is that scott norton?

Yes.

for some reason i thought he was dead.

What exactly is Jim Cornette out of touch about? I love conversations like this, because it always involves a lot of ad hominem. The only way he is antiquated is that he uses his anger as a teaching tool. Still created more stars than NXT has in about the same amount of time. If the dude spoke in a calm manner and watched everybody's feelings, I swear to god everybody would be like "Oh, you know what, that's 100% correct."

People don't like Jim Cornette and thus don't like his views, not vice versa. Generally speaking, of course.

Is that recent? Fucking hell he looks like he can still go.

Yeah, was in the Rumble at Wrestle Kingdom yesterday and had a tag match at New Year Dash today.

His view on wrestling is in the 80s he acts like marks can't get on twitter and tell that these characters are not real.

@Rammsteinmad

looks like WK 11 from this week based on the set design

Shame they had to tone down the crowd because his regular theme couldn't be played since they popped the hardest for his appearance during the match.

Then again a lot better than a few years ago when NJPW would just mute everything till wrestlers with licensed themes entered the ring.

No it's not. Not in terms of logic and psychology. Maybe because he would actually try and book things instead of scripting inane back-and-forth "episodic" nonsense. I mean, can you point to an actual belief Cornette holds that would be anachronistic in today's wrestling? The one thing working on RAW is Braun Strowman, and that's something Cornette has been calling for for years.

I actually don't understand your second point. Cornette acts like marks can't get on Twitter and tell that these characters are not real? He points out that marks are on Twitter acting like goofs all the time. He seems to be taken more seriously by fans of, say, Kevin Owens and The Young Bucks than he takes them.

It's today's generation that seem to have more trouble with Twitter and telling apart what is real and what is fake. Will Ospreay with Vader is a perfect example. The Revival trying to work and drumming up heat for themselves is another. Find me a wrestler that tries to have a gimmick on Twitter. I think even Bray Wyatt has given up at this point.

Twitter could be a place for wrestlers to prove that they actually at least understand promo content. You obviously can't get inflection and tone as over with a post like that, but who actually tries to promo with their Twitter account? Such a missed opportunity.

Do people forget how Cornette practically ran roh into the ground?

Cornette is smart but so very past it.

Hell, Vader used Twitter to book himself a sizable payday. In 2016. 20 years past his prime.

If anything, he should be teaching workers how to use Twitter properly.

Broken Matt Hardy.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="und" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/WWEPC?src=hash">#WWEPC</a> <a href="https://t.co/mNeu1X7I3S">pic.twitter.com/mNeu1X7I3S</a></p>&mdash; Bayley (@itsBayleyWWE) <a href="https://twitter.com/itsBayleyWWE/status/816791181539610625">January 4, 2017</a></blockquote>
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Now I miss Ice Train

https://scontent-amt2-1.cdninstagram...MTE5MA%3D%3D.2

Feel like "every female employee" of the WWE has taken a selfie holding this "Activate" pouch of whatever it is

In addition to the first rumored 2017 HOFer



the second member of the class is expected to be

Is this video good or awful?

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awful

Count me as one of Americans who are New Japan World subscribers

Lol, Matt Hardy's not a serious gimmick.

Cornette's side of the story is very different to that. His plans for ROH were actually very similar to what was done with OVW and what Triple H would eventually do with NXT.

Cornette is as interesting as all hell to listen to and i think if it wasn't for his anger management issues he would be "somewhere" today.

Where would the wwe be today without the cash injection from the attitude era? Would the company still be seen as successful?

I would seriously rather listen to Cornette talk about wrestling than watch an episode of RAW. People forget just how fucking good this guy was at talking. Unbelievable.

As someone who was watching at the time, I call bullshit on this. He brought in a bunch of past their prime dudes. He also basically forced a bunch of guys out of the company. Just because Cornette says something, doesn't make it true. He's as carnie as they get.

Lol remember how awful and disorganized that "Pick 6" thing he did

You only asked if there was wrestler that uses Twitter to promo nothing about serious. Matt Hardy does it better than anybody.

