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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 14:45:09 GMT -5
I've always been amazed how the GWF had DAILY television on ESPN during weekday afternoons, yet made no money with it. They weren't paid for TV rights fees, but could have run live events or even PPVs if they wanted to, yet chose to just do shows at the Sportatorium. At the time, Dallas was basically a dead wrestling market due to the bad taste the Von Erich family tragedies left in people's mouths. But they were on ESPN nationally. Every damn day. And did nothing to try to actually run shows in other areas based on ESPN. Very quickly, they were just giving away free tickets to the Sportatorium to try to make the crowd size look acceptable for TV, but couldn't even sell tickets. No rights fees, no tickets sold in Dallas, no trying to even run other cities. Baffling. I honestly think Pedicino didn't understand how utterly scorched earth Dallas was in terms of wrestling. He thought he could use it as a starting point, rebuild it from where USWA left off and get things rolling again, and then expand. It certainly didn't help that investors kept backing out, setting him back to square one repeatedly.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 13:43:37 GMT -5
I'm guessing they are supposed to be the French Foreign Legion? Supposed to be, yes.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 13:41:04 GMT -5
Yep. Mike was in the New Blood, while the Huckster was F.U.N.B. Not knocking Kidman but they should've gone with Awesome. Yeah they did have a match but I feel the feud should've been with Awesome. Hogan did not like working with others who didn't work super-light, especially in his later years. One of the (several) reasons he was never interested in working with Rude but loved working with Bossman. Awesome...Awesome did not work light.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 13:27:37 GMT -5
This is from the Lutte promotion out of Montreal in 1985. It was the rookie year of the man who would go on to be Rikishi, under the name Alofa the Polynesian Prince (a name his cousin LA Smooth would use later on as well). Absolutely stunning to see how much he changed physically from this to what we know.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 12:55:07 GMT -5
I remember Lance Storm saying that Mike Awesome said he was related to Horace, but not Hulk, at least not directly, but that Lance couldn't remember the specifics. In any case, I don't get the impression they were close or anything. It was through Horace's mother - Hogans' brother is Horace's father who iirc got shot and died in the 80's They're not questioning the exact relationship between Hulk and Horace; Horace being Hogan's nephew isn't disputed. They're trying to figure out how Awesome is related to Horace but not Hulk - and the answer is one of Awesome's parents is/was the sibling of Horace's mom. Not sure which, though.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 12:21:00 GMT -5
15 minutes? PART ONE?!?!?!
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 11:57:54 GMT -5
I really think had Hawk gone solo full-time, the no-selling would have lessened. Not go away completely, but he would have had to tone it down a tad.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 6:44:50 GMT -5
This Portland territory match is from 1988, the year before the Steve Austin we all know debuted in Texas. Somehow, I don't see this guy stomping mudholes in too many people.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 6:39:44 GMT -5
I know I've posted this sometime way back there, but thought it'd be nice to revisit it. One of the best moments in the history of the Portland territory.
For context, here's the write-up provided by the YTer who uploaded it:
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 5:39:49 GMT -5
The list of people in the business that were on Andre's good side is incredibly short. He tolerated a number of them, but there just weren't a lot he genuinely liked, especially after the changeover from Vince Sr to Jr.
