroyed Rock with a chokeslam and two stout elbows. It took them a few months, but the WWF finally put together another TV show that made me embarrassed to be a wrestling fan. Raw is War (August 2): Raw opened with the Millennium
Clock at 1:25:10, which meant it would strike zero at about 10:25
PM... Rock came out to cut a promo. Big Slow was shown backstage
watching on a monitor. He got all giddy and acted like he was
going to head down to the ring, but Undertaker told him to wait
and see what Rock had to say. Rock said he hated Wight and made
fun of him. He sang Wight’s entrance music and called him — get
ready — "Big Slow". Undertaker and Wight ran down to the ring
and killed Rock. X-Pac and Road Dogg both tried to make the save
but they got punked too. Kane finally made the save and cleared
the ring of the bad guys. Good angle to open the show... Backstage,
a limo arrived and Shawn Michaels got out... X-Pac cut a heavily
censored promo backstage challenging the Acolytes to a Tag Title
match later in the show... Gangrel d. Christian after blowing
mist into his face behind the referee’s back. The Hardyz ran out
and attacked Christian afterwards. Edge tried to make the save
but they laid waste to him too. Michael Hayes then jumped into
the ring and yelled at the Hardy Boyz. So the Hardyz turned on
him to a huge pop. Matt and Jeff left with Gangrel after destroyed
everyone in the ring. The heels were kicking ass this evening...
Backstage, Faarooq & Bradshaw accepted X-Pac’s challenge...
Jerry Lawler interviewed Jesse Ventura. Ventura got a loud standing
ovation from the rubes in attendance. Jesse spent a long time
hyping himself up, and I have to say he talked circles around
90% of the guys active in this business. Suddenly, HHH came out
with Chyna to interrupt. Ventura told Helmsely that the best "wrestler"
was going to win at SummerSlam. I wonder what Vince thought about
Ventura using the words "wrestle" and "wrestler" so much. Jim
Cornette was actually taken off Shotgun Saturday Night for using
that term too liberally. Helmsely said the WWF was his world and
threatened to kick Jesse’s ass. Suddenly, Shawn Michaels came
out. He told Hunter that the WWF may be his world, but he (Michaels)
was the one who brought him into it. Hunter shoved Shawn and they
almost got into a brawl, but Jesse held them apart. Shawn then
signed Hunter vs. Austin vs. Undertaker in a Triple Threat Match
for the main event. Michaels gave Hunter a crotch chop afterwards
to a mondo pop. This was a great segment... They showed clips
of D-Lo jogging with Mark Henry in the park. Suddenly, Jeff Jarrett
drove by, jumped out of his truck, and threw D-Lo into a tree.
What a goofy segment... Val Venis pinned Jeff Jarrett with a screwdriver.
Jarrett yelled at Debra after the match and Venis ended up attacking
him. Debra and Venis left together... Austin was shown dead at
the bottom of a stairwell. They said he’d been hit in the head
with a cinder block. They loaded him into an ambulance and took
him away. Michael Cole theorized that Austin had been attacked...
Michaels came down to the ring and called out Helmsely. Hunter
came out and said he didn’t know what happened to Austin. Shawn
didn’t believe it and changed the main event to a falls-count-anywhere,
no-DQ, no-countout, number-one contender’s match with Hunter vs.
Undertaker vs. Chyna with Michaels as guest referee. Hunter said,
with all due respect, that Chyna was "just a girl". She got pissed
and said she’d wrestle the match. Big pop for that... X-Pac &
Kane d. Acolytes to win the WWF Tag Team Titles. Crowd went bucksnort
for the title change. Road Dogg ran down to celebrate with the
good guys afterwards. X-Pac demanded that Kane say "Suck it!"
without his device, and he did. Undertaker and Big Slow realized
how ridiculous it was for someone who relied on a device to speak
suddenly being spontaneously healed, so they ran down and killed
the good guys... Test & Ken Shamrock d. Steve Blackman &
Joey Abs when Test pinned Abs. The Mean Street Posse still has
the coolest music in all of wrestling. Test "broke Joey’s ankle"
with a chair after the match. Shane, who did commentary, threatened
to make Test pay... Backstage, Test cut a promo. He said "Phat
Ass Pete Gas" again. He threatened to beat up Shane... Steve Blackman
cut a promo and challenged Shamrock to a Lion’s Den Weapons match.
