News From Cook’s Corner 08.11.10

The only bad thing about all of this is that football season tends to add a few pounds to the Cook waistline. When I watch football, I eat and drink. A lot. Usually I make up for this by working out like a fiend during the summer and losing 15-20 pounds that I end up putting back on later. This year, I’ve lost zero pounds. So either I’m going to have to cut back on my eating and my drinking, or I’m going to end up being a fat slob by the end of football season and morbidly obese by the end of basketball season.

Sadly, I already know which option I’ll be choosing and I’m applying for the 2011 edition of The Biggest Loser.

Enough about my weight problem. Things are pretty busy in the wrestling world and there‘s way too much to talk about. WWE’s got their second biggest show of the year on Sunday, TNA’s coming off of their big ECW reunion on Sunday, and ROH is getting ready to say goodbye to their current champion…and maybe more. Let’s get it started before anybody else wants to change promotions!

TNA seems very interested in re-creating the past lately. To be fair, there is an audience for it, as the Impact ratings have been up a bit from their norm since the EV2.0 thing started. I’m more about looking towards the future than staying in the past, but if enough people have a craving it’s tough to get on TNA too much for serving it up. C’est la vie.

While TNA relives the glory days of ECW, I thought it would be appropriate to highlight one of my favorite parts of TNA’s past. If it wasn’t for Traci Brooks, there’s a pretty good chance that you wouldn’t be reading this column right now. Don’t hold it against her. Her interview with your humble correspondent was enough to keep the bosses from firing me in 04, and somehow I’ve managed to hang on all this time since then. Huzzah!

So what’s Traci up to these days? It turns out she was just in Charlotte for the NWA Legends Fanfest. Had I known this earlier, I would have sent Manu Bumb to get me some merchandise. She’s working the reunion/indy circuit, so maybe she’ll be in a town near you very soon!

There’s a joke here somewhere about TNA & reunion shows in a few years, but I’m trying to be nice this week. And now, the fake news!

WWE’s PPV buyrates have not been good lately. As seen in Randle’s column because I’m too lazy to try and type it up another way:

– Extreme Rules – 182,000 buys (compared to 182,000 buys for Backlash 2009 and 200,000 buys for Backlash 2008)
– Over the Limit – 197,000 buys (compared to 228,000 buys for JudgmentDay 2009 and 252,000 buys for Judgment Day 2008)
– Fatal Four Way – 143,000 buys (compared to 178,000 buys for The Bash 2009 and 273,000 buys for Night of Champions 2008)

This is obviously not a good trend. Vince McMahon said himself that it had been a lousy quarter, but they’re hoping to turn things around with SummerSlam. He said that the new talent infusion, along with the returns of Undertaker & Triple H, will improve the talent lineup.

To quote Wade Barrett, the winds of change have been pretty strong in WWE lately. People like Shawn Michaels & Batista have completely left the company. Undertaker & Triple H have been off for extended periods of time to recover from injuries. Guys like Randy Orton & CM Punk have missed time due to injuries. Vince said in the conference that he’d never had a situation where so many people have been gone at the same time. I’m sure we could think of another time if we tried hard enough, but it has been a pretty rough go for WWE.

On the bright side, WWE has been taking this time to reload their roster. Both Raw & Smackdown are full with new heel acts that are getting pretty good reactions from the crowds that are sticking around. Let’s take a look at some of them…

Raw:

Sheamus: The Celtic Warrior has had a very impressive 2009-2010, and it‘s hard to think of anybody in WWE that‘s accomplished more. In a year’s time he’s gone from being some new pale dude on ECW to being a two-time WWE Champion. The first time was kind of fluky, but he’s proven that he belongs at the top of the card.

The Miz: No matter what people say now, everybody had John Morrison pegged as the breakout star of the Mizorrison tag team. While Morrison has floundered a bit on the baby face side of things, Miz has broken out as one of the more interesting characters on WWE television today. He’s gone from a guy that wanted to be a wrestler on MTV to being one of the fastest rising stars in WWE. I just wish Michael Cole would shut up about him.

