The Wednesday Wire: 8.29.12: Say Goodbye To Wednesday

It’s time for the #WedWi! I’m Nick Marsico coming to you LIVE from Florida where The Wednesday Wire will no longer be produced.

COMMENTARY DISCUSSION!

I agreed with you that I prefer when the show ends with a match. I think the kick to the back of King’s head was pretty lame, but Cena’s promo was great and the premise of Punk wanting Cena to call him Best in the World was also a good idea. And remember, I didn’t say RAW was anything special. I said I didn’t feel like I wasted my time watching it and it didn’t drag on and on.

From The Great Capt. Smooth: “Well, Henry did say he had “plans” for HHH after his loss to Brock. I wouldn’t mind them forming a team called “The Hall of Game”.

I expect a higher level of performance from you. For shame.

From Bonerfied: “Seeing Heyman in all his promo glory makes me hate myself for not watching ECW religiously back in the 90s. If Ziggler could command the mic like Heyman, he would be the biggest star on the roster, even bigger than Cenatron.”

Ziggler would maybe have been able to be a huge star 12-15 years ago based on that criteria, but NOTHING can make anybody a bigger star than Cena right now. Punk had the chance to be on equal ground but they screwed that pooch, didn’t they? Cena is the gold standard because he is the chosen one. It’s not based on talent/ability alone. That’s not to say Cena isn’t deserving of being a huge main event star, because he is, but he’s not the best in any category outside of having a presence. Vince decided that Cena would be the next big star and he has been marketed as such. No amount of talent can get anybody to rise above Cena with the current regime at the helm. Heh, heh. “Rise above” Cena.

From G-Walla “It’s not that the US Title isn’t important (well, we all know it isn’t) it’s the fact they want the Youtube show to seem important. Having an unimportant title change hands there is a good way to start, the common fan won’t think it’s as unimportant, ’cause they love Santino.

I didn’t not enjoy RAW… but there’s just little things like that that bug the shit out of me.”

I agree on all counts. I’ve been bugging my wife all week about how King refused to call Punk the Best in the World. If having the title doesn’t make him best, what the fuck does? And if Punk isn’t best, who is? Cena? Based on what criteria? Punk has beaten him on a number of occasions. I can see refusing to call the WWE Champ “Best in the World” if they won it on a fluke or had just become champion, but Punk won the belt all the way back in November and has defended it on a regular basis against all comers without backing down. Fucking stupid.

From Russonomics: “Mr Marsico sir. Another great column. Nice work! Quick question for you. Do you take fan submissions for the Free Pro Wrestling segment?”

Thank you for the compliment. I will absolutely take fan submissions for Free Pro Wrestling as long as it follows the guidelines. The match must be obtained with the permission of the owner. If the promotion or the wrestler posts it on Youtube that pretty much makes it fair game and me posting it here just helps them get more of the recognition they are looking for.

From the mecca: “love Sheamus. really like Del Rio, since Sheamus isn’t losing the title anytime soon Del Rio needs to move on. Sheamus needs to beat some real legit contenders not just the same ones over and over. Del Rio’s new aggressive attitude is fun, but he needs to rack up the wins by submission for a couple months so people think he might actually take the title off of Sheamus. Have Del Rio win a #1 contenders match and announce when he will cash in at a ppv in advance, say he knows that hell in a cell is coming up so he’ll wait till Survivor Series for a bigger payday, then he goes undefeated for the next couple months with constant submission victories, then we have a nicer rivalry than we do now.”

If they want Del Rio to be a legitimate threat to Sheamus’ title he needs to move on to other guys and beat them for a little while. Getting shot after shot and continually losing will only serve to make him lose credibility.

