News From Cook’s Corner 03.27.12

Why?

Well, anybody who’s read this column for any amount of time has picked up on the fact that I am a University of Louisville graduate and a huge fan of the Louisville Cardinal sports teams. I was not particularly high on Louisville’s chances heading into the Big East Tournament, and they won four games in four nights. Then the NCAA Tournament started, and people picked the Cardinals to lose in every round they played in. Davidson over Louisville was a very trendy first round upset pick. New Mexico was supposed to shut the Cards down with their defense. Michigan State was a #1 seed and had humiliated Louisville in the 2009 Elite 8. Florida was supposed to score way too many points for Louisville to keep up with. Yet, somehow, Louisville managed to win all of these games and now find themselves in the Final 4.

That would be enough reason for Louisville to go completely insane. Add in the fact that their opponents will be their arch-rivals, the team that people either love more than life itself or despise more than anything in the universe, the Kentucky Wildcats…good God almighty. Louisville vs. Kentucky in the Final 4 is the biggest thing to hit the Commonwealth since Makers’ Mark whiskey. These fanbases do not like each other one bit. There will be comments on this column from Kentucky fans wanting my head on a pike. I’m not even going to say anything bad about their team. They’ve got a damn good team that I picked to win the national championship heading into the tournament.

Anthony Davis, Terrence Jones & Michael Kidd-Gilchrist are beasts.

John Calipari gets great talent to play for him.

SBNation.com does have some awesome GIFs, I must say.

They’ll be tough to beat, but the one thing playing in Louisville’s favor is that all of the pressure will be on the Wildcats, whose fans will see anything less than a championship as a failure. Nobody expected the Cardinals to be here, and nobody expects them to beat Kentucky. Nobody believed in them! That seems to be enough in most sports these days. Will it be on Saturday? We’ll see.

On Sunday we’ve got the biggest wrestling show of the year. There’s plenty of news out there, but it seems that we’re running low on news that won’t instantly be refuted by WWE. We try our best, but it is what it is. Here at the Corner, we’ve never claimed to be 100% accurate, 100% trustworthy or 100% sober. However, we are 1000% Guapo, which we feel makes up for our deficiencies in other areas.

I think most of us remember Rock so fondly that we’ve created a myth of Rock that is far greater than the truth. We do the same thing with Michael Jordan. Don’t get me wrong, they’re both among the greatest…but we’ve turned them into Demigods, which causes heightened expectations that are hard to live up to. I think Rock is in the same spot as Jordan in 95. Everybody assumed would return to the Bulls as the exact same guy he was in 1993 and when it didn’t work out that way, some suggested Jordan was washed up. But once he had a summer to work on his game and a full training camp, Jordan came out firing in 96 and in some ways was superior to his previous incarnation. Rock has been away from wrestling for almost a decade and even though he’s technically been back a year, he’s never been truly back. Like Jordan returning from baseball, it’s unfair to expect Rock to just flip a switch and be that guy we loved so much a decade ago.

I still think he’s been fantastic- as has Cena (the IWC blames him for doing what Vince wants…totally unfair. Cena is a GREAT performer)- but if he could come back on the road for even a month, I bet we might not just see the Rock of old…but an even better Rock than before. Now that’s never going to happen, but I think we need to understand just how well Rock has done given the circumstances, rather than bemoan the fact that he’s not the same guy he was in 2002. – Ronnie

This is a very good point, and plays into the next comment we’ll discuss. Rock isn’t competing against the wrestlers of this era, he’s competing against himself and the memories we have of him from his prime. The Jordan comparison works too, because both men left their profession at the top of their game before people were ready to see them go. Jordan came back, got even better, and retired again before people were ready to see him go. Then he was with the Wizards, which was kind of like Hulk Hogan in WWE in the 2000s. People still loved him & bought his merchandise but he wasn’t up to Michael Jordan standards.

Now Jordan runs the Charlotte Bobcats, and that’s very similar to Hogan running TNA. It’s about as successful, too.