Nexus: I’m a huge fan of these guys. A reader even said that I was going to join the group a couple of weeks ago, and I certainly would if they’d have me. I even got myself a Nexus t-shirt, which earned me the wrath of somebody who shall remain nameless that really, really doesn‘t like the shirt. I suppose they’re against me. The Nexus angle has been one of the more interesting aspects of WWE television over the past couple of months, and hasn’t lost a step even with the departure of Daniel Bryan. It remains to be seen if Wade Barrett, Skip Sheffield, David Otunga, Michael Tarver, Justin Gabriel, Heath Slater & Darren Young will all become viable commodities for WWE by themselves, but for right now they’re part of something that is working pretty well.

Smackdown:

Jack Swagger: The All-American American has gained the support of the 411 staff at least, even if his World title reign wasn’t exactly a critical success. Swagger has all the tools to be a big star, and they at least had enough confidence in him to make him champ, so we’ll see what the future holds. Assuming, of course, that he didn’t drown in the Gulf of Mexico.

Drew McIntyre: I have to admit that the Chosen One is growing on me. He carries himself like a guy that belongs in main events, and he’s pretty good at getting under the skin of the Smackdown audience.

Dashing Cody Rhodes: Smackdown recap readers know of my man crush on Dashing Cody. No, there’s nothing wrong with having a man crush. Seriously though, the Dashing character has fit Cody like a glove, and he’s been really impressive on Smackdown with his matches and grooming tips. I look forward to seeing more of DCR, who is starting to exhibit some of that Rhodes knack for pro wrestling.

I didn’t even get to guys like Dolph Ziggler & Ted DiBiase, who WWE also has big plans for, and all the NXT Season 2 people. WWE has a lot of young talent right now that has the potential to rise to the top. You never know what will happen with any of these guys…there’s always the possibility that things don’t work out and they don’t live up to potential. The fun is in finding out, and WWE fans should have a lot of fun watching this young talent in the coming years. Business might not be the best now, but let’s see where it is in a few years.

I think it’ll be good, but I’m just a guy with a column.

WWE’s WrestleMania special was a pretty big flop for NBC last Saturday night. The show scored a .65 rating with 1.78 million viewers. They got more viewers than Impact, but not by much. Why’d this happen? Simple: WrestleMania was months ago. Most people who wanted to watch WrestleMania either watched it live, or they’ve purchased the DVD by now, or they found other means to watch the show that won’t be discussed here. Nobody was staying home on Saturday night to watch something that they already watched.

OK, I had it on in the background while I was writing things for this website, but I am not the average WWE fan. Masked Warriors was on afterwards, so I opted for a night of wrestling and writing over my usual Saturday fare. It was an interesting look at the Michaels/Undertaker match, but I could see why most people wouldn’t bother with it. It was uninspired even by NBC standards.

I take that back. Sometimes I forget how much NBC standards have slipped.

Speaking of Shawn, remember how he was supposed to be all mad about Bryan Danielson getting fired from WWE? Well, the tweeting version of HBK said that he didn’t even know about it until a couple of weeks after it happened. He said it wasn’t his business. I’ll tell ya, Shawn sure sounded peeved. Or not.

Justin Long, Charlie Day & Jason Sudeikis will be guest hosting Raw next week. First of all, I didn’t exactly miss having guest hosts. Second of all, I have no idea who these people are. I’m sure that will greatly offend some of you, but I can’t be the only one. I even broke a long-standing tradition and asked my sister who they were, and she had no idea. We run in different pop culture circles, so I have the feeling that if neither of us know who any of them are, they can’t be that famous.

Steve Austin did an interview defending WWE going all PG. I’m over the whole PG argument because everything’s been said that can be said about it, and nothing is going to change as long as Linda McMahon thinks she’s a politician, but can we at least get the Divas wearing swimsuits that are a little more revealing than what my grandmother wears to the pool? I don’t think that’s too much to ask, and there’s really no reason for me to care about “Summer Spectacular” matches if the girls are wearing wetsuits.

