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July 14, 2005SHOOT THE WORKSJohn: Welcome to this worked shoot edition of OUR so-called SPORT. Usually Jeff and I complain to each other that there isn’t much to talk about so we slack off and don’t update. All of a sudden, there are lots of things to talk about. We still didn't feel like updating, but here we are. Last year, WWE got fixated on this idea of interactivity, having the fans vote for stuff. This year, the new fad is being all smarky and aiming content squarely at the complaining assholes on the Internet. Speaking of assholes who complain on the Internet, this week on RAW, the fired Matt Hardy showed up unannounced, attacked Edge and called him ‘Adam,’ called Lita a “whore”, said “WWE can kiss my ass,” and got ‘arrested.’
John: They did a pretty good job of making it look like it was unplanned, but seriously, if Hardy really did crash RAW, they would have cut away to a Maria interview or something. The angle was pretty convincing in the moment and it was cool to see something unpredictable occur. Hardy even yelled something about Johnny Ace, WWE’s head of talent relations.
The Ghost of Brian Pillman: That’s telling him! I still don’t respect you, booker-man.
John: It would have been so awesome if Hardy urinated in the ring. While the entire truth behind everything surrounding this real-life stuff/turned angle between Hardy, Lita and Edge won’t be known for a while, Hardy probably had some sort of deal in place for his return around the time of Edge and Lita’s wedding when they teased Hardy’s music. But one thing’s for sure, Matt Hardy is fat. He looks like he drowned his bitterness in cheeseburgers after being released.
Jeff: He sure is. He has this weird combination of fat, crazy, and unkempt going on. If ECW were still in business he'd fit right in. As it is, he plugged Ring of Honor, who also sent Matt Striker to wrestle Kurt Angle for the second time, and some jackass fans to hold signs up at the show. I wonder if Vince is thinking of buying the company to provide another path for minor league talent to move up. If he did, there'd be no stopping my own personal dream match: Samoa Joe versus Heart Throb Antonio. I just hope he doesn't pick up where Feinstein left off and start sending RF Video catalogs to my office. INTO THE BLUEJohn: Apparently, Blue Meanie and JBL never liked each other in real life ever since Meanie was a WWE employee years ago. Suddenly, that became relevant at ECW One Night Stand when they got into a real fist fight during the brawl to close the show. JBL, being bigger, stronger, and not a doughy fat ass, popped Meanie and busted him open for real. But whatever real animosity exists between the two is now fuel for a good ol’ fake wrestling angle as the Blue World Order reunited on Smackdown last week. Meanie scored a win over JBL with Batista’s help. It never occurred to me when I saw Stevie Richards and Simon Dean were drafted to Smackdown that the bWo would reform. As soon as this angle with JBL is over, which could well be now already, the skinny guy, fat guy, and superhero in blue look like just the kind of gringos the Mexicools hate.
Jeff: Even if it's only temporary, I'm happy to see the fat Blue Meanie back.
Jim Ross: Blue Meanie at 300 pounds is good, but he could be really special at 215.
Jeff: He was. You made him lose the weight and you fired him anyway.
Jim Ross: But you should have seen the special way he handled that pink slip.
Peter Gammons: The Blue Meanie is one of the most special people I've met in my 30 years of covering baseball. It comes from his exceptional upbringing. Mr. and Mrs. Meanie should be proud.
Jeff: Ever since Vince became the only game in town, the era of the wrestling fat ass came to an abrupt end. If you don't have a crew cut, a six pack, and hot pants, you're not making it to the big leagues. Not so with ECW. If you're a fat ass who can either do a moonsault or fall through something from really high up, you've got a job. The other great thing about the return of the bWo is the return of the cutoffs and half shirts. There have been some gay wrestling outfits over the years, but Stevie Richards has always been in a class of his own.
Tobias Funke: I fail to see anything "gay" about cutoffs. Stevie Richards is exactly the kind of man we should all like to get behind. EVERYONE MUST GO!John: Last week, WWE fired 20 people: Bubba Ray, D-Von and Spike Dudley, Kenzo Suzuki and Hiroko, Matt Morgan, Charlie Haas, Jackie Gayda, Marty Jannetty, Dawn Marie, Mark Jindrak, Maven, Shannon Moore, Akio, Gangrel, Billy Kidman, Mordecai, Joy Giovanni, announcer Mark Lloyd, and Jim Cornette. It’s interesting that with Maven and Jackie fired (joining Nidia and Linda Miles last year) the winners of the first two seasons of Tough Enough are all gone. Dawn Marie is pregnant and Haas and Gayda are newlyweds so it sucks for them, but overall there isn’t anyone here I truly mind not having to watch anymore, with the sole exception of Joy Giovanni. I hadn’t gotten anywhere near getting my fill of her yet, and now she’s gone. Everyone else I’m pretty cool with. If there’s a tragedy here, it’s that there are hardly any midcarders left to lose to the Masterlock Challenge. These fired wrestlers could have used the $14,000 soaked in Chris Masters’ jocksweat.
Jeff: Firing Joy was criminal. Sure, her only skill was showing off her body, but that body was so much better than almost anything else out there and she showed it off with far more zeal than any of the rest of them. Plus, she was willing to let the Big Show drool all over her to be part of the show. Why not keep her around? Of the others who left, Gangrel and Akio never really got a chance and the rest had worn out their welcome. But on the plus side, if anyone's thinking of taking a trip to Japan, you might be able to see a fat vampire wrestle for a couple of yen. EX-FOOTBALL WASHOUT WANTS TO WRASSLEJohn: On the same day they were firing a dozen people last week, Brock Lesnar was in Stamford, CT meeting with Vince McMahon. I hope Vince made him crawl through the tiny “Supplicant” flap on the door and Brock got stuck in it like Winnie the Pooh did when he ate too much honey. I don’t have a lot of sympathy for Brock. He walked out on his lucrative job to play football, washed out, tried to sue the company and didn’t get anywhere, plus he gets to come home and fuck Sable every night. I have a hard time feeling sorry for the guy. The last word on the state of Lesnar’s crawling back to Vince looking for his old job back is that Lesnar and Vince “vented” and there is no deal in place. Which means there’s a deal in place.
