Scott Keith

What version of Heaven have I found myself?

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https://www.wrestlinginc.com/news/2021/11/big-swole-announces-aew-departure/



Nia Jax and Big Swole are no longer taking up any valuable TV time. I'm expecting all you atheists to fall on your knees and acknowledge there is a just and righteous diety out there somewhere…

Brad

That seems harsh.  Swole never got much better and they didn’t need her once Jade came in as the new athletic badass, but saying she’s as bad as Nia Jax is ridiculous.  

Knowing the matches

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Scott,

One of the biggest reasons I like AEW is that they promote what matches are happening ahead of time. Sure they may have a few happening that they don’t advertise , but you tend to know the big matches. Meanwhile almost all the matches are fresh with very few repeats…

Meanwhile, wwe rarely lets folks know any of the matches ahead of time and isn’t afraid of doing the same match multiple weeks in a row.

Do you think this is contributing to AEW’s growing popularity since people have something to look forward to instead of just watching the brand and HOPING for something interesting?

Without a doubt.  

I can’t be the only one who sees it

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Cody's current character is a meta take on Hogan in 1995 WCW, complete with weight belt and his booking is a another wink at HHH because he'll say going heel was “the plan all along” just like the booking of Bryan during the Authority Era.

Also, the guy in the Cornette shirt was a plant, right? That was just a little too perfect.
Bit of a stretch I’d say.  

Hogan wanted to be a Horseman!?

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Going thru your old Observer Flashbacks & caught this tidbit: – “FOUR HORSEMEN UPDATE: The deal is dead. Flair wanted himself, Curt Hennig and the Road Warriors, and Hogan wanted to be a part of it and proposed himself, Flair, Savage and Sting. So they broke off negotiations and now no one gets any Horsemen SO I HOPE EVERYONE IS HAPPY NOW.”

On a scale of Paul Roma to 100, how good of a Horseman would Hulk Hogan have been?
They sure wouldn’t have been doing any jobs at least!  

Rocky and the Beatles

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Hey Scott,

I know you’re a huge fan of Rocky and The Beatles, have you seen either Rocky IV: Rocky vs. Drago or The Beatles: Get Back yet? If you have will there be a rant on the BOD for them? I sure hope so.

Thanks for your continued good work,

Shea 

Rocky didn’t play in Canada.  Beatles is on my list after Hawkeye and my backlog of serial killer shows on Discovery Plus, the BEST streaming service ever.  

Hard to explain

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Hey Scott, 


Remember the last decade or so of WWE crowds hijacking shows with chants for CM Punk and others, doing the wave, etc.? Remember how people (especially WWE stans) blamed it on how fans today just wanted to get themselves over or something like that? Isn't it incredible that this never, ever happens at AEW shows? AEW has somehow managed to find a fanbase that exclusively consists of the type of wrestling fans who wouldn't fuck with WWE's high quality programming just to make themselves seem cool. Amazing, don't you think?

Huge if true.  

Where’s my writer’s contract?

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One of the comments in a thread the other day about Lesnar’s suspension being lifted got me going down a rabbit hole. Here’s what SHOULD happen.

Lesnar’s suspension stands. Meanwhile, Otis over on Raw gets tired of being…whatever Gable has made him into, destroys Gable and quits. A couple weeks later, the Bloodline issue an open challenge to any team they haven’t beaten, but with the catch that if you don’t win, the person that gets pinned is fired. Otis, newly signed to SD, teams up with, eh…doesn’t matter, what matters is, the Usos engage in shenanigans and Otis is pinned. He swears this isn’t the last they’ve heard of him, but he’s fired.

Couple weeks later…same challenge. Out comes a masked man – who is clearly Otis – identifying himself as “Meat Machine.” The Usos protest, but he wins on the technicality that they cannot prove he’s Otis. They then ask who would be dumb enough to risk their career to team with him, and out comes a huge guy in a mask with a sword tat in his chest, Beast Machine. The team of Heavier Machinery win the tag titles.

The Usos and Reigns are furious and demand a rematch with the titles and the masks on the line. Heavier Machinery agrees, but in exchange if they win again, Otis and Lesnar are reinstated. They win. After the match, Reigns comes in for the 3-on-2 beat down, but Lesnar unmasks and whoops his ass, setting up the Universal title match.

It should go without saying, but during this entire thing, Beast Machine is dancing and goofing around just as much as Otis. Maybe he even has a boom box he calls the Beast Box or Meat Box or something.

I accept PayPal as a form of payment.


Well that's a relief.  I'm always worried about sending cash in the mail.  

Jake v. Savage

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The Survivor Series 91 repost made me wonder if a case could be made that they put TOO much heat on Jake, in the sense that he was SO evil and heinous that the only way that they could blow it off and ensure justice being served was for Savage to literally
(and not in the Monsoon sense of the word) disembowel Jake in the ring.  After everything Jake did, was there anything that Savage could have done, without shooting on him, that would have seemed like proper payback?

I'm sure Jesse Baker would be able to think of something.  

Benoit What If

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Inspired by Tommy's retro reviews today:

1. If police announce the Benoit deaths are a probable murder-suicide on Monday afternoon, what does RAW look like that night? Do we get a random clip show like the international version of RAW or something else?

2. If for some reason the police don't check on the Benoit family until Monday evening or Tuesday morning and the Vince McMahon Memorial Show goes ahead does Vince show up on Smackdown or the next RAW to break kayfabe and abandon the storyline or is it just quietly dropped and WWF pretends the memorial show never happened?
1.  Definitely we get the international version.  They were trying to cut bait on the show by halfway though as it is.
2.  I think they just quietly drop it and move on.