The stuff that The Rock is doing now is exactly the same stuff that had everyone in the IWC drooling years ago. It’s no different, but now they are trashing him. I don’t understand it. – Greg

Rock got his fair share of hate back in the day. I think this has been glossed over with revisionist history, but if you surfed wrestling websites in the late 90s & early 00s there was no shortage of people hating on Rock’s promos being too repetitive or complaining about his wrestling moves not being as crisp as other peoples‘. I remember that Eric S. & CRZ were especially bitter towards Rock and Scott Keith actually stood out as somebody that liked the guy. I think people understood why Rock was popular with the casual fans, but they didn’t want to go along with it.

Boy, couldn’t the last paragraph describe Rock’s opponent at WrestleMania if you changed the timeframe and put some different writers’ names in there?

Cook – you need to show DeMarco where to get all the good pix for the 5&1. – Overhaul of BANG

Just wait until Buggy returns to Versus on April 14. Greg is going to present the absolute worst pictures of her opponents that he can possibly find in order to give Buggy an edge. I’m not sure how much that will affect the voting, as I don’t know if people base their votes on the pictures Greg uses or their general feelings on the ladies. I would think the latter, but can’t say for sure. The results on that feature usually confuse me.

Mr. Steve Cook I got a question: I find it funny that WWE gladly excepts Maria Menounus and puts her a in wrestlemania match for no rhyme or reason. But your girl Michelle Beadle, who has annointed herself the unofficial WWE shill / fan chick, who wants to be in a match, gets ignored. I find this funny, I don’t know why.

What do you think Mr. Cook? – Big Lou

I can‘t say whether or not Michelle‘s ever had any talks with WWE, but I imagine getting ESPN to agree to let Michelle take time away from her duties with their network to train for & have a match at WrestleMania wouldn’t be the easiest thing in the world. I don’t think ESPN would be inclined to have their on-air talent associated with wrestling. They don’t mind hiring people that have been in wrestling before if they think they have the skills, but once they become part of ESPN you typically don’t see them back on WWE television. That’s probably the biggest reason she hasn’t done any business with WWE.

Menounos has been affiliated with NBCUniversal during her time with Access Hollywood (produced by NBCUniversal) & Extra (carried on NBCUniversal stations), so there’d be less red tape in arranging to have her make an appearance. She’s a bigger star than Beadle, who doesn’t have much recognition outside of the sports world since all she’s done has been in sports media. Maria hosts TV shows & has appeared in movies. She’s not any less of a wrestling fan than Beadle, as a website that she founded hosts Raw & SmackDown recap shows with people like Brian Kendrick & Maria Kanellis talking about the happenings on those shows. Menounos has plenty of “wrestling credibility” by celebrity standards, and her appearing on WM is something I don’t have any problem with.

I’m a bit down on Beads at the moment because she’s indicated on tweets during Raw that she is not a Daniel Bryan fan. I was very disappointed to read that. How can you not be a Daniel Bryan fan? I’d say she was more into muscular guys, but CM Punk’s her favorite wrestler so I don’t know what to make of it.

I’m actually intrigued by what they’re going to do with Tensai/A-Train/whatever. He’s spent some good time in Japan, got over pretty well there – if he can bring some of that experience back and put it to good use, then maybe he’ll be a solid addition to the roster. Of course, the ‘E will probably screw it up somehow, as they usually do… – Tony

Tensai isn’t a young man, but people were high on his work in Japan and there’s always a place for a monster heel in WWE. Some people say that it’ll be tough for people to take him seriously because of his previous WWE stint…but you could have said the same thing about Umaga or Mark Henry. A good portion of WWE’s fan base won’t remember Prince Albert, and those who don’t read the Internet don’t know that A-Train went to Japan and now he’s back. As usual, it’ll all come down to the booking, which is fair to question.