And even the ones that were kinda-sorta on Andre's good side HATED wrestling him. He did not go out of his way to protect others, he would manhandle them without provocation and generally just did whatever he wanted to them in the ring.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 5:16:53 GMT -5
Comic books should at least try to be in supermarkets, book shops, etc. While it was good for shoring up the industry at one point, having specific comic book stores for comic book fans creates a self cannibalising market. Stories need to be in a place where the non comic book fan can see them, and in a format where a casual, first time reader can understand what the hell is going on so a wider range of people can be interested in and follow the stories. Agreed. I would also like to build something off of your last point. There are too many writers writing big multi-issue story arcs and not writing single-issue stories. There is the potential that each comic is the first comic that someone will ever pick up, and that means that each comic should have a story that can pull in a new reader and leave them wanting to have more. Too many comics are "writing for the trade". You want to write an epic, do a graphic novel. Not the call of the creators anymore, at least at Marvel/DC. They have zero choice on the matter. The company wants material for trades and nothing else now. That's where the money is made and that's what the bean-counters demand. It isn't going back to how it used to be. Said it before a billion times, comic books are the least important part of the comic book industry now.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 5:04:13 GMT -5
Stalker. But seriously, yeah, this month has been...trying. Got fired on the 2nd, the stove thing happening within a day of me accidentally dropping my phone off a balcony and destroying it (and my provider's stores in the area are closed) and then that troll over there going on a rampage. Some other bits and pieces that just compounded it all. I'm just glad I can cook again. You may have mentioned this before so sorry for not responding before, but sorry to hear that. How are you doing, Madison? This is a rough time to be unemployed. I'm...here. Things looked rough the first couple of weeks after they let me go and Dallas went into lockdown, but most of the issues that compounded got worked out. Still no phone but I'm in no hurry to get a new one, was never much for one to begin with. Sleeping patterns are way off, sleeping between half an hour to two hours, then up for 15-20 hours, rinse and repeat; but at least it's sleep, which can be pretty elusive for me at times. Otherwise, just sort of here. I hope you are doing well through this. And all the rest of you out there, too. Stay safe.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 25, 2020 4:56:35 GMT -5
The Brawl for All? Nathan Jones? Sin Cara? Lars Sullivan? Katie Vick? Concrete Crypt? The Higher Power? What's the criteria for "a big deal?"Not Lars Sullivan, I can tell you that.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 23:54:29 GMT -5
Real name Rafael de la Torre. Not to be confused with the more recent luchador sharing that name.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 23:01:18 GMT -5
Why didn’t they get sued for the Juicer? Because there was nothing to sue? Even though he'd gone by Beetlejuice elsewhere, when he signed to WCW, they immediately changed his name and stripped him of all recognizable elements. Had he shown up out of the blue as the Juicer without ever having the previous gimmick, most people wouldn't have even made a connection to the film. And even then, Warner Bros owned both WCW and Beetlejuice. Now they DID get a C&D from Marvel regarding Arachniman. Of course, I wasn't aware of the O'Barr thing prior and had always gone with how it'd been explained to me prior regarding Sting/Crow, so what the f*** do I know?
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 21:16:41 GMT -5
Also, when Daniel Bryan debuted in the WWE, I thought he'd be a upper midcard mainstay(or as HHH and Stephanie put it, a B+ player), but after the YES movement got started, he became the company's most over guy to the point where crowds were hijacking shows in protest of pushing him. Very surreal. I think the exact moment I realized Bryan was going to make it was the "I'm not the weak link!" rampage where he destroyed the Shield by himself.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 21:00:35 GMT -5
Hawk. Dude got dangerously close to almost putting everything together he needed for a brief time during the period we're talking about here.
Ricky was great as a short-term placement in the main, but he relied far too heavy on being the underdog-in-peril aspect for him to keep that going long-term.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 20:40:37 GMT -5
Worked Windy City Pro and Great Lakes Championship back in the '90s. Rest easy, Haystacks
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 16:57:11 GMT -5
They’re not blood related but they looked like they were Funny because to me, Awesome looked like he was closely related to Piper instead.
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Post by Joe Neglia on Apr 24, 2020 16:50:26 GMT -5
He must not think so since he's willingly doing this angle. Don't speak for others please. He may be doing it in hopes they do change their mind, even if that hasn't happened yet. He may be doing it to make as high-profile and positive an exit as possible as a calling card to other promotions interested in him. He may be doing it so he doesn't have to stay cooped up in the house. And you can still do all of those while thinking the handling of it is screwed up.
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