Return Of Squashes?

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Raw this past Monday had 8 matches total, 5 of them basically being squashes.  Bear in mind I am not complaining about this at all, as I think it's a smart strategy with the brands being separated again.  However, do you expect this to be the norm going forward, or do you think this was just a 1 off thing?
Well if the episode bombed even more so than usual in the ratings, then it'll probably just be a one-off. 

John Morrison returns! For real this time!

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https://www.f4wonline.com/wwe-news/wwe-officially-confirms-john-morrison-returning-company-298731 
This time we have confirmation from both sides, after he initially signed in September and then spent two months apparently denying it on Twitter with no announcements from WWE.   

The SmarK Rant for WWE Monday Night RAW – 12.03.19

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The SmarK Rant for WWE Monday Night RAW (Hulu Edition) – 12.02.19

The Authors of Pain show up and speak SCARY FOREIGN LANGUAGES when asked why they beat up Kevin Owens.  I bet their books about pain aren’t even written in English.

Live from Kevin Nashville, TN

Your hosts are Vic Joseph & Jerry Lawler & Samoa Joe

Read moreThe SmarK Rant for WWE Monday Night RAW – 12.03.19

The Tuesday Night Streaming Wars!

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Tonight!  It’s the season finale of NWA Powerrr, featuring the Rock N Roll Express challenging for the NWA tag team titles one last time:

Also, AEW Dark has some stuff from Chicago…

No Monday ratings info yet due to the holiday last week.  I had to call and chat with technical support at Apple for work on Thanksgiving day, and the people working there were flummoxed that anyone would be calling or buying stuff on that day, as if it was a holiday everywhere in the world.

Also, my daughter finally clued into the Baby Yoda landslide sweeping the pop culture world and demanded we watch all the episodes available of The Mandalorian so she could squeal at how cute he is over and over.  But, now she’s watching Star Wars with me, so my job as a parent is complete.

Have a great night, and I’m off to have supper and review RAW on Hulu for tomorrow.

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Wondering if you planned on having a match of the year and/or decade countdown to close out the year on the blog?

That sounds suspiciously like something that would require work on my part, plus the ability to remember shit that happened before last year.   Neither is really a strong point for me as of late.  

WWE’s idea of “Attractions”

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So your shared disapproval of WALTER jobbing first and quickly at SS, and you picking him in a fantasy league, had me thinking about the following. WALTER sometimes reminds me of Andre in his prime. A man of intimidating stature, presence, who could GO in the ring and the simple offense of overpowering blunt force makes the match unique . He, I believe, is a true Attraction, And NXT UK, for the most part, has presented him that way. So of course WWE does the opposite. 

Then you got the Lesnar & Strowman matches from Crown Jewel. I really have no good idea of their opponents, but they were from outside the norm, and were shown to be “special attractions”, which is fine, but you don’t need to waste that at CJ, where it doesn’t matter who’s on. Unless Vince told them that’s who Yoko & Warrior are now, so I could be wrong.

Then you have them thinking that Lesnar still is the money making, ratings drawing Attraction from years ago , but we all know how that’s going.

Then the one attraction they are investing in now , The Fiend, gets Red lights which makes me not even want to watch the fucking thing!

Basically I have no idea what makes who they are telling me is special , special . I have a black light at my parents house, if I get that to Rusev would that give him some better shit to work with?

At least people are reacting to Rusev.  That's something, I guess. 

AEW’s biggest problem

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AEW is still fine, but this past week’s number has been, I think, the biggest cause for concern thus far. Regardless of how they’re doing, or what metrics we use, there’s one booking pattern that has been bugging me.
Especially with Lucha Bros losing again, it feels like the underlying philosophy of the booking is that the greater a talent you are, the more you can afford to lose. Personally, I’ve always hated this philosophy. Guys are only ever bulletproof up to a certain point. Your best guys, your Austins, Rocks, Hogans, etc. need to fucking win.
If I could see one change, it’d be to have the Lucha Bros, Bucks, and Kenny win the next 90% or more of their matches. So far, only Jericho and Mox are getting that kind of correct treatment. 


I agree.  I know the thinking is that, for example, they want to build up the Best Friends as a contender, but the Lucha Brothers should not be used as stepping stones.  They're the last guys on the ladder, not the first.  It's really weird to be in a situation where we're having to beat the drum about the owners of a promotion not being booked strongly enough, but it's particularly mystifying in the case of someone like Kenny Omega, who looks like a goof much of the time in his own promotion.  

The SmarK Rant for WWF Prime Time Wrestling – 03.09.87

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The SmarK Rant for WWF Prime Time Wrestling – 03.09.87

Back to 1987 for the buildup to Wrestlemania III and a senses-shattering first appearance!  This is bigger than the debut of Dynamite and the moon landing PUT TOGETHER.  Like, if AEW Dynamite did a special show live from the moon.

