Ask 411 Wrestling 10.08.08: International Edition

BANNER!

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Cleaning Up

Regarding football players: Missed a few, but not surprising: Ricky Ortiz, Hacksaw Jim Duggan, Wahoo McDaniel, Bronco Nagurski, Heidenreich, Manny Fernandez, Lex Luger, Tito Santana.

Regarding home town wins: Of course, Trish won her retirement match, for the title and in her home town. An unheard-of honour for the most improved female wrestler of all time

Regarding Snuka as part of the Anoa’i family: Some people should chill and read the whole answer before jumping on things.

Regarding Marc Mero: I don’t know why but I always mix up the 45 and the SSP. The TKO debate is an interesting one because both arguments make sense. Anyone want to go ask Marc? While you’re at it, point out to him that including people like Owen on his Death List is pretty crass, since his death was in no way linked to the issue he is pushing, namely pro wrestling causing people to do steroids.

That will do us for the corrections, so let’s move smoothly on along? Are we ready for some trivia? Then Let’s Get DANGEROUS~!

Question Time!

Bob starts us off with a question about a legend:

Been reading this column for years, across many different writers. This is my first time asking a question. What is the condition of Magnum T.A.? Can he walk around without a cane now? Did he get worse? I know he has made occasional indy appearances, but I have never heard how he is doing.

Last I heard he was on crutches following back surgery. He owns his own construction business near Charlotte and has made appearances backstage at a couple of WWE events. The wrestling community has been good to Magnum, holding several tribute and benefit events in his honour. I have not heard if the surgery improved his condition at all.

Creepy Old Young Man has some Dwayne Johnson questions on behalf of a friend:

Now, I am not a Rock fan, but a buddy of mine asked me some questions that I did not have the answers to, so I decided to use Ask411 for what it’s for. So here’s a few Rock related questions for you…

1. When was the first time The Rock used his, “You Smell What The Rock Is Cooking” entrance music? Did it début on Raw? Did it début on a PPV?
2. When was the first time The Rock asked if you smelled what he was cooking?
3. When did The Rock first start using “The People’s Eyebrow” consistently?
4. When did The Rock first start referring to himself in the third person?

All of these happened around the same time: when he turned heel, joined the Nation and started usurping Faarooq. It sprung to prominence when The Rock gave all the Nation gifts. Faarooq got a portrait of the Rock and everyone else got Rolexes. Those were the days…

Fred is apparently bringing us questions from down under, where women blow and men chunder. I love Aussies, even if they do call me “Pommie bastard”.

Giday mate love the column
I’ve got three questions for you from the early 2000s

1.with the return of R-truth I’ve been having flash backs of K-Kwik now can u plz tell me what idiot came up with that gimik and why it failed so badly

Well I can’t pin this one on Russo: Killings wasn’t called up to the main roster until 2001 and Russo was gone by then. I don’t think the gimmick was bad or that it failed, he was just around at a bad time: right around the Invasion. With all these new faces showing up. Killings got shuffled behind the back burner and was released. And if you think K-Kwik was bad, his name in XPW was K. Malik Shabazz. No, seriously.

2.What exactly was the idea around the brood

The idea? They were Gothic warriors, followers of vampirism. Sound familiar? Gangrel was the clear leader and Edge and Christian were his followers, after Christian debuted as a heel against a face Edge (playing an angry young man gimmick at the time) and eventually turned Edge to join the group. They also had what is widely considered the greatest entrance ever.

3.Why did the brood Version 1 fall through ( i believe that Christian and edge where apart of it)

Couple of reasons. Mainly because Gangrel was and still is a legit follower of vampirism, and Edge and Christian were…a touch spooked by the whole situation, Creative decided to go ahead and split them up. There was also a thought that Edge and Christian were going to be huge, and would be better off getting out from under Gangrel’s shadow.

Damien continues the trend of asking me what was said in the ring:

I was wondering if you knew what The Rock was telling Stone Cold Steve Austin after their Wrestlemania 19 match was over in the ring while Austin was on his back. It seems like The Rock was telling him something, patted him a couple of times on the chest, and then got up.

There are at most 3 people who know for sure what was said, and since I am not Austin, The Rock or the referee I am not one of them. I can make an educated guess that Rock thanked Austin for putting him over in a solid match, and possibly talked about giving the fans something to remember.