Want a job with WWE? If you have ten years of experience in television & a Masters Degree you could be Vice President of International Affiliate Marketing. The VPIAM is responsible for distribution and marketing of WWE TV, PPV and digital products in 145 countries, manage revenue, and budgets, financial analysis and forecasting. Now, I could be wrong, but isn’t this what Shane McMahon used to do? I wonder where he got his ten years of experience in television before he was hired.

Season 3 of NXT is reportedly going to feature four men and four women, which increases my hopes that they have signed Sexy Star & Rain. I got excited yesterday when Kristin Astara changed her Facebook location to Tampa, but then I remembered that her boy Ryan O’Reilly signed with WWE a little while back. I doubt she’d be taking indy bookings if she was going to WWE too.

In news that will greatly upset Jeff Small (and probably nobody else), Great Khali will not be a part of the 7 on 7 match at SummerSlam. WWE.com is reporting in storyline that Khali suffered patella and ligament damage due to the attack by the Nexus on Raw. I’m pretty sure that Khali has had knee problems for awhile, so this might be their way of giving him some extended time off, which he was originally supposed to have a few months ago anyway.

No, I don’t know why they didn’t just give him the time off then. Yes, that would have made sense.

Linda McMahon won the Republican primary election yesterday, and will be taking on Democrat Richard Blumenthal in November. Ms. McMahon has spent $21,349,619 on her Senate campaign so far, and she has $21.5 million coming from candidate loans, so she hasn‘t even spent all of her own money yet. I know most of you probably won’t realize how completely insane this is because politics is a very scary thing that none of us really want to pay attention to, so I’m going to show you some numbers comparing this total to other Senate candidates running in 2010:

Connecticut:
Richard Blumenthal: $1,370,207 ($0 candidate loans)
Linda McMahon: $21,349,619 ($21,500,000 candidate loans)

Blumenthal has $2,125,401 on hand, so he’s running a fiscally smart campaign thus far. Doesn’t it kind of make you wonder which one is the Democrat, and which one is the Republican? Now, let’s go to some other states and see what some other high-profile Senate candidates have spent on their campaigns. Keep in mind that there’s still a little less than three months until Election Day.

Arizona:
John McCain: $15,680,760
California:
Barbara Boxer: $5,772,256
Carly Fiornia: $9,695,620
Florida:
Charlie Crist: $4,020,863
Marco Rubio: $7,122,913
Kentucky:
Jack Conway: $3,282,332 ($525,000 candidate loans)
Rand Paul: $3,227,924
Massachusetts:
Scott Brown: $10,469,679
New York:
Charles Schumer: $2,194,709
Schumer has $23 million still on hand, the majority of which comes from individual contributions.
Nevada:
Sharron Angle: $1,778,973
Harry Reid: $8,940,302
Pennsylvania:
Arlen Specter: $11,063,758 (he lost in the Democratic primary!)
Joe Stesak: $5,987,925
Pat Toomey: $5,637,392

John McCain is the second highest spender I could find…and he’s still $6,000,000 behind Linda. Somebody really needs to tell her that a Senate seat doesn’t have to be that expensive. She says she has $50 million of her own money to spend on this campaign. $50 million! Aren’t there some kids in Africa she could feed or something? I can‘t really say for sure, but I’d like to think that if I had that kind of money I’d find something better to do with it than a vanity run for the U.S. Senate.

Maybe I’d buy a golden boat.

Reason #985 I need to cut back on my drinking…while watching Impact last week I told Manu Bumb that Lacey Von Erich was getting better at the whole wrestling thing. He told me that I was crazy, and then the next day I read that Goldust was talking on the twit box about how bad she was. Maybe Manu & Goldust need to drink more, or maybe I need to drink less. Who can say?