From Jason King: “One final mention of the Punk heel turn before I move on — I know a lot of people say he’s coming across as a whiny heel, I see it as more of a frustrated heel. He’s fought for respect for a whole year since his pipe bomb promo, and now that he’s been the champion and proven himself for 9 months, he’s still taking a backseat to crap like Cena/Johnny Ace and everything in between. Wouldn’t YOU be frustrated and start demanding the respect you deserve too? I feel you on the whiny, but maybe my bias toward Punk makes me absorb it as a frustration instead.

I was thinking Cena could win at NoC and lose to Rock at the Rumble and then have either Punk or Cena take on Rock at WM, but would they really have Cena lose two in a row to Rock?”

If they would have Cena lose to Rock twice then they might have the balls to try to turn him heel too. I doubt either would happen, but I do fear that they’re going to do the rematch in April at WrestleMania. Sadly, I would be absolutely SHOCKED to see Punk get a match with either Rock or Cena at ‘Mania, which is exactly why WWE hasn’t made any true stars in the last 10 years not named John Cena. And no, Edge and Randy Orton don’t count.

From Guest#0674: “Oh look at people coming around to my theory.

this is simple stuff….”

Gotta be honest, I’ve pretty much stopped caring. Even though Heyman has given it the old college try and has been great in his role, the whole return, excluding everything that happened from his return to the end of the Cena match, has been a bust. Brock as the primadonna who hides behind his manager and his lawyers is unbelievably shitty. Is it supposed to be making fun of MMA guys who duck fights until they can get the money they want? I just don’t get it.

From The Big Fat F: “I would like to see JBL come back not as an announcer but as a manager. It would be great to see him start a hostile corporate takeover of the WWE by forming a stable. You give him some random diva as his assistant (who could be at house shows instead of JBL) and have him form a stable. Scout guys for a while. Maybe throw Justin Gabriel and Mason Ryan together as a team. Maybe sign Cessaro and give him a little bit of a higher profile. It’s tempting to put Del Rio in there too because he and JBL have similar characters. Or maybe Matt Morgan, if he comes back. Then JBL also brings Brock back around the SS PPV and represents him. Bringing him in for the “big matches” when he needs him. I wouldn’t mind JBL pulling some double duty as an announcer, like the Brain used to. I could almost tolerate the king if JBL was around to put him in his place for being an idiot.

Swagger/Riley – I think Vickie needs to bring in Riley and use him and Swagger as a tag team. Yes, Riley got some cheers when he faced Miz but the guy just has that “dickhead” vibe to him. Him and Swagger would be great together.”

I like the JBL idea. Triple H would probably find a way to make it about him, though. Bourne and Kidd would probably make a good team, but right now Gabriel and Kidd have been paired off and are a good team in their own right. Mason Ryan’s best fit is not on my television. Or in a great buddy cop movie that never got picked up by the big film studios. Zeke and Henry are both big black dudes who have huge smiles, so I guess that works. I’d prefer to see Riley as a face in one of the midcard title divisions.

Dr. Wiki, I didn’t have time this week, but a look at the current NXT guys will be a great feature for next week’s Tuesdebut. I’ll start working on that.

PROFESSIONAL WRESTLING NEWS!

– DDP signed a Legends contract with WWE a few weeks ago, which I apparently missed (or wrote in my column but don’t care enough to remember) and he recently said that if the opportunity arose he would consider a comeback match. On a very slightly related note, I miss Random Kanyon Cutters.

– Everybody is talking about Kassius Ohno and Antonio Cesaro teaming up in Orlando to take on CM Punk and Seth Rollins at the most recent NXT taping. It took place after the official taping was over but it happened while the cameras were rolling and JR & co did commentary, so maybe it will end up on DVD one day. NXT: Orlando – The Complete First Season?

– Speaking of KO and AC, it has been speculated that while the two will never reunite to be part of the tag team division, their past may be mentioned on air and they could reunite for one-offs in the future.