Isaac takes us back to the time of high tops, flat tops and tube tops:

Great article.  I did some 80’s DVD watching this weekend and came up with a few for you to contemplate / clear up.

In the World’s Greatest Wrestling Managers DVD, there is a clip with Heenan and Perfect holding up one of the old tag team belts.  What’s that about?  Perfect wasn’t a tag champ, unless they did a phantom switch or something.

This is back when Flair first came to WWF and they were working the “Real World’s champion” angle with him. As he still had physical possession of the NWA title belt (he wouldn’t give it up until he got his $25,000 deposit back) he would appear on TV showing it off. The NWA had an injunction to stop WWF from displaying it on TV so the title was blurred. Once Flair did return the belt, they switched to an old tag title belt which was still being blurred out.

– Is it really true that Jerry Lawler holds victories over Andre, Flair and Hogan?  I’d assume any of those victories involved shenanigans of some sort, and Lawler booking himself like the star he isn’t.

Don’t be so quick to write off Jerry’s star power. He is HUGE in the mid south, especially Tennessee. His bid to become mayor of Memphis was a serious one and could well have succeeded. He has a tag team victory over both Ric Flair and Triple H (with Shawn Michaels as his partner) on a house show in 2003, and his WWE.com profile states he holds a victory over Hogan (and Terry Funk), but I could not find any record of a match with Andre. He does hold victories over Randy Savage and Bret Hart though.

When Lawler beat Texas Tornado for the WCCW belt, was that the end of that promotion, or was there a re-match shortly afterwards to restore order?  I do have the WCCW DVD somewhere, but haven’t got around to watching it and don’t know much about that fed.

Well, it was and it wasn’t the end. Lawler beat Kerry for the title twice, and the second time marked the first folding of WCCW. It was revived in several forms over the following 3 or 4 years but never took hold, mainly because most of the big stars had died or moved on. Jerry Jarrett bought WCCW and merged it with CWA before the title unification in 1989, but the matches continued for a little while under the WCCW name.

Senthil continues this week’s international flavour with some questions from India, home of Small’s man-crush and the second-greatest batsman in the last 30 years:

I was watching a clip in youtube. It might be something you guys have discussed a lot, but I never saw any matches from WCW(as I am from India, we can watch only WWF/E. WCW wasn’t telecast there). So the question…It was some PPV and the match was Y2J Vs Goldberg. Y2J is shown backstage and he starts with two guys with HUUUUGE bellies walking his way and opening several doors but the doors lead to the parking lot etc and he seems to be lost on his way to the ring. At last he makes to the ring and tries to mock Goldberg’s entrance, but the fireworks doesn’t start..Then he kicks it and goes to ring and match starts after some time. The match was a very short one ans Goldberg taps to the Liontamer. My questions are

1. Did Jericho really loose his way to the ring? Wont there be guys who signal him to the correct path?

Jericho did not lose his way to the ring. The whole thing was an elaborate joke and meant to make fun of Goldberg’s entrance, during which someone would knock on his dressing room door and he would be escorted through the backstage area by (normally) 4 security personnel. Then he’d come through the curtain and stand on the entrance ramp in a shower of pyrotechnics, which you seem to know about. Jericho getting lost was further proof that he is one of the 3 best goofy heels in wrestling history (with Kurt Angle and Kai en Tai).

As an aside, Jericho did not beat the real Goldberg. In fact, the real Goldberg never tapped out to anyone. It was in fact a random little person dressed as Goldberg, and they did this 4 times in total with Jericho claiming to be 4-0 against Goldberg. One of the guys with the belly was the legendary Ralphus, the other was the Jericho Ninja. The occurrence to which you are referring was at Fall Brawl. Here, see:

2. Did the fireworks malfunction or was it meant to make Jericho look like an idiot?

It was meant to make him look like a cheap knockoff. As an aside, WWF tried a whole gimmick that made fun of Goldberg (Gillberg), which was hilarious and had guys standing either side of the entrance ramp with sparklers in their hands.

3. I heard that Jericho and Goldberg had some real fight backstage..Is that after this match or before? Can you please explain me the real life incident?