Steve Blackman needs to remain the silent assassin... Rock came
out and challenged Big Slow. Suddenly the Millennium clock appeared
on the big screen and counted down to 0:00:00. When it hit, the
lights went out and Chris Jericho appeared on the ramp to a huge
superstar pop. "Welcome to Raw is Jericho!" he screamed. He cut
a long promo desperately trying to turn himself heel, but was
still cheered by a big portion of the crowd. After about three
minutes, the crowd started to turn on him and finally chant "Rocky!"
Rock said that was the most boring three minutes of his life,
called Jericho a little jabronie and ran him down for awhile.
This was a fantastic segment and Jericho has been thrust right
into the main events... Backstage, Bob Holly went looking for
Big Slow... Jim Ross said Bossman vs. Road Dogg was a non-title
match. So Road Dogg won. Al Snow hit Bossman with an animal carrying
case, which they claimed contained Pepper, for the pinfall. Maybe
they can bring back John Tenta and he can do an Earthquake Splash
on Pepper... Rock d. Giant--DQ when Chris Jericho ran in. Rock
went after him but Billy Gunn made the save and destroyed Rock...
Ventura came out to do commentary for the main event. Chyna ended
up winning the Triple Threat match after Austin returned, KO’d
Helmsely with a chair and put Chyna on top for the pin. No word
on how Austin, who was in a hospital this whole time, figured
out that Chyna had been put in the match and wasn’t just at ringside
as Hunter’s valet like usual. Pretty piss-poor main event to an
otherwise awesome show. WWF On Tour Doswell, VA (August 5): Steve Blackman d. Al Snow, Test d. Midian, Bob Holly d. Gangrel, D-Lo Brown d. Jeff Jarrett to retain both the IC and European Titles. Debra no-showed to hang out with the injured Steve Austin at his house. I’ll bet they were playing checkers or something. Mankind d. Big Bossman, Godfather & Val Venis d. Droz & Prince Albert, Ivory d. Tori to retain the Women’s Title, Acolytes d. Edge & Christian and Hardy Boyz to retain the Tag Team Titles, Kane d. Big Slow--DQ in the main event. Washington, DC (August 6): Val Venis & Godfather d. Prince Albert & Droz, Midian d. Chaz, Acolytes d. Edge & Christian and the Hardy Boyz in a three-way to retain the Tag Titles, Steve Blackman d. Ken Shamrock via knockout (harsh!), Al Snow & Tori d. Bob Holly & Ivory, Road Dogg d. Mr. Ass in the dog collar match, D-Lo Brown d. Jeff Jarrett. No Debra again. Bossman d. Test in the nightstick on a pole match, Kane & Rock & X-Pac d. Undertaker & Big Slow & HHH in the main event. Pittsburgh, PA (August 7): Godfather & Val Venis d.