– Rumors are now saying that the Lesnar/Triple H rematch will take place not at Survivor Series but rather at the Hell in a Cell PPV. Now Triple H can have another 30+ Hell in a Cell match, but this time it won’t be as good and he can get his win! Meh. I can’t wait until we find out that the SummerSlam buyrate, just like Extreme Rules, is very disappointing.

– Bully Ray and Devon are reported to have not signed new deals with TNA. That’s a shame since Bully is doing so great, but I assume that he will leave TNA after a huge blowoff against Abyss. Can we please get ROH to bring the Duds in to take on the Briscoes in a one-time dream match? Please?

– Ric Flair is begging to be in The Hangover III, which is due out in 2013. His fans originally took up the cause and he has encouraged them to continue. Ric may be disappointed when he learns that there will be no party beforehand that leads directly to the movie’s namesake.

– Bret Hart recently spoke with Arda Ocal and said, notably, that he believes CM Punk and Daniel Bryan are this generation’s Hart and Michaels. That’s certainly high praise. He also said that he wishes that there could have been more Bret v. Shawn matches.

– Chris Jericho was on The Live Audio Wrestling show on Sunday night for an interview, and among other things he discussed his thoughts on the current PG era. And, not shockingly at all, he’s completely right:

“The Attitude Era was a great time; if it was still going on, I’d be right in the middle of it still doing all the stuff that I used to do. But it changed, and that’s the way it is, so you must change with it. It’s still wrestling; it’s all about having great matches, great characters and great build-ups. It’s the same concept, it’s just that you can’t say “ass” and “son of a bitch” anymore. Well, if you can’t do a good program and not say “ass” and “son of a bitch,” then you don’t need to be working in this business anyway.”

– CM Punk’s new DVD is coming out on October 9, and it looks quite good. The matches are all good ones that can be found quite easily on the Youtubes, but the documentary feature is my main draw for these DVDs anyway. Of course I’ll be waiting for it to come out on Netflix. One Blu-Ray extra piques my interest: “No Microphone” is its name. I wonder…

– Here’s a list of soon-to-be-released books about professional rasslin’. My thoughts are included!

The WWE General Manager’s Handbook
This book will be Have you ever dreamed of being the General Manager of Raw or SmackDown, so you can decide for yourself which Superstars get to face each other in the ring? Now’s your chance! The General Manager’s Handbook is a 24-page activity book filled with info about the different types of matches, the Superstars on each roster, and tons of activities centered around building your own matches! The book comes with 4 pages of reusable stickers, so you can make different matches each time you open the book!

This will be released on Amazon on 9/27/2012. At only $7.99 this surely could become a fixture on the youngest Marsico’s colorful bookshelf right next to WWE Mad Libs. I wonder if this is the text that WWE “creative” uses to book TV every week.

A Most Mizerable Christmas
For years The Miz has bullied his classmates—including Sheamus, Kelly Kelly, Wade Barrett, Kofi Kingston, Dolph Ziggler, and Natalya—yet managed to stay on Santa’s list of good boys. When a new kid arrives in town, he shakes the foundation of The Miz’s selfish beliefs, and sets in motion a chain of events that results in The Miz trying to fool Santa Claus and his new helper, The Cenelf, on Christmas Eve! Will the new kid help everyone on Wrescal Lane enjoy the holidays while teaching The Miz a lesson, or will it be A Most MIZerable Christmas for everyone?

The latest children’s classic from Mick Foley (artwork by Jerry Lawler) is due out on 10/1/2012. I haven’t read any of Foley’s kids books, but I think this year I may buy a couple for the boy. I wonder if they have them at the library. Can someone start a Twitter hashtag petitioning Cena to dress up as the Cenelf for the holiday shows?