Why are they even wrestling at the Royal Rumble at this point?


<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">BREAKING: <a href="https://twitter.com/WWERomanReigns">@WWERomanReigns</a> defends the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/USTitle?src=hash">#USTitle</a> this Monday on <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RAW?src=hash">#RAW</a> against BOTH <a href="https://twitter.com/IAmJericho">@IAmJericho</a> &amp; <a href="https://twitter.com/FightOwensFight">@FightOwensFight</a>! <a href="https://t.co/67WzfaBLlp">https://t.co/67WzfaBLlp</a> <a href="https://t.co/jx8OXuFWLC">pic.twitter.com/jx8OXuFWLC</a></p>&mdash; WWE (@WWE) <a href="https://twitter.com/WWE/status/817422290182963201">January 6, 2017</a></blockquote>
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At least that one is a triple threat (or handicap?) match. The one on one nonsense is ridiculous

Is the goal to make every match as un-special as possible?

Well I guess unless it has to do with Brock, Goldberg or Taker.

TOOOOOO much weekly content.

I think Roman wrestled them in a handicap match a few weeks ago and won clean, on RAW.

Switch over to NJPW and save_yourselves

Can't wait to see Reigns win even though one of Jericho/Owens could quite easily just lay down for the other.

<blockquote class="twitter-video" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">NJPW is not for kids. <a href="https://t.co/auptEDTg2F">pic.twitter.com/auptEDTg2F</a></p>&mdash; Italo Santana (@BulletClubItal) <a href="https://twitter.com/BulletClubItal/status/817414607744671744">January 6, 2017</a></blockquote>
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GOD are so over the top I kinda like them. It's like playing Soldier of Fortune.

Corino couldn't take Camacho here

Because RAW's Creative is really horrible in general. Only real saving grace left in their feud is if the Rumble match ends up being title vs title.

I keep hoping one of their matches will be title for title. It would be cool to see if Owens would try to make Jericho defend the US title on his behalf.

Or have they dropped the "we're both champion" thing? I'm a bit behind on the shows.

They've dropped it. KO seemed 'concerned' about Jericho announcing he is in the Rumble this week.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/djstarion">@djstarion</a> It got 6 stars, so that's pretty good</p>&mdash; Wendy's (@Wendys) <a href="https://twitter.com/Wendys/status/817071136190111746">January 5, 2017</a></blockquote>
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<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/PuroPodcast">@PuroPodcast</a> Hi Puro, personally I'd say it looked painful but made for a great match. Glad you like our sausage rolls. :) TY - Paul</p>&mdash; Tesco (@Tesco) <a href="https://twitter.com/Tesco/status/817216361151819776">January 6, 2017</a></blockquote>
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Wendy's know's wrestling from Jim Cornette.

Yeah, I wasn't starting an argument, just that he's ridiculous.

Ha, no. What was that?

Christopher Daniels has re-signed with ROH, which is sort of a bummer, because I'd have really liked for him to get a WWE run. Frankie Kazarian could follow later, but in the meantime he could have done a singles thing in ROH and maybe even gotten a World Title run.

Scott Norton could still fold you up and stick you in his pocket. :eek:

I think they made it a 2 on 1 Handicap match. Probably whoever pins is champion so they will fight over it and the Floman Drains will win in the scuffle.

But if Roman Reigns is fighting both Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens on RAW, who could Seth Rollins possibly face?!!!

Guess who's back?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C1iJdO5UsAAA-4W.jpg

Good God that just looks awful.

I have no idea who either of these guys are but the one in green is just begging to be photoshopped into multiple situations.

Watched a WWE show for the first time in probably 6 months, was pretty good, I really like the new Divas on Smackdown.

A SHOW BABY!!

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Wow Cornette's podcast now has a good co-host who is funny and doesn't try to control Cornette. The woman was terrible.