Prince Albert & Droz, Midian d. Chaz, Acolytes d. Edge &
Christian and the Hardy Boyz in a three-way to retain the Tag
Titles, Steve Blackman d. Ken Shamrock via submission (ouch!),
Road Dogg d. Billy Gunn in the dog collar match, Al Snow &
Tori d. Bob Holly & Ivory, Bossman d. Test in the nightstick
on a pole match, Rock & X-Pac & Kane d. Big Slow &
Undertaker & HHH in the main event. They return November 15th
for a live Raw. WCW News and Notes • It seems certain at this point that Kanyon & Bam Bam Bigelow will lose the Tag Titles to Harlem Heat at the pay-per-view. Kanyon has been pulled from house shows in order to work as a stunt coordinator for the WCW movie starring David Arquette which begins filming in a few months. He missed the Thunder show this past Thursday and Page said he was busy moving into a million dollar house in New Jersey or something, which was obviously a rib because there’s no such thing as a million dollar house in New Jersey. Page also looks to be entering into a prolonged feud with Chris Benoit over the US Title. Since Kanyon won’t be available all the time, and since Page will be off doing his own thing, it stands to reason they’ll give the belts to Heat so they can defend them on house show tours. • Ric Flair requested to be taken off TV for the summer last week, and then no-showed Nitro after being told he was going to have to put over Shane Douglas. Flair claimed he didn’t have medical clearance to wrestle and said he was suffering from arthritis in his back due to his airplane accident 24 years ago. This may be the smartest thing Flair has done in years. • The TV Guide covers featuring Kevin Nash, Randy Savage, The Nitro Girls and Sting are out this week. I’m afraid No Hulk Hogan plus No Goldberg equals No Sales, but we’ll have to see. • Bret Hart is expected back on the August 16th Nitro. His column in the Calgary Sun this week talked about football. I hate football, so I didn’t read it. • The Hummer Driver will not be revealed until the Road Wild pay-per-view. The angle is that the driver is actually George’s bodyguard, to ensure that she won’t be raped weekly in the future. • A Road Wild match between Arliss and Jason Hervey was seriously talked about before someone with half a brain decided that this would be a really stupid idea. • David Flair’s new bodyguard is expected to be THE MONSTER MENG. • Dallas Page appeared on the Craig Kilborne show last week. They showed clips from Nitro and then he was introduced to some hip-hop rap music. He said he was happy. He plugged Road Wild and revealed he would be facing Chris Benoit on that show. He said he was going to ride his motorcycle to Sturgis. I hope he enjoys it because the word is this may be the last show in Sturgis. Page talked about Kimberly and then plugged the "First Daughter" TBS movie which he’s got a role in (he’s a "bad guy"). The movie airs August 15th. They showed clips of the movie to close out the segment. This was not mentioned on the show, but the premiere for the movie was August 2nd and was attended by a lot of major Hollywood names. The consensus was that, among made-for-TV movies, this one was pretty good. Jason Hervey got Page the role, and it’s only the third original movie TBS has produced. USA Today also did an article on Page and the movie last week. • Page was also on Hollywood Squares all last week, the highlight of which was undoubtedly when he headbutted a camera and busted up his own nose (really). • Here are the predictions I made about Nitro on the Sunday edition of the Wrestling Observer Hotline. Those of you who follow the days of the week will note that Sunday is THE DAY BEFORE MONDAY, which means these predictions were made a full 24 hours before Nitro aired. You can check them now for accuracy, and I swear I did not change these after Nitro aired: 1. Hogan will cut a promo and say "brother!" 2. Randy Savage and Sid will each cut a rambling, incoherent promo. 3. The Nitro Girls will dance. 4. Chad Brock will appear and force millions of viewers to switch to Raw. 5. Lenny Lane and Lodi will act gay. 6. The Shat will kick someone. 7. The Triad will tell some mama jokes. 