Non-big two successes

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Hey Scott,

What, in your opinion, is the best in-ring wrestling year for a North American promotion that wasn’t WWF/E, WCW or NWA / Mid-Adlantic?

The AWA was having a pretty good year in 1983 before Hogan left.  The problem though is that promotions weren't particularly forthcoming with information on how they were doing. 

NXT 2.0 vs Smackdown 2004

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Hey Scott.   I remember when you used to review Smackdown in 2004 and it was so bad that you pulled the plug on it.  Is NXT 2.0 an even worse show in your view?

Sadly the real test is yet to come, because once they start shedding the indie backbone guys like Gargano and O'Reilly and eventually Ciampa, then the geeks are going to have to craft matches on their own and it's going to get uglier.  So i'd say it's worse than Smackdown from that era, but it's still not quite at the bizarre performance art level of Vince Russo's WCW yet.  YET.  

Cole with the Elite gone

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So with Omega gone for awhile, and the Bucks having some time off,  do you steer Cole towards being more heel or slowely getting face momentum with his entrance alone?  I can definitly see him getting cocky and brag about holding the Elite together in everyones absence, but i think i would enjoy a jealous Omega returning more than a face-turning savior.  Cole at this stage can definitly main event against Hangman in a ppv and be defeated cleanly  without losing an ounce of overness. OR, since the Bucks make great assholes with their attire alone, do you have them turn on Cole and Omega makes the save and now you got one hell of a tag-match?  

Sidenote:  is Guinness following the wrestling world if 2021 breaks the record for most ladder matches in a year?  Nxt is having a gimmick match determine something in another gimmick match!!!


Yeah I'm not really fond of NXT backsliding into throwing gimmick matches on regular TV every other week because it's going to kill them even more than they already are. 

As for Cole, it's super obvious that Kool Kyle is coming over by the end of the year to reform reDragon and I imagine you can slot Gargano in there as Strong 2.0 and bam, there's your Undisputed Era to usurp the Elite and turn them babyface.  Then Hangman reunites with them, and we do Blood & Guts on the first TBS Dynamite and blow it off, where you turn the Era babyface in the loss and the Elite can all turn heel again and then they do the rematch on Rampage but reversed.  And then I guess you can do something for the second TBS Dynamite, I dunno, my booking genius only extends so far.  Maybe Dexter Lumis will get fired and he'll kidnap Stephanie on the way out of Titan Towers and debut with her as his unwilling manager and then HHH can be All Elite when he's recovered from his cardiac event and come to AEW to get revenge?  

Post SummerFest ‘91

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So the recent mail question got me wondering, what the plan for Warrior post Summerslam? Was he to feud with Undertaker? Jake? Team up with Hogan to do tag matches with both of them?

I don’t know if he had already been doing the house show loop with Taker (and thus would have been moved to Jake) but it really does leave a lot of possibilities. Do you know what the plan was?

Doing the house show loop with Jake.  They specifically brought Savage out of retirement to replace him for those matches. 

I object!

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Scott,
 
Huge AEW fan here, but I can't be the only person who finds it borderline offensive that Billy Gunn is appearing on television in any capacity whatsoever. TK has a large roster of talented wrestlers and I somehow watched a Billy Gunn match on dynamite this week. Maybe him getting less of a crowd reaction than Red Velvet will help end this, but good lord, how is this the best thing they have for Darby?


He's tall, muscular and has meaty thighs, pal!  That's good shit!

Oh that's the other guys, forgot for a minute.  

I dunno, like I said they were fine as babyfaces with Billy doing a nostalgia run, but as a part of the main show it's a very weird choice unless it's like Darby ends Colton's winning streak as the big payoff or something.  

2nd nap unlocked

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Happy paid day off Thursday Scott,

When was the last great steel cage match?

A cage match that had high stakes, either a title on the line or end of an epic feud, great execution and a worthy ending that had the masses yearning for more?

I'll hang up and listen.

Ha ha paid day off.  That’s funny.  The real Thanksgiving is in October.  
As for the cage match, I’ll refer to the one that just happened at All Out.  Bucks vs Lucha Bros.  

AEW on TSN

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Hi Scott. Long time reader of yours going back to Rantsylvania. I noticed you keep travelling overseas to watch AEW TV. Just wanted to let you know (if you weren’t already aware) that the TSN app has a really handy on demand section for AEW (going back to the first Dynamite in fact). Generally  they show stuff live on the app too. May or may not save you some trouble (although it sounds like a good deal with the PPVs). Images attached. Cheers. 


The problem is that the app is not exactly timely with updating the AEW content.  I’ve seen it go for days without posting the new episode.  Fite is instant.  

Made WWE guys

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Hey Scott:


WWE has been cutting wrestlers left and right and I don't see an end in sight.   Which wrestlers do you feel are bulletproof in the company no matter what happens?  The two best examples that I can think of are Randy Orton and Roman Reigns.  Thanks.

Orton for sure.  Reigns I’d still rank at 99% because you never know.  Seth Rollins is getting there.  

McMahon Thanksgiving

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Hey Scott,

 

Hope all is well.  So say Triple H is bringing the stuffing for Thanksgiving dinner at Chez McMahon.  Does Kahn future endeavor the stuffing before it even hits the table?

 

Only the casseroles brought by HHH.