There is one video on youtube which pretty much sums up all of Sid’s awesomeness in a nutshell…

Go to about the 1:25 mark… – Guest#9244

This is pretty cool stuff. First of all, you have Sid hailing from “Anywhere he darn well pleases”, which is a pretty great hometown. His opponent is “Marvelous” Marc Mero, and I just find it great that he was using the “Marvelous” moniker before he became Johnny B. Badd. Plus, the moment Guest#9244 mentions. Also, you have Gordon Solie & Tony Schiavone on commentary. It’s good times.

Also, who can forget Sid’s face-off with Hulk Hogan after the 1992 Royal Rumble had concluded? A significant part of the live audience openly chanted for Sid and booed Hulk Hogan, which WWE initially overdubbed on the initial VHS video release (and later restored for the DVD Anthology release and other airings). – Nick M.

They didn’t give the fans enough credit on that deal. Everybody knew that the Royal Rumble was every man for himself and the winner was going to be the WWF Champion, so the fans understood why Sid threw Hogan out. He was trying to win the match! Hogan whining & complaining about it proved that either he didn’t know the rules or didn’t think they applied to him, and he assisted Ric Flair in winning the match. I guess they assumed the crowd would side with Hulk Hogan just because he was Hulk Hogan, but the fans had grown tired of Hulk and were looking for somebody else to get behind.

Then Sid failed a drug test before WrestleMania VIII and he decided to leave rather than serve a suspension. It’s an interesting “what if” scenario…what if Sid passed his drug test, stuck around and became WWF’s top star after Hogan left? Sid wouldn’t have gone back to WCW & gotten pushed there until he had a brawl with Arn Anderson. Certainly Bret Hart would have had to wait longer for his shot on top of the company, and perhaps it never would have come. Would he have gone somewhere else? Lots of potential fallout there.

“-I do like that they brought back the old-school interview stage for it. They need to do that more often.”

I like that they brought back the old school interview itself. A lot of these guys with poor mic skills would look a lot better if they had someone to prompt them and play off of. – Guest#8618

Gene Okerlund was the best of all time at this, and the people that have followed him in the role of backstage interviewer haven’t been close. Today’s interviewers generally look like they’re about to piss themselves whenever they talk to a wrestler and don’t have much to offer than “What are your thoughts?” I think Scott Stanford has shown potential in this role, but they have Josh Mathews doing most of the interviews because he’s more cosmetically appealing. It’s another aspect of the show where WWE thinks appearance matters more than competence, so you have prettier people doing things half as well as their predecessors.

Let’s be honest, there’s no chance in hell a younger Gene Okerlund would get hired by WWE in 2012. He was bald by the time he was 30 and had a goofy looking mustache. They wouldn’t go for that.

I feel compelled to defend Rick Patino here.

I live about 15 minutes from the KFC Yum! Center across the bridge in Indiana. I saw Louisville smash IUPUI earlier this year. – go Cards

The Louisville fan base has been split on Rick Pitino ever since the events in 2003 that were revealed in 2009 that led to extortion, court cases, embarrassing court testimony, and general foolishness. I think most would have forgiven him if the extortion didn’t take place during the 2009 NCAA Tournament…as much as Pitino would argue otherwise, it had to be a tremendous distraction and play a role in his coaching not being up to par in the Elite 8 game against Michigan State. A couple of first-round exits didn’t help his cause, and this season didn’t look like it would be much better with injuries that people blamed on Pitino‘s practice methods. Now that they’ve won the Big East Tournament & made their way to the Final Four when nobody other than Brie Bella was expecting it, Pitino can reclaim his title of Basketball Genius and no Cardinal fan can ever question him or his methods again.

I’ll still make a joke about his sex life every once in awhile though. Just like with Bill Clinton, I kid because I care.

“nobody bought into him (DDP) wanting to be with Sara instead of Kimberly”

Really? That’s pretty stupid. Stalking isn’t always just about attraction or even sex. It can be about enjoying the feeling of power and the fear the stalker inspires. Honestly, just saying “I don’t buy it, his wife is hot” is really, really naive. – JB

I am more than ok with being really, really naïve when it comes to stalking. I don’t need to know everything.