There’s been a lot of talk lately about how TNA regulars are unhappy with the direction of the company, and how they might be looking for other places to work. Since we hear this so often on the Interweb and nothing ever happens, I’m not going to think much of it until a whole bunch of TNA people actually end up leaving the company. If there’s one thing that’s always been consistent about TNA, it’s that anybody that is unhappy about something just has to wait a few weeks for things to change…for better or for worse. If it’s the EV2.0 thing that’s getting people down, I’m sure that’s not going to last forever. It’s only a matter of time before one of the old ECW guys gets busted for something and gets everybody else in trouble with them. We’ll wait a little while before getting all excited about young TNA guys either leaving for WWE or a promotion that doesn’t exist yet.

TNA wrestlers were not required to attend Hardcore Justice. Well, I’d hope not, since they weren’t booked. Dennis Stamp would have been ashamed of all of them if they showed up.

Some interesting names were backstage at Impact this week. Roderick Strong was at the Impact Zone on Monday, and the rumor was that he’d be working a tryout match on Tuesday. Strong has worked for TNA in the past, he opted to leave the company in 2006 because he wasn’t really doing anything there and he got heat for showing up late for a PPV due to a blizzard in the Northeast. He did appear in TNA’s very first match on Spike TV, which was a losing effort to AJ Styles. If Roderick decides that TNA is where he wants to be in 2010, that would make Ring of Honor’s title situation more complicated than it already is. We’ll get to that later…

Becky Bayless was also backstage this week, and it’s being reported that she’ll be working a Jersey Shore type gimmick with Robby Eckos, who revealed on his MySpace (really?) that he was signed by TNA. Well, Becky does look a lot like a certain star of the Shore.

Snooki on the left, Becky on the right…I think.

GTL, baby. Whatever that means.

Chris Harris was there this week to visit friends. I wouldn’t expect him to be getting hired, but stranger things have happened.

Rosie Lottalove was not used at this week’s Impact tapings, and hasn’t been used since her debut at the June 3 tapings. Dang, now I feel kinda bad for complaining about them signing her. What a waste of typing…I could have complained about any number of things instead of a girl who only appeared once. It’s like they say: don’t sweat the small stuff. Well, Rosie’s kind of big. You know what I mean.

Dixie Carter put over Desmond Wolfe’s “card magic” on her Twitter. I’ve heard of more ridiculous reasons for pushing a wrestler than being good at card tricks, so hopefully this leads to something for the former ROH Champion.

Speaking of ROH Champions, Tyler Black has signed a developmental contract with World Wrestling Entertainment, and the hot rumor of the moment is that he will go to FCW and then be one of the featured performers on Season 3 of NXT. Having seen a lot of Tyler’s work in Ring of Honor, I think I’m a bit more qualified to talk about this than my colleagues Stephen Randle & Jeff Small. Small admitted he’s only watched one Black match, and I’d be willing to bet a shiny Canadian nickel that Randle has watched zero. Of course, there are other people here at the 411 familiar with Mr. Black, and it turns out that 411 Music Guru Michael Melchor has a thing or two he’d like to say on the issue after a conversation we had. Any time somebody that people will actually pay to write something wants to appear in this dog & pony show of a column, the floor is automatically theirs. Take it away, Michael!

——————–

So, we started getting in to a discussion on Facebook about a comment I left that was largely misunderstood. No one’s to blame but me on that; the way it read was rather misleading:

WWE signed Tyler Black?! Oh, MAN…all bets are off in RoH right now…

That statement had actually very little to do with Black himself, if anything. I’d actually explained it later to the Columnist of Honor, Ari Berenstein:

IF [Tyler Black signing with WWE] is true, then, I’m not questioning RoH’s survival at all. Been there, done that. What I’m worried about are Pearce and Cornette losing their minds at having to scrap 4 months (plus?) worth of future booking plans and re-writing the rest of 2010 on the fly…

However, in talking about Black himself, you brought up a couple points to me that got me thinking…First was:

Black’s a good talent, but he wasn’t really getting over as the top babyface champ anyway. He’d be good for them to have, but I honestly don’t think it makes much of a difference for them.

Then:

He really needs to pick it up on his promos, so maybe he can learn that in FCW.