8. The old guys will wrestle a bad main event with no finish. If my uncanny psychic abilities are not enough to get you to call my Sunday Hotline update, nothing will. • Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope of Insane Clown Posse apparently own their own ring which they keep stored in a warehouse in Michigan. They used to put on backyard wrestling shows before they "made it big" in the independents. • The Nitro Girls pay-per-view aired last week and was pretty well received by fans. I didn’t see it but Craig recorded it for me so I’ll probably have seen it by the time most of you read this. It ran an hour and a half. There was a lot of skin, colorful swimsuits and "suggestive poses". The girls played around and chatted about the shoot. They posed in exotic locations. A short vignette aired on each of them. They were shown rollerblading, running and jet-skiing. They were not shown jumping on trampolines, however. At one point, Chae got an oil rub and seaweed wrap wearing nothing but a thong bikini. Chae also said she would "go for it" with anyone, male or female, if their body was right. She then started playing around with another one of the Nitro Girls. They played Truth or Dare and revealed their favorite wrestlers. Tygress chose Kevin Nash, Storm chose Booker T, Fyre chose Buff, Spice chose all the Cruiserweights (oh!), Chae chose Goldberg and Kimberly — NOTE! If you are Dallas Page please skip this next sentence — chose Hulk Hogan. Oddly, none of the girls chose Insane Clown Posse. There wasn’t any real nudity, although there were a few shots of the girls in wet T-shirts. Craig Proper viewed the program live and logged this report: "I’ve never wanted to be an undergarment so bad in my whole life." • Hak will be out of at least a few more weeks. • Thunder drew a 2.6 for last week’s episode, which is about what it’s been doing lately. It appears that, rather than try to make the show stiff competition for Smackdown, WCW has decided to pretty much just give up on the show altogether. • Fit Finley complained of having no feeling below his knee following leg surgery, so it’s likely he’ll have to go back under the knife. Our continued best wishes to him. • Konnan was on WCW Live last week. He said he needed to just shut up and be a good boy to avoid trouble. He was probably speaking specifically about the time he ran down WCW in a USA Today interview and got his ass chewed out behind the scenes and jobbed miserably for weeks afterwards. Konnan said his big mouth and quick temper got him jailed in Mexico a few times. He did not mention that his big mouth and quick temper got him jailed in the United States about two weeks ago, but that’s because he’s denying the spousal abuse incident ever occurred. Maybe it was a different humongous, bald man named Charles Ashenoff who happened to be on a flight with a bunch of other WCW wrestlers and employees. Anyway, he also said the Filthy Animals group, which would consist of himself, Kidman, Rey Jr. and Disco would be forming in the near future. He said management originally nixed this idea, but Kevin Nash recently decided it would be cool and is going to allow them to go through with it. Unfortunately for Konnan, Nash’s reign as booker looks to be coming to a swift and just end within the next few weeks, which may mean the Filthy Animals may have to be put on hold yet again. • Rena Mero told the folks at Off the Record that Marc Mero has retired from wrestling, which means there is little chance of him returning to WCW. Marc and Bischoff did not leave on the best of terms originally, and Bischoff told people at that time that he would never be invited back into the company. So it may have been a case of Marc really having nowhere else to go that would offer a salary competitive to the one he received in the WWF. Also, his wife is making the big bucks now. • Madusa vs. Mona has been taken off the Road Wild show since Madusa was hospitalized last week (no real details here). • Lex Luger will be back on television in a few weeks, but likely won’t be wrestling for another two months or so. • They are probably going to retire the Hardcore Trophy. Thank
God. It was like the Hope Diamond, cursed. WCW On Television Thursday Thunder (August 5th): Mike Tenay opened the show saying fans were just nine days away from the Road Wild pay-per-view in Sturgis. He did not mention that fans were ten days away from getting the results from the Observer Hotline since nobody in their right mind would actually buy the show at this point... Prince Iaukea NC Chris Adams when Sid ran in and destroyed both of them. Rarely have I been so happy to see Sid. The crowd initially went hoss for Sid, then began chanting Goldberg to no avail. Sid cut a promo, the highlight of which was when it took him two attempts to successfully spit the gum out of his mouth... Buff Bagwell beat Scott Riggs. Even though these two tagged together for a long time, this was definitely not Shawn Michaels vs. Marty Jannetty. Maybe Marty Jannetty vs. Marty Jannetty. Riggs has a dope dropkick though... They aired a Harlem Heat video package hyping up the match with Kanyon & Bigelow at the pay-per-view... They showed clips of Page on the Craig Kilborne show. It’s a good thing I saw this when it originally aired, because the clips they showed on Thunder had bad audio problems... Kidman went to a no-contest with Eddy Guerrero when Vampiro ran in. Rey Misterio Jr. made the save and the three of them destroyed Vamp to a huge pop. This whole segment actually drew an amazing amount of heat. The funniest part was during the