Jericho confirmed the fight happened, it was well after the parodies and took place when both were in WWE. Goldberg mentioned something about Jericho needing to learn how to sell better…hang on:

There goes the irony meter. Anyway, Goldberg told Nash to take liberties with Jericho. Jericho heard about it and took Goldberg down with a front facelock. No punches were thrown and it was quickly broken up. Apparently they were able to function well enough together after that incident as they had a match at Bad Blood.

John has some more old questions:
Long time reader, long time watching WWE/F and have a few questions that always had me scratching my head:
1. I remember watching Todd Pettingill and that other woman(Melissa something) on Saturday mornings, and remember Todd was about to introduce a match with Crush. He then went on to say Crush had been fired due to guns being found in his house. Was this true? It seemed a bit strange at the time and after he announced it he just moved on to the next match up as if it was just a run of the mill incident.
“That other woman” is now Mrs Shane McMahon and her name is Marissa, by the way. Crush wasn’t actually fired for the incident, but he did do jail time for having an illegal stun gun in his home, along with steroids. Go figure. He was obviously off air during this time, and when he came back it was worked into his character.

2. When Ken Shamrock was feuding with the Corporate Ministry, I remember he called Taker out but actually called him Mark. Did he get any punishment for this as with what was asked about wrestlers being called by real names last time.

He didn’t get punished because it fit in perfectly with his anger and the way the angle was written. This was at a time when shoots and insider comments were still new and cool, so although it was almost certainly a slip, it was allowed to slide.

3. I’m sure it’s been asked before, but when I was a kid WCW came to Ireland on St.Patricks Day. It was billed as the “St Patricks Day Bash”. Anyway, WCW was rarely shown on tv in Ireland back then, so the only guys I knew of were Sting, Vader & British Bulldog(although I knew Vinnie Vegas looked familiar when he turned up as Diesel!) In the main event Sting beat Vader for the WCW heavyweight title. It was a shock to everyone as even back then we knew titles hardly changed hands especially big titles. Vader won it back a few days later in England, but I’m sure it was mentioned on WCW. Why doesn’t Vince ever do this, even with the US/IC titles, it would give a bit more credibility to the European tours instead of just booking them like house shows.
On a side note the best thing about that event was the announcer frantically telling everyone to get out of the ring when it was invaded by 60 odd kids after the main event!

Vince does do it every now and then, he’s cut down on it a lot since removing the European title from circulation though. The problem with putting a title change on a house show is that very few people will get to see it. Vince is all about money, and barring an injury changing titles in front of even a big house show is throwing money away. The scenario you mentioned, with the guy who lost the title winning it back a few days later, is often viewed as cheapening both the title and the title win for the guy who gets it for 4 days.
 
4. Last one, I’ve only ever met 3 wrestlers. Million Dollar Man, Regal & Finlay. Finlay came across as being grumpy while Regal & DiBiase were great. Do wrestlers actually enjoy meet & greets or is it just a pain for most of them to take time out of their schedule for a few hours. It also bugs me that you always have to purchase merchandise such as a WWE book or Video Game to gain access to meet them

There are so many variables in relation to this. Some wrestlers are in fact pricks, so they resent these sessions. However for the most part the wrestlers will not show it, even if they would rather be anywhere but there, since the sessions are a great source of income for them and help them get over with fans. Things like a long and tough tour, a bad mood, following kayfabe if you’re a heel, difficult or smarkish or annoying fans and even being stiffed by the organiser of the event could make the guy you just paid to see seem annoying. I can see your point about buying the merchandise, however the company putting on the event (normally a retailer who has paid the wrestler and/or WWE for the appearance) has to recoup their costs somehow. I have very limited experience at these signings, and the last one I was at (Lance Storm and Bushwacker Luke) was very reasonable. I saw Lance signing DVDs from the RoH show he wrestled on, action figure boxes, magazines and even 8x10s of other guys with him on it for free. The only charge was for the photos and t-shirts he brought with him, which you were not required to buy.

Stewart has a question only loosely related to wrestling, but I shall answer it anyway:

Love your column i read it every week. first time question. Ok so last night im watching a new episode of the american version of Ramsey’s kitchen nightmares. They renovated a Long Island bar into Long Islands first gastro-pub. 1 of the guests on the show was the guy from twisted sister who after the grand re-opening of this place invited some of his friends to join him there for dinner this is towards the end of the show. 1 of his guests there looked exactly like Mick Foley but it was not credited on the show. After watching wrestling the past 25 years i can tell you i know foley. Can you tell me was that mick foley or have am i wrong ?