It's Kassius Ohno. (Chris Hero)

was just reading about jarret and it reminded me of that terrible feud in late wcw. millionaire's club vs the new blood. my god, was that fucking terrible.

wasn't it around that time hogan feuded with billy fucking kidman?

goddamn, no wonder wcw was so cheap at this point.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C1iJdO5UsAAA-4W.jpg

This Just In: The Midcard Snare Trap has broken.

http://www.wwe.com/gallery/raw-women...s#fid-40076927

Can always count on WWE.com for a good photo gallery.

I'm such a nit-picking prick, but it bugs me that Miz is having an absolute meltdown at the end, but still maintains holding the mic up to his mouth. :D

http://i.imgur.com/ETQYJhH.gif

Not so phenomenal

He went down down on Up Up Down Down.

WWE considering offline and downloadable options as future additions to the Network.

https://www.streamingobserver.com/ww...-content-2017/

I think the Rise & Fall of WCW book explained why Hogan-Kidman feud happened and mainly due to Hogan getting a lot of heat for always holding down talent or hogging the spotlight. Hogan wanted to prove that wasn't the case and he had no problem making new stars.

Kidman got a win or two in the feud but Hogan still went over and/or dominated enough of the feud so Kidman never got a real star making rub from it.

Is the book accurate? It was written by the WrestleCrap guy.

The cruiserweights can cruiser wait, brother.

Been years since I read the original book but I'd say yeah overall. Really good book about the history of WCW and didn't come off as just being WWE-like revisionist history or a dirtsheet focused book for stuff.

Even has stuff about WWE to show what was happening there during certain moments and periods in WCW.

Written by the WrestleCrap guy and Bryan Alvarez....

I think Miz should be back on the road to maybe another WWE World Title in the future.

fair enough. still, why would he pick kidman exactly? that made zero sense.

He was actually pretty damn over along with the rest of the filthy animals and Rey had already been involved with bigger talent.

meh. why was scott steiner a part of the new blood? hardly a newcomer.

just admit it, it was fucking awful. all of it.

Yep Russo sucks

I wouldn't be against that, to be honest. :yes:

It was a terrible angle but I can understand Steiner being in the New Blood. He had yet to get a main event run despite being with the company for ages.

Hogan was a master politician. He was really good at picking his spots, knowing when to be on television and when not to be. He would do strategic jobs that would make it look like he was helping a guy out, but would really be setting them up to either fail, or at least not succeed on a level where a company ever felt secure in their decision to drop emphasis on Hogan.

It wouldn't surprise me if Hogan knew that Kidman would never be a top guy, so he felt that putting him over would come off as comical and never sacrifice much ground while still technically doing his duty.

Eh, I'd be careful what you wish for. There's a difference between Mid-Card Miz and Main Event Miz. Part of The Miz's charm is that he's a fun mid-card act that can get his ass kicked by an indy darling babyface and get your average crowd invested. He's got a lot of value to the company in that sense, but I don't think he's really someone to build around.

I'm still expecting him to head into WrestleMania with the IC Title and be forced into a multi-man Ladder Match by Daniel Bryan. I think he dropped the belt to Ambrose to "refresh" that "last shot" stip with Dolph Ziggler, so that he can be inserted into that Ladder Match too, with Miz complaining the whole time.

Truth be told, I can see Miz retaining the belt at Mania and then losing it to Nakamura on the post-Mania SmackDown. Then maybe they swap the IC and US Titles between RAW and SmackDown, since they are the only belts that aren't "branded."

SDL is really quite good at moving their pieces around the board so I wouldn't be surprised to see Miz get a crack at a face WWE Champion, but equally he's called the IC Title "his" so he's got plenty of reason to keep chasing that down/come back to it. He's also got this whole deal against the SDL brand/Bryan/Renee Young. Could they do Miz vs. Shane (defending his GM) at Mania? With the IC Title on the line? With the added stip that if Shane wins Miz stays on SDL with an ironclad contract that means he can't be drafted to Raw, and if Miz wins he goes to Raw with the prestigious Intercontinental Championship. Would that be decent for the Mania undercard?