The first point of yours, we agree on. Black’s departure will be easily overcome. Granted, signing away anyone’s World Champ is kinda fucked up, but it’s not like it hasn’t happened before. RoH has lost so many good names, but they’re still around because they know what their fans want and how to give it to them. Coupled with the fact that there are a surprising number of guys that love to actually wrestle (as opposed to entertain) and therefore like the style that RoH provides, that company will be just fine.

Now, Black. Yes, he’s a pretty good worker. No, he’s not the greatest promo in the world. That’s why so many people are predicting that he’s doomed for failure in WWE. And that’s exactly why, at this point in his career, he’s custom-made for WWE.

You see, I’m not sure how many fans realize that, with actually very few exceptions, WWE isn’t looking to sign stars. They’re looking to sign guys that they can make stars. Aside from your established odd-man-outs like CM Punk, Bryan Danielson, and Low-Ki, most of the guys they sign aren’t ones many people – even tried-and-true wrestling fans – have even heard of. Somewhere out there, they caught WWE’s eye and were signed on because they could be easily molded.

I don’t think most of the developmental guys signed to WWE are required to be the best promo guy or wrestler out there right now. In fact, I’d bet that WWE would prefer that they aren’t. They’re looking for guys that have the right amount of talent that gets them recognized, but doesn’t let them stand out quite yet. The whole reason behind the developmental system is to teach and train in the ways of Sports Entertainment; to make the talent fit that mold so that they can go on to bigger and better things in WWE.

Tyler’s perfect for that. He’ll certainly learn how to cut a better promo in FCW, because (for one, you have Dusty Rhodes there, and if you can’t learn how to talk from THAT man, you’re a lost cause but also because) that’s what he’s there to do. He’s there to learn their style. He’s there to learn how to speak in an entertaining matter. He’s there to become a WWE star.

Anyone who’s seen him in RoH knows he’s probably not quite ready to strut on to Raw and become the next breakout star. He’s not quite at that level yet. As far as WWE’s concerned, all the better. He shouldn’t be. But he will.

——————–

Michael Melchor, everybody! He’s doing Music news on Sundays, so click on over during your weekend hangover!

In the big picture, Michael and I are pretty much on the same page. I probably came across as a bit critical of Black in my comments, so I’ll go ahead and clarify my stance on Tyler Black.

Black is a good athlete. He can do some cool stuff in the ring…his finishers in ROH are a Phoenix splash and a small package driver, he also likes to use a turnbuckle power bomb and has a pretty good super kick he uses a lot. Maybe now that Shawn Michaels is out of the picture we can have a new super kick guy in WWE. When Black first arrived in ROH he attracted quite the cult following without winning a lot of matches. I remember the response he got when he battled Bryan Danielson in Dayton, and there was a PPV match with Nigel McGuinness that really put him on the map with the ROH audience. He’s definitely a capable wrestler, and at the age of 24 he’s nowhere near the peak of his abilities yet. Tyler Black has the potential to be a very big deal in the wrestling business.

He does have one glaring weakness, and it‘s a weakness that has to be overcome if he‘s going to have any success in WWE. His speaking ability is pretty much non-existent. One of the main drawbacks in Black’s reign as ROH Champion has been his inability to draw people buildings with his promos. The good thing for Tyler is that if there’s one place where he can learn how to cut good promos and talk people into coming to arenas, it’s WWE. Melchor said it, and I agree with it…if Dusty Rhodes can’t teach you how to talk, nobody can.

There was a backlash against Tyler within the ROH fan base once he became champion. I think it was mostly unwarranted, and ROH fans have a reputation of turning against their favorite wrestlers once they become champion (the fan response to Nigel needing to take some time off due to injuries back in late 2007-early 2008 was one of the most ridiculous things that I‘ve ever seen in wrestling), but it is worth noting that Black’s reign as a baby face champion never really got the reaction that the company was hoping for. Whether that’s his fault or the fault of the fans, it’s tough to say.

I don’t think ROH is necessarily screwed with Tyler Black gone. There has been speculation about the new Florida-based promotion run by Sean Davis with Milton Wilpon money signing “top ROH talent”, and you never know when WWE or TNA are going to decide they want to somebody. So far, ROH has managed to overcome talent defections by finding the next wave of new talent. Black’s departure will give somebody else a chance to step up to the next level, and maybe they’ll be more successful as a champion.