It was Foley. Not only does Mick live on Long Island, he is very close friends with the lead singer of Twisted Sister. So it makes perfect sense for him to be there.

Tarek has a series of great questions:

I will add to your ever increasing pop by saying great job on the column. I have some questions to ask.

1. In ECW why are they debuting so many talents when they are not using Elijah Burke. He is good on the mic, great look and is not awful in ring? I mean whats he doing not on TV? I mean he is never on TV. Not even to job.

Excellent question, and one to which nobody seems to have an answer. He’s not even being used on house shows, there have been no reports of heat, failed drug tests or being demoted to developmental (he’s not showing on any FCW cards either), and he hasn’t been fired. I’ve said before in my Sunday news column that I think they are overloading us on debuts, and like you say not using Elijah is a conundrum.

2. Where are the following talents: Mark Jindrak, Luther Reigns, Mohammed Hassan, Maven and Justice Smith?

I wouldn’t go so far as to call Justice Smith a talent, but he’s working on American Gladiators right now. Mark Jindrak is still wrestling, making appearances as far afield as Europe and Japan. He had far more talent than he was ever allowed to show (as did Palumbo and O’Haire) and would have been a solid midcarder. Reigns is also still wrestling in the Indys, including with Scott Norton’s Wild West Championship Wrestling. He’s doing some work as a bodyguard too because really, would you fuck with him? Maven works for the Home Shopping Network and does the odd show for Hermie Sadler’s UWF. Mark Copani (Mohammed Hassan) is done with wrestling and is currently working as a writer.

3. When the WWE make someone a champion for the first time why do they seem to always book them weak? Rey, CM Punk, Edge (first time), Eddie, Jericho, Khali and Orton (first time). The only ones in recent memory that made it as first time champs are Cena, Batista and JBL. Now I can understand the arguments to be made with Rey being an underdog but come on how can they expect someone to get over especially a face if he does not win clean and jobs on the reg? Its so annoying. Plus I see that this kind of action and story telling is hurts the value of the belt. Do you agree?

While I think making your champion look weak CAN hurt the value of the belt, I don’t agree that Eddie and to a lesser extent Khali were booked to look weak on their title runs. The others did and the reasoning behind it is as confusing as your first question. Edge and Jericho were heels for their first wins, while Punk and Orton were faces so you can’t say it was a face/heel thing. However, the cowardly heel champ who retains cheaply is an accepted booking policy, so that kind of excuses Jericho and Edge. Orton and Jericho both dropped to HHH, but Edge dropped to Cena and Punk to Jericho so again, it’s not a politics thing.

There is no hard and fast answer, it seems. In Orton’s case, it was a litmus test for a face turn and a title run (neither of which he proved to be ready for) and also a way to get the “youngest-ever champion” accolade off Brock Lesnar and on to someone they still liked. Rey was booked as an underdog who found ways to win, Eddie’s whole gimmick was lying, cheating and stealing, Edge was the chicken shit heel. CM Punk was supposed to be portrayed as a plucky, never-give-up champion who won despite being beaten down, but he came off as a flukey guy who wasn’t capable of dominating anyone.

4. Taker why does he not job? I don’t care what anyone says that he makes people look good because he really doesn’t. He wins every feud he is in and never puts anyone over. Orton, Cena, Batista, Edge. These matches he has he always seems to win the last match in the feud hence he gets the rub not the other guy. I know he is respected and has a lot of value but seriously I cant rate Edge that high any more because he was made to look weak against Taker at SummerSlam. I know the argument that he kicked out of the last ride but he was beaten with a Tombstone, not two but only one. He was chokeslammed through the ring and injured so bad that he hasn’t appeared on TV since. Taker was fine after his match…. how does this make Edge not look weak? Taker does not need any rub or overness as he is more over than HBK. Does not make any sense. Please let me know why.