I’m so amped for Lord Tensai.

Bring in Karl Anderson in blackface, call him Boogooloo Jones, team him with LT as the 21st century East-West Connection…. – RVMC

If Anderson gets a contract…eh, it’s still a horrible idea, but the ends justify the means.

And now, the fake news!

WWE news this week…there was a lot of weirdness going on. A lot of rumors came out, like Mick Foley being on Team Teddy, FCW closing its doors, all sorts of madness. Most of it ended up not happening. I’m not going to waste my time clearing up rumors that didn’t end up happening, so this section’s a lot shorter than it usually is.

Alberto Del Rio will not be competing at WrestleMania this year. He told the media during an appearance in Puerto Rico over the weekend that at one point he was scheduled to wrestle Randy Orton, and then he was supposed to be part of Team Johnny, but he was told recently that he would no longer be in the match. He teamed with Ricardo Rodriguez on the show against Epico & Primo and Zack Ryder & Mason Ryan, and was said to look in good shape during the match. The speculation is that ADR isn’t quite 100% and they don’t want to rush him back for a spot in a 12-man tag team match.

Evan Bourne had a pretty big setback in his quest to return from two Wellness-induced suspensions last week, as he broke his foot in four places & dislocated it in five in an automobile accident. He’ll be out of action indefinitely, and the odds of him returning to WWE and getting some sort of push continue to diminish. One hopes that Evan’s accident wasn’t aided by a drug-induced stupor, but I’m sure that’s the first thing that popped into everybody’s mind when they read this. The last thing we need is another wrestler going into a Matt Hardyesque self-destruction binge, especially one like Evan Bourne that had the potential to be a solid hand for WWE for years to come and did some of the cooler flippy moves that you’ll see.

The Rock tweeted a picture of himself applying the Sharpshooter on some fool while training for his match with John Cena. Bret Hart saw the picture, noticed Rock was applying it wrong, and offered to teach him how to do it. If he’d noticed this a decade ago he would have saved the Internet a lot of whining & complaining.

Dean Ambrose also mocked Rock’s Sharpshooter. I think Ambrose has a ton of potential, but stuff like this is why Rock started telling people to know their role and shut their mouth.

Maria Menounos broke a rib while training for Dancing With The Stars, but Raw indicated that they still expect her to compete at WrestleMania. I wouldn’t expect her to do too much anyway, but this could be something to keep an eye on through the week.

Rowdy Roddy Piper will be at WrestleMania 28, but will not be hosting a Piper’s Pit segment. This is fine with me, as it’s one less thing to take twenty minutes away from the matches.

WWE held a meeting for its performers about Twitter and the proper use of hashtags. They want the WWE Superstars to use WWE-approved hash tags so their followers will use them too and it will help WWE benefit more from social media. CM Punk asked his Twitter followers to shoot him during the meeting, and Chris Jericho tweeted a picture of himself looking like an audience during an Al Snow promo.

(Is it just me or has the world been lacking in Al Snow jokes ever since he & Mick Foley stopped working for the same company? I like Al, but I think we need to bring them back. #AlSnowJokes)

Layla is expected to return after WrestleMania and is in line for a big push. She was said to do well in her return performance in FCW some time ago. WWE officials are impressed with her because of her dedication to improving in the ring, and…well, do I really need to tell you why else?

Michael Cole is now entering to Kerwin White’s old entrance music. It was tough to find this theme on YouTube without people talking over it…this was the best I could find:

Pretty awesome stuff, yeah? Not enough to make me want to see Cole, but at least he has good taste in music.

Kelly Kelly will miss the WWE Hall of Fame ceremony to attend the Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards. She’s up for the honor of “Favorite Buttkicker”. The other candidates are Jessica Alba, Tom Cruise & Taylor Lautner. My guesss: they wanted Cena, WWE wanted him at the HOF, so they gave them somebody that didn’t particularly need to be there. It’s a shame that Kelly will miss out on the HOF induction of her favorite 80s wrestler, Arn Anderson.