Heroes & Icons: The Pro Wrestling Hall of Fame
The good guys of professional wrestling take the spotlight in this comprehensive examination of the memorable characters who inspired fans, providing insight into what makes a great hero. Compiled using firsthand interviews with hundreds of wrestlers, managers, promoters, and historians, these entertaining profiles document wrestling’s golden boys from the 1930s to today. It discusses the roles of wrestling superstars that include Hulk Hogan, Dusty Rhodes, and The Rock as well as lesser-known figures, including Tiger Jeet Singh and Whitey Caldwell. With more than 100 action-packed photos, this engaging and informative book invites both devoted fans and newcomers to the sport to appreciate the rich history of these esteemed performers.

This one is a very interesting title that will be released on 10/1/2012. Smart choice putting Punk on the cover, as it may entice WWE-centric readers (are there any? LOL) to pick up this book under the guise of it being a WWE licenced publication. This is actually part of a series, which also includes titles such as The Heels, The Tag Teams and The Canadians. I may be looking up this series at my local public library.

A Battle Royal in the Sky: The Life and Death of Wrestling’s Greatest Gods and Gimmicks
Every child of the 1980s who watched wrestling remembers the good old days of larger-than-life superstars in unintentionally cheesy promos, while every wrestling fan of the 1990s thinks back to a golden era of grappling, where two companies battled and no matter the outcome, the audience always won. Nowadays, wrestling just isn’t the same. Many fans’ heroes growing up—whether it’s Randy “Macho Man” Savage or Curt “Mr. Perfect” Hennig—have passed away well before they should have, and many favorite gimmicks and story angles have been permanently retired. With humorous poignancy, A Battle Royal In The Sky celebrates both 50 legends we lost, and 50 gimmicks. Told from a true fan’s perspective with superstar career highlights and lowlights, this book also features quotes from some icons in the wrestling business including “Superfly” Jimmy Snuka and Nikolai Volkoff, matched with funny and factual wrestling sidebars ranging from worst celebrity WrestleMania appearances to top rated wrestling managers who were pets.

Man, I really need to get my ass in gear and start reading again. My favourite literary genre is historical non-fiction and my favourite pastime/hobby/form of entertainment is pro wrestling. Thankfully there are so many other books I can grab from the library first so I don’t go broke on October 1st.

– The Rock claims that he pulled his hamstring when he took the top rope legdrop from Cena in their WrestleMania match. I don’t buy it, partially because almost 5 months after the fact is really awkward timing and partially because Rock was so winded 2 minutes into the match that a pulled hammy would have rendered him completely incapable of finishing.

– Apparently Triple H cut an emotional promo on RAW because he felt that the fans didn’t take his loss to Lesnar seriously enough. Maybe they didn’t take it seriously because he has wrestled at least 3 matches in less than a year’s time after stating, in no uncertain terms, that he would NEVER wrestle again. Then he spent months begging The Undertaker and Brock Lesnar to wrestle him. After spending months avoiding wrestling. Mixed messages like that make it hard for the fans to take you seriously, sir. Plus, it’s incredibly obvious that in this era, nobody beyond 6-year-old kids are going to believe that you are going to retire because you lost a match. They bought it when Flair and Michaels did it because the months leading up to their retirements absolutely choreographed the fact that they really were leaving. Nobody thinks Triple H is going to retire without a humongous retirement match at WrestleMania. People thought he might be done after the Undertaker match, but it’s silly if he really thinks people are going to bite on him retiring after the Lesnar match. Come on now, have at least a tiny bit of respect for the audience’s intelligence.

– Made up story of the week: Cole got heat for not calling the “Rock Bottom” that Punk did that transitioned to the Anaconda Vise in his match with Lawler this Monday. Sounds like somebody noticed Punk doing that spot and didn’t hear Cole call it and decided that it would be a great “insider” story to make up.

WWE RAW 8.27.2012: Umm…

– Jerry Lawler responds with THAT? Really? He must be absolutely determined to leave RAW embarrassed. I’m tired of guys getting in King’s face because of shit he says on commentary. Yes, he had a very good match with Miz on RAW in December 2010, but that was against the unproven new WWE Champion, not the 10-month worldbeater who is our current champion. Shitty opening segment and even Punk stumbled over his lines a few times.