It’s partly the Legend effect – the man is the biggest name left active in professional wrestling. Most non-wrestling fans, or even people who used to watch, will remember Taker and ask if he still wrestles. They know Hogan doesn’t, they know The Rock doesn’t. Taker seems to be remembered more than even Austin. We’re talking about a guy who gets 4-minute PPV entrances simply because they pop the crowd. Beating the Undertaker even once can do wonders for your career. Edge’s feud with Taker didn’t make Edge look weak at all, in fact it was some of his best heel work to date and when he comes back it will be fascinating to see how he works. Unlike people like Ric Flair and Mick Foley whose later years were devalued by losing to all and sundry, beating Taker still means something and that’s because it rarely happens.

The Biesel wants to know if wrestling has audibles.

Great column…keep up the good work.
 
Question…do wrestlers know the outcome of their matches leading up to the PPV, like when they’re going through the storyline and doing promos? Or do they find out the night of the event, or even right before they walk through the curtain.

Depends. It used to be that events were planned long in advance, and in fact Vince McMahon was known to plan Wrestlemania a year ahead and work everything in between to get to his final destination. In recent years though Vince has started changing and rechanging his plans over and over again. This is likely because he is always trying to score one over the internet marks who read spoilers. One famous example would be the time leading up to WrestleMania XX, when Rey, Kurt Angle and Orton were all rumoured to be winning at various times and the decision was allegedly made right before the match started.
 
In addition to that, has there ever been any famous incidents where the outcome got changed right at the last second, or even during the match (and how they find out it’s been changed if they’re in the ring)? Has any wrestler ever found out at the last minute and tried not to go through with it?

Well there’s that minor incident in Montreal in 1997, which wasn’t set in stone until just before Michaels went to the ring, and even Hebner didn’t know what was happening until the Sharpshooter was applied. I’m pretty sure there’s a really famous example that is completely slipping my mind right now, so hopefully one of the readers can grab it.

The Way I C It…

This week’s opinion seeker is Ange, and they’re really good ones:

1) A while ago this column was asked what the best promo of all time was, and I believe it came down to Dusty Rhodes’ Hard Times narrowly edging out Mick Foley’s Cane Dewey. So we now know what the best face promo and the best heel promo of all time are (at least according to this column’s staff), but they’re both rather serious promos. What, in your opinion, is the best comedic promo of all time? I would humbly submit Chris Jericho’s Man of 1004 Holds, but I would not be surprised if The Rock or one of the other comedic greats has a better one.

Jericho’s is my favourite. I also enjoyed his introduction of the competitors in the Cruiserweight Battle Royal. The Rock has some classics, including his impersonation of all 5 opponents in the Armageddon 2000 6-man Hell in a Cell match, his tag team verbal beatdown with Jericho of Stephanie, and his backstage promo with Kane and Hogan on the nWo. Angle also cut a great promo prior to that Hell in a Cell, but I have never been able to find it, and he had that goofy-funny promo he cut on Rey Misterio. The nWo Horsemen parody was hilarious too. I still think 1004 holds tops them all, at least for now. Santino might get there one day.

2)What would you recommend as the single best match with which to get a person into pro wrestling? As in, I have a friend who respects that I like the stuff but is sceptical about it himself. What match should I show him in order to convince him that pro wrestling can be badass> and not just “sweaty men rolling around for 20 minutes”?

Wow. Amazing question. First, I’m going to rule out any match from an Indy. Although the in-ring action may be technically better, you do NOT want to have someone’s first impression of wrestling be in a poorly-lit gym with 500 candidates for early myocardial infarctions yelling insider shit. Second, you want a match that is fast, athletic, does not need a long angle to back it up and isn’t a gimmick match. Because I could not possibly come up with one match myself, I checked with some friends:

The Family Roaster came up with Savage-Steamboat from WM 3
Jeremy Thomas went with Bret-Owen from WMX
THE Ryan Byers went with Dean Malenko-Rey Misterio from Nitro
Lansdell goes with AJ/Daniels/Joe (any of them) or AJ/Daniels-AMW

It was pretty sad how many matches I came up with and had to toss out for the simple reason that Benoit was in them, and you would not want to show his matches to a sceptic: Benoit-Angle (any of them), Benoit-Bret from the Owen tribute, Benoit/Jericho-HHH/Austin, Benoit/Jericho/Angle…

Well folks that’s going to do it for another week. As always, it’s been a blast. Small, Bayani, Lansdell and the Fact or Fiction crew are in tomorrow, and you can check out my review of TNA Impact for the 360 some time today, with any luck. Stay Cool, Rock Hard.