match, when the referee was giving a standing ten count, the audience started counting too, only they were counting a lot faster and the referee ended up speeding up his count to accommodate the fans... Brad Armstrong & Swoll beat Lodi & Lenny Lane. They are doing a very good job protecting Swoll and pairing him up with someone who can actually work, although Armstrong has some really perplexing facial expressions at times. Lodi and Lenny are hilarious in their role... Booker T d. Bam Bam Bigelow when Page ran in. This was a good match while it lasted. David Flair inexplicably ran in and joined in on the beating. Stevie Ray tried to make the save but they kicked his ass too. The bad guys spraypainted what was described as a "Triad symbol" on the good guy’s backs. Maybe the WWF can drop a Triad Symbol from the ceiling on Raw next week... Gene interviewed Randy Savage and George. Actually, George was not present again. Gene expressed concern about this for the third time in a row. "WE WANT GEORGE!" the crowd screamed. Savage was over like a mofo and the fans booed whenever Rodman’s name was brought up. Savage promised a Miss Madness 2000 contest on Nitro as well as the revelation of who drove the Humvee. And it’s not Jerry Flynn and Juvie... Page and Bigelow came out and made fun of Benoit’s mama. Benoit ran out and beat them up. Page ended up getting the pinfall after Benoit did a diving headbutt onto the US Title (David Flair had distracted the referee and thrown his belt into the ring)... Goldberg d. Rocco Roc in the main event. Actually, he pretty much killed both of Public Enemy by putting them through a table. Then he jackhammered Rocco for the pinfall. Goldberg was bigger and scarier than ever. The show ended with the World’s Biggest Mark holding up a "Taz Could Kill You!" sign. God, was that ever funny. Monday Nitro (August 2): Tony Schiavone is back. Damn
it... Tony opened the show with the revelation that Sting had
given control of WCW back to the company. He said JJ Dillon was
named head of the Executive Committee and Dusty Rhodes was named
head of the Championship Committee. Remember this stuff because
it may have changed by next week. He also said a new President
would be named in the next few weeks. I can’t wait... Vampiro
& Insane Clown Posse d. Lash Laroux & Norman Smiley &
Prince Iaukea. This was WAY better than you’d expect and the Dead
Pool was CRAZY OVER with the Boise fans. Violent J used a moonsault
for the finisher, which actually caused Hugh Morris to go crazy
backstage since that is his finisher. Someone needs to tell Morris
that he sucks and is not over and to shut his mouth... Backstage,
Chris Benoit attacked David Flair for making fun of Dusty. So
Dusty signed Benoit vs. David for the US Title later in the show...
The Rednecks came down to the ring accompanied by a brand new
entrance song. This one — and I know this sounds unbelievable
— was even better than "Rap is Crap". Jackass Tony made no mention
whatsoever that this was a new song and kept talking about "Rap
is Crap". Hennig & Windham d. Public Enemy. I saw rookies
this Saturday, some of whom were in their first match ever, who
could work circles around Johnny Grunge... Mona pinned Little
Jeanie. Mona is still over despite WCW’s best efforts to crush
her. Brandi Alexander tried to attack Mona after this match but
Mona ran her off. Although Mona has had two televised matches,
Tony called her a "prolific" wrestler... Backstage, Nash, Rick
Steiner and Sid attacked Hogan as he was going out for an interview.
Goldberg and Sting made the save. Hogan cut a promo, saying he’d
quit wrestling if Nash beat him at the PPV. Go, Nash, go! They
also signed Hogan & Sting & Goldberg vs. Sid & Rick
Steiner & Nash for the main event of Nitro. Sting suggested
Nash put his career on the line at Sturgis too, and Nash said
OK. Good heat for this segment... Nick Patrick replaced Charles
Robinson in the US Title bout. I have no words in my vocabulary
that would possibly do justice in describing how hot Torrie looked
on this show. My heart stopped beating and actually began fluttering.
Anyway, Benoit killed David in the Greatest Match Ever with the
diving headbutt to win the WCW US Title, which is his first official
singles title in WCW (he won the TV Title a few times at house
shows but those wins were never acknowledged). The Triad tried
to attack Benoit afterwards but Malenko, Saturn & Douglas
ran them off. Benoit challenged DDP to a no-DQ US Title match
in Sturgis... Gene interviewed Savage, who came out without George.
Gene expressed concern as usual. Savage said she’d be back after
he destroyed Rodman. Savage left without revealing who the Humvee
Driver was or having the Miss Madness 2000 contest... Eddy Guerrero
& Rey Misterio Jr. d. Dave Taylor & Chris Adams in a really
good match. ICP and Vamp destroyed the good guys after this match.