– For a second there I thought they were just going to reboot the immediately abandoned Swagger/Ryback thing from a few weeks back. Nope, just Swag getting his ass kicked and then screaming about having had enough. If they really wanted to make an impact they would have him come out later on tonight and interfere in the Punk/King match to give King the win and then have him kick King’s ass just for the hell of it. Fuck all of the waiting until Rocky comes back in 2013 for the Rumble. Let’s make some new god damned stars.

– Way to make the women’s division seem even less important by having Vickie stand there the whole time. Pretty sweet rollthrough by Layla though. Also, I don’t think the way to solve the problem of RAW being a dangerous workplace is to beat up your employees. It is, however, a badass way to shut them up.

– Not sure I get the reasoning behind putting Cena and Miz out there together just to have Cena go over completely and squeakily clean.

Hour Two: Nothing. Absolutely Nothing.

– Wow. Maybe the biggest waste of an hour in television history.

Hour Three: Triple H Cries, Punk Bleeds

– Holy horseshit, Triple H! That promo was 30 times more masturbatory than the shit HBK crapped out of his mouth last week. Even my wife and son were BEGGING for him to stop with the Hogan-esque basking in the chanting of his name and to just talk already. THEN, he said that he was done stalling and would say if he was going to retire or not. THEN, he spent 10 minutes talking about how he wasn’t going to stick around too long. THEN, he didn’t tell us whether or not he made a decision but he did shed a tear and say that he hopes we remember him when he’s gone. This was an even bigger waste of TV time than the entire previous hour.

– More time wasting. Kane chokeslams a bad guy instead of a good guy. PROGRESS! What amazing storytelling!

– Boring tag team match that AGAIN sees Ziggler eat the pin fall. I bet he gets pinned clean by Orton on Friday, too.

– Punk and King had an okayish cage match, but the crowd by this point couldn’t be assed to give a hoot about any of it. Can we call Punk’s heel turn official now?

Overall RAW Thoughts
Not a good show. At all. Seriously. What a piece of shit. I wish I could say that I can’t believe it, but I can — they had 5 weeks between SummerSlam and Night of Champions and instead of using the extra time for some good build they completely wasted two weeks. Let’s see…

WWE Title: CM Punk laid out a great stipulation. If Cena wanted a match, he had to say that Punk was the Best in the World. Cena refused, but it was obvious that they were going to do that match anyway. Instead of coming up with an interesting way to make the match, they have AJ simply walk out before the cage match and make the announcement in the most anticlimactic way possible.

World Title: Sheamus beats ADR twice, so after Sheamus thwarts his cheating, Del Rio complains, beats Orton and we have a third match in a row on PPV with these two. Booooring.

Tag Titles: They have been building up to a big tag team resurgence, and I expect all of the teams to vie for Kofi & Truth in the same match. Prime Time Players, Usos, Primo & Epico and Gabriel & Kidd. I think that’s all of them. Again, with 5 weeks of build they could have run a tournament on RAW and SD to determine #1 contenders and really make the match seem important, but I’m expecting that they’ll just bicker for a while and then there will be a multi-team match at the show. Maybe at least we’ll see the return of TAG TEAM TURMOIL~!

Intercontinental Title: Miz beat Mysterio and Rey is out again with a concussion. They didn’t line up a challenger on SmackDown and Miz was defeated clean by Cena on RAW in a complete afterthought match.

United States Title: Santino will probably get a rematch with Antonio Cesaro in an underwhelming match.

Divas Title: Kaitlyn will wrestle Layla. Nobody will care.

There are only 6 titles? Wow. That’s improvement!

Free Pro Wrestling: EPIC WAR

See ya later, Wire Choir.

Next week: TNA talk? Ring of Honor frustrations? Excited chitter chatter about how I’m the new Tuesday news guy?

– Nicholas A. Marsico