There’s also the little matter of Bryan Danielson still being an independent wrestler. I’m sure ROH fans would be more than happy to see him again. If they bring him back, ROH fans won’t care if WWE takes Tyler Black, Kenny King, the Kings of Wrestling, the whole ROH wrestling school & Cary Silken, while TNA takes Roderick Strong, Delirious & Sara Del Rey, and the new Florida-based promotion takes Jerry Lynn, Christopher Daniels & Rhett Titus. A little Dragon would fix a lot of problems.

I’m 99.8% sure that Tyler was one of the people that was part of that tryout we discussed last week, so we should be hearing about a couple other names coming in pretty soon.

Dr. Lucha (I bet that isn’t his real name) reported that Lucha Libre USA drew somewhere around 2,000 people to their show in Las Vegas last Saturday, and the crowd was really excited and into the action. That’s a good sign that people are watching the show and liking what they’re seeing. 2,000 people is a great number in this day and age for any wrestling company not named WWE. Most ROH crowds are well below that, and I’m pretty sure most TNA house shows are too, though they have packed them in pretty well for some shows.

I read that they booked the Thomas & Mack Center for the show, but I’m hoping that they were actually in the Cox Pavilion, a 2,500-seat venue that’s connected to the Center. That would look a lot better on television, and it’d probably be cheaper too. If I was promoting Lucha in America, I’d be looking to book smaller venues that have a really interesting look to them. Part of the fun of watching Lucha is the bullrings and other strange looking buildings that the shows take place in. It isn’t like WWE’s arenas that all look the same, or like TNA or ROH, which both have their television at the same place all the time.

Best wishes to Johnny “Mr. Wrestling II” Walker, who suffered some sort of ailment over the weekend that may or may not have been a heart attack. Old wrestlers seem pretty touchy about these things…just a year or so ago, Blackjack Mulligan went out of his way to tell everybody that he did not have a heart attack, and then posted on his website that he indeed had a heart attack. I guess they’re afraid nobody will book them if they have weak hearts.

I was not a big fan of the Hardcore Justice lineup. I wonder if we would have got more of a response from the staff if we did a roundtable for tomorrow’s Impact.

Weyer talks about some people that could/should have been Horsemen, while the commenters hate on RD Reynolds. When did it become popular to hate RD? He’s a funny guy that knows his wrestling. Jed Shaffer’s also good people, so we here at the Corner support the Wrestlecrappers and their celebration of wrestling that sucked.

Ari loves the American Wolves shirt. This makes me question his opinions on fashion.

Hubbard ranks the top ten SummerSlam matches. The only real complaint I have is that Austin vs. Angle from 2001 should have been on there somewhere. Even with the crap finish, it was an amazing match. Oh well, I’m sure it’ll be on next week’s Contentious Ten anyway.

Campbell reviews YouShoot with Dixie Carter. I demand to know which luchador gave her his hotel room key, so I can shake his hand.

Byers saves the best for Part 2, which only makes sense. I have to admit that my outlook on wrestling and life has changed a lot thanks to the match he made me watch.

The Triple Threat talks about the Nexus, so obviously they’ll get a plug.

I’ll be appearing on Fact or Fiction on Thursday, & Buy or Sell on Friday! Click on over and see what questions they’ll ask me about WWE, TNA & everything in between.

We close with a big Get Well Soon to Larry Csonka, who is recovering from a heart attack he suffered last week. Larry will be ok, but the “super-special feature” I had planned this week has been postponed indefinitely because he’s going to be involved with it. If it wasn’t for Larry Csonka, I would never have been hired by this website, and all of the tremendous things that have happened to me thanks to my affiliation with this website wouldn‘t have happened. That’s a shoot, brother!

Well, that’s all we have time for this week! The honorable JP Prag will be in tomorrow, and I’ll be back next week with more News From Cook’s Corner. Until then…