It falls into the same problem as a lot of potential Miz matches, in that there is always something better for the other guy if they are anything close to a star. When it comes to the rumored Shane matches (Brock Lesnar, Dean Ambrose and AJ Styles), all of them are more exciting and bigger deals than Miz facing Shane would be. Not that it would be bad or anything.

I actually disagree that SmackDown is good at moving their pieces around. I think they just randomly shove people into WWE Title matches and hope for the best. I know it's the darling show at the moment, but it's hard to get enthused about Ziggler and Ambrose as main event stars when they spend so much time swapping mid-card titles with The Miz.

I do honestly think it would have been better once Ziggler had won the IC Title for him to put it on the line against Styles in an "All or Nothing" scenario for him and Styles to walk away with all the gold and all the focus as the male singles champion on the show.

I actually gave a shit about Ziggler and Miz matche since the brand split and I haven't in years. It's all well written.

I'd rather have a random element in the title picture like Corbin as long as they've been winning matches. Keeps things fresh.

I saw one of their matches -- I think it was Backlash. It was good and it felt "better" than the endless series they've had in the past. It would be stretching it to say that I gave a shit.

The problem is that you'll have Corbin lose an IC Title match, then get a WWE Title shot, then win the IC Title. None of the title wins really feel like a big deal, except for the WWE Title, which has been firmly planted on Styles, despite the non-title losses to a jobber.

Corbin hasn't competed for the IC title though? He had a good, competitive series against Kalisto where he came up the decisive winner (unlike that 50/50 crap on Raw) and is now barging himself into the main event. There's no reason he can't hang with the likes of Cena and AJ but come up short and drop back down, maybe then go for the IC title before working back up to the main event guys.

It was a hypothetical. He did lose a contender's match against Crews and Kalisto, I believe, but that at the beginning of the draft, so it is fresh to me but probably not to everyone else. But that's just a technicality. There's nothing wrong with a guy moving around the card, it's just the pacing and the presentation of it is very "quick" on SmackDown, and frankly rather arbitrary.

Been getting back into wrestling podcasts. Am I missing any good ones?

-Austin Show
-JR Show
-Squared Circle
-Jim Cornette Expierence.
-Bruce Prichard.

I wonder if this is all a way for perhaps Miz chasing Jericho for most IC title reigns?

I like a few of the MLW ones. MSL is a smart cookie and he does a fun show with Kevin Sullivan, who rambles about shit.

I'm sure Miz will get there eventually; not as sure it is a primary goal.

What is Bruce Prichard's podcast like? I should probably just listen to it, but I just haven't for whatever reason.

Oh, and I do like Killing the Town with Lance Storm and Cyrus. I've skipped the Deletion one and the Omega interviews, but may even come back to them. Generally speaking it is fun to hear them talk about professional wrestling. I find them "on point" most of the time. They seem to really love Shane Douglas.

I still listen to Cabana, it has a different flavour to JR's regular "I know better than you"/"what did you think of Goldberg/Lesnar"/impressions routine, and he has guests that don't usually do the rounds with Jericho/Austin/JR.

He and Conrad from the Flair show talk in depth about events about a wrestler or a particular show from all the angles. Think Squared Circle but the guy was there.

They recently talked for about 2 and a half to 3 hours talking about Ted DiBiase (not an interview but Conrad somewhat implied he talked to Ted beforehand) from his entire run WWWF, Feud With Duggan in the south and WWF. They argued because Prichard refused to admit that Virgil was a rib on Dusty Rhodes. Conrad wasn't buying it. Also with Rio Rogers it is easy to call bullshit on it.

It's not perfect by any means but as a comparison to Raw...

Turning Ziggler, moving the IC Title on to Ambrose, and inserting Corbin into the main event mix is more progression in one episode than Raw's 4 person main event scene has managed in a month.

Does Raw and Smackdown have completely separate and "sequestered" writing teams?

They have different heads of, and Vince/Steph are less involved with SD. They fired the overall head of creative and the guy that heads up Smackdown is the former NXT writer who created things like that awesome Zayn/Neville feud and the debut of Owens.