Kidman finally ran out to make the save... Gene interviewed the
Rednecks. They said they were going to perform their new song
later. Gene said Chad Brock was actually the one who was going
to perform. Hennig said if Chad showed up, he’d kick his fat ass.
Gene told Hennig that the Rednecks had been pre-empted. Gene is
lucky he didn’t get his fat ass kicked for that comment... Kidman
NC Disco in another good match when Vampiro ran in. Vamp destroyed
Kidman with a middle rope Michinoku Driver. Disco tried to make
the save but got beaten up for his troubles. Rey and Eddy finally
cleared the ring. Disco offered to shake hands with the good guys,
but decided to leave instead... Scott Norton beat Buff Bagwell
when the Shat ran in. Buff hit Ono with the Blockbuster after
the match. Pretty horrible segment... Chad Brock did his concert
and then got into a pull-apart with Hennig afterwards. Brock did
his best to sell absolutely nothing for Hennig... Kanyon d. Booker
T in yet another good match after the Triad interfered. They played
Kanyon’s Mortis music as he left... Gene interviewed Rodman. The
crowd booed when Gene said his name, but then cheered when he
came out. Rodman went hoss on the mic again and called George
a "bitch". Savage came out and the cops kept them apart. Not as
fun as the angle last week... Hogan came out for the main event
to his "American Made" song and sporting the red and yellow outfit.
STOP THE PRESSES, THE YELLOW BASTARD HAS RETURNED. This REEKED
of desperation, but for some inexplicable reason the crowd in
Boise went absolutely apeshit for Hogan. Sting & Hogan &
Goldberg beat Nash & Steiner & Sid in an AMAZINGLY good
main event. The heat for this bout was literally unbelievable.
Hogan KO’d Nash with a chair and Sting put him in the Scorpion.
Since Nash was unconscious, the referee stopped the bout. So it’s
Hogan vs. Nash in a retirement match at Road Wild and you can
bet Hogan is going to be taking at least a temporary hiatus from
wrestling. Overall, a pretty damn good show. While it wasn’t as
good as Raw, they did do their best to make this a truly competitive
Monday Night. And I appreciate it. BELIEVE ME, I appreciate it.
WCW On Tour Cedar Rapids, IA (August 4): Psicosis & Ciclope d. Silver King & Villano V, Vampiro d. Steve Regal, Saturn d. Riggs, Hacksaw Duggan d. Disco Inferno, Buff Bagwell d. David Flair in a non-title match, Kidman & Rey Misterio Jr. d. Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko, Booker T d. Sid via pinfall in a surprise. El Paso, TX (August 6): Juventud Guererra & Silver King d. Psicosis & Villano V, Disco Inferno d. Vincent, Saturn d. Bam Bam Bigelow, Knobs d. La Parka in a Hardcore match, Rey Misterio Jr. & Kidman d. Bobby Duncum Jr. & Barry Windham, Eddy Guerrero & Chavo Guerrero Jr. d. Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko, Sting d. Dallas Page. Tucson, AZ (August 7): Eddy Guerrero & Chavo Guerrero Jr. & Juventud Guererra d. Psicosis & Villano V & Silver King, Disco Inferno d. Vincent, Knobs d. La Parka in a Hardcore match, Kidman & Rey Misterio Jr. d. Bobby Duncum Jr. & Barry Windham, Saturn & Chris Benoit & Dean Malenko d. Dallas Page & Bam Bam Bigelow in a non-title handicap match, Sting d. Sid in the main event. Phoenix, AZ (August 8): Norman Smiley & Silver King
& Juventud Guererra d. Psicosis & Villano V & Spider,
Disco Inferno d. Vincent, Rey Misterio Jr. & Kidman d. Bobby
Duncum Jr. & Barry Windham, Knobs d. La Parka, Bam Bam Bigelow
d. Saturn, Eddy Guerrero & Chavo Guerrero Jr. d. Chris Benoit
& Dean Malenko, Harlem Heat d. Kevin Nash & Sid--COR.