Speaking of the Hall of Fame, the official inductors were announced during Raw. No huge surprises here…

Edge: Christian
Mil Mascaras: Alberto Del Rio
Four Horsemen: Dusty Rhodes
Mike Tyson: Triple H & Shawn Michaels
Ron Simmons: JBL
Yokozuna: The Usos

Nothing too far outside the box here. There is a lack of celebrity inductors this year, but for the most part there’s some big wrestling names there. And the Usos, but that’s cool since I like the Usos.

-Caught part of the Rock vs. Cena special before the show. The kids talking about John Cena being cool because of his different colors & being on Fruity Pebbles was pretty epic.

-Booker T joins Cole & Lawler this week. I wonder if this means Lawler’s lost his voice again.

-Man, if Bryan loses the World title at WrestleMania I’m going to miss him yelling WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION. Will he still yell YES!?

-Orton & Sheamus take on Kane & Bryan. I guess their plan to make me care about Orton & Kane involves putting Bryan in a match with them.

-Bryan pins Sheamus! YES YES YES YES YES YES

-OK, it happened after a Kane choke slam and after AJ got in the ring to protect her man. What about it?

-Cole is the official commentator for Team Johnny. Are they selling Team Johnny t-shirts?

-Vickie Guerrero is the flag bearer! Tremendous!

-David Otunga is your team captain. Not the choice I would have gone with for leadership, but whatevs.

-Atlanta’s Teddy’s old stomping grounds, no surprise he’s popular here.

-Santino is the captain for Team Teddy, while Hornswoggle is the flag bearer. I don’t think I’d vote Santino for captain of my sock drawer.

-The Miz emerges during some post-match foolishness to take Santino out, and now he’s on Team Johnny! Better that than him running down during the main event for no reason.

-Did you know that Undertaker & Triple H will meet at WrestleMania in Hell in a Cell? Me neither.

-Madonna sings one of the WrestleMania theme songs.

-Kelly Kelly vs. Eve. No mention of Maria Menounos’ broken rib, so they must figure on her being good to go for the show.

-Kelly wins. It was a match. Kelly grunted a lot, even more than she usually does. I think she’s been watching Maria Sharapova tennis matches for inspiration.

-This is Christian’s first match back on TV, right? I missed SmackDown last week, so I’m not 100% sure on this.

-Chris Jericho reports that CM Punk’s mother is a good person, but Punk is in fact a bastard since his parents were married after he was born. This is not good news for Christian, as Punk proceeds to beat the crap out of him.

-Will Christian be able to perform at WrestleMania? Perhaps ADR’s not out of luck after all…

-Yup, looks like Christian’s going to be out for WM. Will he still induct Edge into the Hall of Fame?

-FUNKASAURUS

-Curt Hawkins does not look impressed. He’s been here before. He knows Brodus is gonna get him.

-“Yeah get the girls back in there” says Lawler. Probably not the first time he’s said that during his trip to Atlanta.

-Big Show vs. Primo! Primo has Rosa with him, so even if he gets squashed by Show most of us would like to be him.

-I like how WWE is forcing the FCW wrestlers to tweet during Raw.

-Does Cody have any more Big Show WrestleMania highlights to show?

-Drew McIntyre will be taking Christian’s place on Team Johnny. Nice to see Drew get on the show…hope he isn’t taken out on SmackDown.

-The NWF is running a Body Bag match Saturday night! I don’t think they’ll do well against Louisville vs. Kentucky. I wouldn’t miss that game if the NWF booked Terra Calaway on their show. I mean, Terra’s my girl and all, but this is Louisville vs. Kentucky in the Final Four we’re talking about.

-Who’s the other guy in the Lord Tensai video?

-Smooth move, Zack.

-Eve promises to celebrate after WrestleMania with Zack Ryder. That has about as much chance of happening as Eve hooking up with me after WrestleMania.