Matt Hardy: What up MFers!! Take it from me, the Angelic Diablo, there is no absolutely chance in hell Brock Lesnar is coming back to the WWE! WWE can kiss my ass!
John: So, Brock, when can we expect you to show up on Smackdown?
Jeff: I never heard about the lawsuit and only vaguely remember the Sable thing, but I have a feeling the two are connected. So how'd that lawsuit go, Sable?
Sable: I'm very happy with my non-monetary settlement.
Jeff: That's a lot less than you were looking for. I guess the courts don't feel Scott Hall's shitting in your bag is worth $110 million. Did they at least buy you a new bag?
Sable: No, but I did get a couple cans of Fabreeze. I'm completely satisfied with how it turned out. NOT A GOOD DAY TO RUN A TERRORIST ANGLEJohn: I don’t know if you heard about that terrible tragedy that happened last Thursday: The Undertaker was attacked and garroted by five masked men who could possibly be construed as terrorists at the behest of Muhammad Hassan. Turns out the morning before that angle aired, some real terrorists bombed the London Underground, killed 50 people and maimed hundreds more. WWE and UPN have been hearing it from all sides for airing the Hassan-Undertaker angle on Smackdown with only a disclaimer. As someone who is sensitive to the plights and suffering of others, I think everyone complaining should calm the fuck down. It was rotten timing to do the angle, but how were they supposed to know there would be a terrorist attack on London last week? Using real-life events as wrestling angles is a time-honored tradition. Without the Iran hostage crisis 25 years ago, we wouldn’t have had the Iron Sheik and Ayatollah Blassie. Without the Gulf War, we wouldn’t have Sgt. Slaughter becoming an Iraqi and winning the WWF Title for Saddam Hussein. Those proud, landmark moments and many more in wrestling history would be lost if all WWE cared about was not pissing people off.
Jeff: I had a few problems with Hassan's angle on Thursday, too. First, the attack was really boring. If you're going to have six guys attack the Undertaker, at least teach them a couple of neat looking finishing moves. Second, Daivari really didn't have to take the chokeslam and tombstone. I understand they needed to get the Taker out to the ring somehow, but once he was there, Hassan didn't have to wait until his buddy got squashed to send in the goons. And third, use of the "masked beheaders" is completely contrary to the original Muhammad Hassan character. He's just as American as any of us and doesn't condone any terrorist action. Using a Zarqawi-esque goon squad completely misses the point. A group of Arab wrestlers would have made a lot more sense. But it's probably extremely difficult to form that group anywhere outside of Michigan. THE ANTI-CHRISTJohn: Shawn Michaels is a heel again. As random as it was when he suddenly became Hulk Hogan’s best friend back in April, Shawn Michaels just as randomly turned on Hogan last week and superkicked him after they won the main event on RAW.
John: Rowdy Roddy Piper brought Piper’s Pit back last night for the express reason of having Shawn Michaels on the show to tell us why he turned on Hogan. Even for him, Shawn set new records for pausing in between every word he spoke, but eventually he told us that he superkicked Hogan to ensure that Hogan would be motivated to face HBK at Summerslam to determine who the true Icon is. Then Piper called Shawn a coward and was the only person on Earth who didn’t see a superkick of his own coming.
John: A heel Shawn Michaels sounds good on paper, but he doesn’t
seem quite ready to put Jesus aside and start humping flags in the
ring again. But I am glad that HBK has resumed using his old five
nickname combo: The Showstopper, the Headliner, the Main Eventer,
the One True Icon, the Heartbreak Kid. SEARCH PARTYJohn: I would say that overall, this year’s Diva Search is more entertaining than last year’s but this year’s crop of girls seem blander than last year’s girls. It’s still very early in the competition and Alexis has already been cut, but these girls don’t seem to stand out in the same way Christy, Carmella, Joy, Amy and Maria did last year. They have four blondes who are practically interchangeable (although Ashley seems like she’s the most interested in wrestling), a black girl who is going to be cut next week, a tall, skinny brunette who’s a less coordinated Stacy Keibler type, and there’s Leyla, who Jeff and I agree is the hottest. God, I hope she wins and has sex with me. There is no obvious stand out like Christy was last year; in fact, they’re all trying too hard to be just like Christy. Still, instead of shit like selling ice cream and seducing Kamala, this year’s girls have had better challenges like Sgt. Slaughter’s Bikini Boot Camp obstacle course.
Sgt. Slaughter: Which one of you girls wants to blow on the Sarge’s whistle?
John: The talent competition wasn’t so bad either, even if the unofficial theme of the entire affair was Sexually Harrass Christy Hemme. Leyla won my vote when she gave Earl Hebner a low blow, but she gets my vote every week until she wins. Simona, the blonde who dressed up like the Berserker, should be grateful the black girl is getting cut next week or else she’d have been the one gone for carrying on about “evil men” and kissing Coach (way to alienate the 99% male audience).
Jeff: Leyla was my pregame pick for this one, and it seems like I made the right call. She has a personality, which puts her way ahead of most of them, and she's probably the hottest of the bunch. The talent competition was a waste of time. The girls did nothing but prove they didn't have any talent. I think we already knew most of them were strippers, no need to let them confirm it.
photos (c) wwe.com
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