Also, I’m gonna run into the 24/7 rants on this show right away and I kind of wanted to close the loop on the reviews anyway.

Your hosts are Gorilla Monsoon & Bobby Heenan

Read moreThe SmarK Rant for WWF Prime Time Wrestling – 03.09.87

Rock Star Gary reflects on WCCW 06-09-1984

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Taped from Dallas, TX

Airdate: June 9, 1984 (taped 05/18)

Attendance: unknown

Hosted by Bill Mercer

Can Adams and Parsons overcome the evil duo of Gordy and Khan? What does Stella have in store for Garvin? And who will join me in this rather dangerous episode?

Read moreRock Star Gary reflects on WCCW 06-09-1984

Monday Night Raw – December 2, 2019

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Monday Night Raw
Date: December 2, 2019
Location: Bridgestone Arena, Nashville, Tennessee
Commentators: Vic Joseph, Jerry Lawler, Samoa Joe

We’re less than two weeks away from Tables, Ladders and Chairs and you can probably piece together a lot of the card from here. That being said, there is a lot that still needs to be done so expect tonight to be thrown into overdrive in a hurry. It is hard to say how well that could go for the show, but I’m guessing it’s going to feel long. Let’s get to it.

Read moreMonday Night Raw – December 2, 2019

Monday Night Open Mic

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Howdy Blog O’Doomers!

I hope everyone had a great weekend, a great long holiday weekend in the states and just a normal great weekend for other areas of this big wide world.

RAW tonight should continue with the Seth Rollins heel turn, which got off to a good start last week in my opinion. I know it’s shocking that kind of a whiny hypocritical dude in real life can pull off being a whiny hypocritical character. There is also a Charlotte vs. Kabuki Warriors handicap match advertised and I’m worried about how inept they will make Asuka and Kairi look.

NXT picked up another ratings win, probably because all those young cool TV watches that AEW gets actually decided to hit the bars Wednesday. Make fun of old viewers if you want, but they’re loyal. That’s why Law & Order SVU has been on for 22 seasons.

Seahwawks-Vikings is your EXCELLENT Monday Night Football matchup.

Six NBA, Five NHL, limited slate of men’s college basketball, little more on the women’s side.

Keep it clean.

Joshi Spotlight: AJW Wrestling Queendom 1997

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The main event, between Kyoko Inoue & Aja Kong. All the bouts are on this channel- just type in “Unified” or find out the names in Japanese and search that way.

AJW WRESTLING QUEENDOM 1997:
(23.03.1997)

-Aaaaaaaaaaaaand now we’re into the depressing year. 1997 is where it all fully went wrong for Joshi as a whole, but AJW wasn’t quite bankrupt here. What we now had was a very different company in a changing business, though, as the Joshi boom had hit big and then just DIED by this point. Admittedly it was kind of a “fad” thing and fads die out, but various other factors played into things. Kyoko Inoue was now the WWWA Champion, having defeated Manami Toyota to become the new top star… and sadly her reign was a complete box office failure. Perhaps because of that, this show is doing an interpromotional thing with Chigusa Nagayo’s GAEA Japan, but only with her rookies. So a lot of the undercard has GAEA girls on it. Otherwise, much of the card has people rapidly being pushed on it- the 3WA Tag Champs are Tomoko Watanabe and KUMIKO MAEKAWA of all people- a midcarder and a rookie as of last year! Kaoru Ito’s getting shoved into the Main Event spot, too- it’s like even with most of the old guard still around, they were desperate for people to fill the top spots.

“TL;DR- Why Should I Watch This?”: If you’re gonna love something, you should be there when it dies (ugh, I just compared a wrestling show to a dog being put down). And this is like watching the last hurrah of a company as it slowly falters and takes an eight-year lurch towards the grave. Okay, and the final three matches are all around ****.

Read moreJoshi Spotlight: AJW Wrestling Queendom 1997

What the World Was Watching: WCW Pro – November 18, 1995

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WCW Prime for November 13 featured a new match, with Chris Cruise and Dusty Rhodes doing commentary.

Read moreWhat the World Was Watching: WCW Pro – November 18, 1995

Monday Night Raw – November 25, 2019

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Monday Night Raw
Date: November 25, 2019
Location: Allstate Arena, Chicago, Illinois
Commentators: Vic Joseph, Jerry Lawler

It’s the final important show in Chicago and that means we should be in for the start of something new around here. We’ve been dealing with the NXT Invasion for so long now that I’m almost not sure where things are supposed to go from here. Raw came in dead last on Sunday though and that means it’s time to hold some people responsible. Oh and TLC is in less than three weeks because we’re not allowed to have a breather from major shows. Let’s get to it.

Read moreMonday Night Raw – November 25, 2019