-Somebody is about to get their ass kicked & their wig split.

-And it’s Great Khali. Watching him walk down to the ring makes my legs hurt.

-Henry should take him out of the WM match for his own good.

-Teddy’s about to enter the Hall of Pain! But no, Booker T breaks up the World’s Strongest Slam attempt! I think Team Teddy may have a new member!

-Indeed, Booker T is the final member. The rumor was that Mick Foley was going to be the final man, but Booker’s in better shape so I approve.

-Rock milks the crowd reaction to show the boys backstage who’s drawing these crowds.

-Yup, Civil War Pie is trending worldwide.

-Atlanta has a tough time deciding on chants.

-Cena is right, we do know he will win at WrestleMania.

-Should Cena be bragging that WWE hasn’t been as popular with him on top?

-USA doesn’t like the phrase “goddamn”.

-Cena promises to kick Rock’s ass, Rock promises to kick Cena’s ass. Buy the PPV!

-Not a bad standoff between Rock & Cena there.

-Larry Csonka tells me that Vince re-wrote it during the day…that doesn’t strike me as anything new, and it’s indicative of the state of WWE. They are capable of doing great things. The Cena/Rock build overall has done its job. Triple H vs. Undertaker has been good for most people. But once they get past one or two storylines it just doesn’t seem like they have any idea what they want to do. That’s the biggest problem with WWE. They think they have a vision, but they change it every few weeks. Most of their roster spins their wheels in the same spots they’ve always been in because WWE only cares about Cena vs. Rock & Triple H vs. Undertaker. Maybe Jericho vs. Punk. Even the Johnny vs. Teddy feud, which has gotten a large amount of TV time, has changes being made every day. How many people were rumored to be on these teams over the last week?

I still think WrestleMania will be a good show, but this show didn’t do a whole lot to sell people on it.

Not a lot of TNA news this week, and the little there is doesn’t sound so great. There have been talks of TNA having financial difficulties, which pretty much everybody is these days. I know I’m having financial difficulties. There’s lots of talk going on, but I think it all comes down to the last line of the news item that Larry Csonka posted yesterday:

But with more wrestlers having their pay delayed, it is causing concern that TNA’s corporate office is taking a closer look at the numbers.

Back in 2010, Janice Carter took control of the company’s finances to cut back on her daughter Dixie’s spending. This is probably why TNA doesn’t sign every single person that leaves WWE anymore. Wrestling is a business, and at some point you had to know that Panda Energy wouldn’t be willing to keep pouring money into TNA with no effect. Janice reportedly only allows TNA what’s “deemed necessary” in terms of funding so they can keep financial losses to a minimum. Of course that leads to the question of what’s “deemed necessary”, and I won’t pretend to know the answer to that.

Lower-card wrestlers and the Knockouts appear to wait the longest for their pay, as the tippy top guys like Sting, Kurt Angle & folks like that are always paid on time. Sends a good message to the locker room, but as long as these wrestlers get paid what they’re told they’re going to get paid, I don’t think it’s worth throwing a fit over.

The reports seem to suggest that people getting paid late has happened more often since Bruce Prichard took over the Talent Relations department. I don’t know if Bruce is in charge of paying people, or giving them their money, or if somebody just wants to complain about Bruce to the sheets. (That happens sometimes) Prichard does have bigger issues on his plate, as he’s recovering from a heart attack that took place last week while he was having two stents placed in his heart. Prichard is recovering well, but one can’t help but wonder if having all of these TNA responsibilities on his plate is good for him. He’s heading up the Talent Relations & Creative departments, and heading up one of those departments for a wrestling company is enough to drive most people over the edge. Hopefully he takes it easy for a bit and fully recovers.

Jeff Hardy is appearing at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk for Spring Break. Well, if he can overcome the temptation of Spring Break, maybe this whole sober thing for him will actually work out.