Nash and Sid just destroyed Heat and then walked out of the ring
for the finish. What a great way to put over the team challenging
for the Tag Titles at the next pay-per-view. Sting d. Dallas Page
in the main event. ECW News and Notes • Apparently, the chances of Rob Van Dam leaving for WCW are not as great as we suggested last week. Paul Heyman is telling friends that both Rob and Sonya are covered under ECW’s health insurance, thus he wouldn’t have so much of a financial reason to leave the company. • Speaking of screw-ups, the first TNN taping is actually August 14th from the Seagate Center in Toledo, OH. The first show airs August 27th. • The rumors that the Dudleys will stay with ECW through the
end of the month appear to be false, as the feeling is they are
gone as soon as they sign their WWF contracts. ECW On Tour Dothan, AL (August 5): Danny Doring & Roadkill d. Vito Lograsso & CW Anderson, Jerry Lynn d. Tracy Smothers, Super Crazy d. Little Guido, Chris Chetti & Nova & Jazz d. Simon Diamond & Tom Marquez & Tony DeVito, Balls Mahoney & Spike Dudley d. Dudley Boys to retain the Tag Titles, Steve Corino d. Bill Wiles, Sabu d. Justin Credible, Taz squashed Yoshihiro Tajiri to retain the ECW Heavyweight Title. Birmingham, AL (August 6): Danny Doring & Roadkill
d. Vito Lograsso & CW Anderson, Jerry Lynn d. Tracy Smothers,
Super Crazy d. Little Guido, Chris Chetti & Nova & Jazz
d. Simon Diamond & Tom Marquez & Tony DeVito, Balls Mahoney
& Spike Dudley d. Dudley Boys to retain the Tag Titles, Steve
Corino d. Bill Wiles, Sabu d. Justin Credible, Taz squashed Yoshihiro
Tajiri to retain the ECW Heavyweight Title. Etcetera • If I didn’t have so much journalistic integrity, I would claim to have wrestled in front of 17,000 fans last weekend. What happened was, there is a radio station up here in Seattle called 107.7 "The End" and they were putting on an event called "EndFest". The station flew in seven or eight bands which were to perform songs throughout the day. The theme of EndFest was pro-wrestling, so they contacted the PWF and asked us to go out there and put on some matches. We were told we’d wrestle from 10:00 AM until 7:00 PM. For those of you bad at math, that’s a long time. We had between ten and fifteen guys, so we figured we’d do one match every half hour or so and make sure that everyone wrestled maybe two times. Well, suffice it to say that most of the better bands were scheduled to play at around 8:00 PM, which meant the really suck-ass bands played early in the morning. So 10:00 AM rolled around and we started with a battle royal. Since the band playing at that time was pretty lame, we drew a pretty big crowd. As soon as the battle royal was over, Tim demanded a singles match. He then proceeded to demand two more. Then he demanded that two more guys get in the ring and have a match. To make a long story short, we took a total of about three half-hour breaks and spent the rest of the time wrestling in front of THE LARGEST COLLECTION OF WHITE TRASH AND NAPPY CRACK-WHORES EVER ASSEMBLED IN ONE PLACE. I swear, there were 17,000 people at this event and 16,999 had some portion of their anatomy other than their ears pierced. Some had numerous piercings. If a part of the human body could be pierced, including eyeballs, someone at this event had a bone through it. There were more mullet haircuts here than there were crotch chops on Raw last season. Also, there were no black people at this event. I didn’t see one. Nick and Craig claimed to have seen as many as four black men, but I think they were mistaken. When Rock was a heel and he used to claim at house shows that he was wrestling in front of the biggest collection of white trash ever, he was not telling the truth. If the WWF drew 17,000 people, I’m sure a good percentage of them were black. Black people cannot be white trash, because they are black. Since there were strictly white people at this event, I can safely say I performed in front of more white trash then the Rock. We wrestled forever. I swear we must have put on forty matches between 10:00 AM and 5:00 PM. We never made it to 7:00 PM because everyone literally looked like they were going to die. In fact, Matt Farmer almost did die for real, as he got sick and yacked all over the ring truck, but that was more likely from eating some really rank five-dollar pizza slices over at one of the booths. Man, let me tell you, I woke up Sunday morning and felt like I had the Ebola virus. My head was throbbing like it had never throbbed before and I thought for sure my eyes, ears and skin were going to start spontaneously bleeding. I ate like ten times that day. I felt like Mick Foley, walking with a permanent hunch. I hated wrestling, wrestlers, and anything having to do even remotely with wrestling. I hated the Olympics, because they had wrestling as an event. I hated our Nation, for hosting the Olympics. I hated Vince McMahon and Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan and Kevin Nash more than ever. Let me tell you how much pain I was in. I was in so much pain that I even took two aspirin. I can count on one hand the number of times I have taken an aspirin in my life, because I hate taking stuff and my body is so sensitive to it that I could probably regrow an amputated limb in one week simply by taking a multi-vitamin and two aspirin a day. But I hurt so bad that I took two aspirin. Had my mother seen this, she would have demanded I go to the emergency room. But I persevered and felt better by the end of the day, so good that I actually sat down for an hour at 7:00 PM and watched all of Heat, including the part where Meat came to the ring with an erection. And then I had to take two more aspirin. • Rena Mero was on Off the Record last week. She appeared along with host Michael Landsberg and guests Gene Mack and Brian Budd. She didn’t have much to say. One of the first questions was whether she would respect a women athlete who got surgery to enlarge herself. This was a strange question since it indicated that Landsberg thought she had natural breasts. She said she "definitely" would respect such a woman. They had some "Quicky Facts", one of which was that Sable worked at a law firm before becoming involved in wrestling. They just wanted to put the words "Sable" and "Quicky" together. They talked a lot about drug use in other sports. Rena was violently opposed to all drug use anywhere. They talked about Phil Jackson of the Lakers and how he was wearing a political button during games which supported a presidential candidate. Rena said this was wrong and he should not wear the button during game play. Most of the segment featured revelations such as this. • According to someone with inside knowledge of the Sable lawsuit settlement, she was forced to divulge her true age and — get ready — she might really only be 31 years old. This source could not reveal her true age due to the settlement restrictions, but claimed the general consensus of 37 or 38 was ridiculously high. • Rena also did a chat on Playboy.com. Absolutely nothing of value, unless you count the funny screen names from chat visitors such as "MManley" and "Donkey Daddy". She did say that Hugh Hefner treats her like a lady, a comment which comes just a few months after she revealed that Hef once tried to coerce her into the woods so he could have sex with her. I guess that’s how you treat a lady. • Rena also appeared on the Howard Stern show last week. He repeatedly called her Sable and showed what a rebel he was by saying he didn’t care if the WWF filed a lawsuit against him for using that name. About the only thing worth repeating here was her claim that she was "ecstatic" about the settlement. For the last several weeks, depending upon who you talked to, you would have either been told that she made a doinkload of money or she made absolutely nothing at all. As it turns out, her lawyer talked with Entertainment Weekly and said Rena made no cash off the settlement. Actually, the exact wording was "non-monetary compensation". So I don’t know what in the hell she’s so ecstatic about. • Super Chico’s Phattest Ass Tape in the World Volume I is a compilation of my first six videotaped matches. The tape runs approximately one hour and forty minutes and is taped in SP mode and shipped priority mail. The cost is $20, which includes all shipping and handling charges. The PWF is also selling a tape of the complete June 16th Milton, WA house show (I wrestle two matches, one versus Ken Parelli and the other versus Lady Vi) and the May 8th Tacoma Dome Show (including Alvarez vs. Craig Corrosion with Tim Flowers doing commentary). The Milton tape is $12 and the Tacoma Dome tape is $25. Checks or money orders can be sent to: PWF, PO BOX 73118, Dept. C, Puyallup, WA 98375. We also still have copies of our Real Names and Insider Terms booklets for sale. Each booklet is $5, or you can purchase both of them for $8. • Make sure you check out the "Off the Top Rope" radio show if you live in the Chicago area, hosted by our good buddy Brian Schenk. It currently airs from 7:00 to 8:30 AM on WEEF AM 1430 every Saturday morning. Brian is also selling tapes of his show, and you can receive a sample copy for $2 to PO Box 6082, Lindenhurst, IL 60046. For more information, you can e.mail Brian at his new e.mail address: offthetoprope@mailcity.com. • Thanks for reading this week!
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