We have some good Taeler Hendrix news to report this week…she’ll be part of the newest incarnation of Gorgeous Ladies Of Wrestling. GLOW was a cult favorite during the 1980s featuring lady wrestlers in various gimmicks & campy segments played for laughs. Promotions like WOW & Wrestlicious followed in its footsteps, and now GLOW is returning under new ownership. I wouldn’t expect the product to be too much different than it was in the 1980s, and it’s tough to predict any long-term success for it because women comedy promotions never seem to last too long, but it’s always nice to have a promotion out there for the woman wrestlers to work at, get paid and have a good time.

Taeler will be wrestling under the name Vanessa Hendrix Wundor, and has been hyped as the protégé of Melody Trouble Vixen, a rock & roll chick from the original series. It makes sense, Taeler’s style is very similar to Melody’s, and even though it took me a few minutes I understand the initials. I’ve heard that at least one of the DeMarcettes will also be involved in GLOW, so expect this group to get a lot of 411 love in the next couple of months. They hold television tapings on April 16 in Las Vegas…no word yet on what TV outlet it will be appearing on.

Former Cincinnati Bengal Antwan Odom will be serving as a special guest referee on the Alabama Wrestling Federation’s show this Saturday night. He’ll be overseeing the action when Heidenreich & Joey “The Body” Barrett take on Doink the Clown & Chuckles (w/Grave Digger). This next joke is funny every other year: Odom obviously has plenty of experience dealing with clowns, having negotiated a contract with the Bengals front office.

Bert Sugar passed away over the weekend at the age of 75. Not only was Sugar one of boxing’s foremost historians, he was also somebody the mainstream media relied on for quotes & information about wrestling. He co-wrote The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Professional Wrestling with Lou Albano and appeared on some WWE Home Video documentaries. You’ve probably seen him at some point, he was the older gentleman with the fedora on his head & cigar in his hand talking about the old days. I was surprised he was only 75, as he looked at least that old the first time I saw him in the 1990s.

I’ll be returning to MMA Fact or Fiction tomorrow to continue my mission to become a two-time winner of the MMA Tournament of Great Significance. Speaking of MMA, I should be appearing on a podcast this week with MMA Zone writers Jeremy Lambert & Todd Bergman over at mancavethoughts.com. It hasn’t been confirmed by all parties yet, but the plan is to talk WrestleMania 28, NFL news and Louisville Cardinals basketball. I’m listening to Jeremy & Todd’s last podcast as I write this part of the column, and it’s pretty good stuff. Looking forward to being part of it!

The 411 on Wrestling featured Larry Csonka & your humble correspondent speaking with NWA National Champion Chance Prophet, who’ll be in action this Thursday night in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida at NWA Ring Warriors Battle of the Belts. We’ll be back this Friday night with a WrestleMania preview!

The Greg DeMarco Show featured interviews with ROH’s Tomasso Ciampa & DGUSA’s Larry Dallas. I was quite impressed with Dallas, as I was inclined not to like him due to things I’d read on the Interweb & drama involving myself and people he associates with. He actually seems like a solid dude with an interesting take on pro wrestling. Good times. Greg will be back on Tuesday night at 10:30 with Andy Critchell & a cast of thousands!

Fact or Fiction pitted Stephen Randle against Andy Clark in a discussion of Maria Menounos, Tim Tebow & other wrestling-related topics.

Wright ranks the heels.

Renken writes about Stan Stasiak. Stasiak’s son Shawn would be another example of why not every second-generation wrestler is destined to be a star, though the Planet Stasiak gimmick was funny.

Weyer talks Hogan vs. Rock. I disagree with his assertion that Hogan should have won the match, as it would have made people grow tired of him even quicker than they did.

The WrestleMania Countdown continues! Yesterday we looked at WrestleMania 21, and today it’s WrestleMania 22! Both have some Steve Cook involvement, as did WrestleMania 20.

Well, that’s all we have time for this week! Nick Marsico will be in tomorrow with the WedWi, and I’ll be back next week with more News From Cook’s Corner! Until then…