Last Monday night, the entire WWE roster (sans CM Punk, John Cena, Randy Orton and Sheamus) held a vote of confidence in HHH as the COO. The result? They all walked out on him, including the referees, announcers, and many of the technical crew. So how will this affect tonight’s episode of Smackdown? Will anyone show up? Or will we just see HHH standing in the middle of the ring shrugging his shoulders for two hours?
I held off on posting this article because news of the passing of Eddie “Umaga” Fatu was much more serious and important. (more…)
I hate this. I didn’t get into writing about wrestling with the intent of having to write tribute articles – not for guys whose matches I was just reviewing 6 months ago, at least. When Captain Lou died, yes, it was a sad day for me as a fan, but Lou Albano was 76 years old. Eddie “Umaga” Fatu passed away yesterday at the young age of 36, with reports coming in that he died of a heart attack.
It was pointed out that WWE’s obituary, or whatever you want to call it, on WWE.com makes sure to note that Umaga was released from his WWE contract on June 11, 2009. The person who mentioned it was pondering why WWE would point that out. The reason is simple – WWE doesn’t want to have more heat on them about drug use if Fatu’s death turns out to be drug related. WWE let Fatu go because he violated the wellness policy a second time and refused rehab. The company can’t afford bad publicity right now, not with Linda McMahon running for the US Senate.
ECW is set to be re-branded and re-formatted in the very near future. The rumor going around is that the veteran ECW wrestlers will be moved to SmackDown and RAW, while whatever ECW becomes will be a showcase for new talent.
Speaking of which, I went back over the last few days and watched the first three episodes of ECW on SciFi. Not quite the original ECW, but not nearly what it’s become. Anybody else find it funny that Mike Knox made his during a segment set to “Buttons” by the Pussycat Dolls?
I hope TNA can sign RVD. TNA’s guys can work circles around half of the WWE roster, and RVD can work circles around all of them. With the Hogan deal, maybe we’ll see The Whole F’N Show become Mr. Thursday Night again.
Jeff Hardy’s court date has been postponed once again, this time until January. This means we’re certainly not going to see the Charismatic Enigma any time before the end of the year in any wrestling organization.
That’s all I’ve really got for the moment. JT will be here tomorrow with another edition of Random Randomness!
Holy new champions, Batman! While my predictions for Extreme Rules didn’t really pan out too well – and neither did the PPV itself, for that matter – the company was definitely shaken up. 48 hours after I posted last week’s ThinkSoJoE’s thoughts, four Championships were in the hands of somebody different. In fact, there were FIVE title changes in that span. If that doesn’t set the tone for a big week in professional wrestling, I don’t know what does.
During our Extreme Rules coverage on Sunday, Drowgoddess and I pondered the fact that Batista hadn’t climbed the cage once in the buildup leading to his match at Extreme Rules against Randy Orton. He didn’t climb the cage at all during the match either, yet still won the WWE Championship. After the fact, we found out that Batista had been injured before the show and was scheduled for surgery two days later. It was originally believed to be a torn bicep, which is a very severe injury, but the word going around is it’s just a torn tendon, not nearly as severe. WWE, however, says that it’s a torn bicep, which is leading some Internet Wrestling Community pundits to speculate that it’s a coverup for a wellness policy violation. What do I think? I think WWE is lying to us, not to cover up an injury, but to add more impact to Batista’s earlier than expected return. They’ve been doing this for a few years now – John Cena at the Royal Rumble in 2007 comes to mind. If he did fail a drug test, I seriously doubt they’d have given him the WWE Championship the day before his suspension kicked in.
Speaking of the WWE’s wellness policy, the roster is one Superstar shorter than it was last week as Umaga was released for failing a second drug test and refusing to go to rehab. The IWC is comparing this to Jeff Hardy’s termination from WWE several years ago for some reason. TNA is apparently interested in bringing in Umaga once his 90 day no-compete clause is up.
The WWE roster is actually one Diva shorter as well, as Vickie Guerrero has given her notice and officially quit as RAW General Manager last week. The new GM is scheduled to be named this week on the three hour edition of RAW, which happens to eminate from Charlotte, NC. I’ll give you one guess as to who the IWC “journalists” expect to be the chosen one. I’ll also tell you why it won’t be who you’d expect. The standard recovery time for the The Randy Orton Super Magic Mega Kick of Final Ultimate Death!!! is around four months. Ric Flair was hit with the move a mere two weeks ago. There’s no way the WWE is going to try and make us believe that a 60 year old man managed to come back from the devestating move quicker than Triple H or Batista did. I’m not going to make a guess as to who it will be, but I’m willing to bet that it’s not Flair.
BoredWrestlingFan.com turned 1 this past Tuesday, and in the 369 days we’ve been around, we have never once mentioned Combat Zone Wrestling. There’s probably a pretty good reason for that, but reports have come in that a CZW wrestler was severely injured doing one of the “company’s” patented light tube spots. According to reports, a wrestler by the name of Nick Gage severed a main artery after taking a bump on a light tube. Gage never passed out, instead running to the back in a panic before being air lifted to a local hospital. It’s said that he lost a lot of blood, and not really knowing what to do the wrestlers started an impromptu battle royal. The card was apparently taking place in one of the wrestlers’ parents back yard, which is probably why this is the first time we’ve ever mentioned CZW here. Don’t worry though folks, thankfully CZW’s website reports that Gage is going to be ok.
Rumor was making it’s way through WWE this past week that Rey Mysterio was leaving the company. These rumors appear to be unfounded as it’s been reported that Rey just wanted the week off.
Speaking of taking time off, John Cena came home early from the WWE’s tour of Mexico amidst rumors that he was getting married. It was, in fact, his brother that tied the knot. Cena is allegedly getting married in July.
Not a lot of TNA news this week, but what do you expect when the company tapes a month of shows in two nights? Supposedly a wrestling website reported that new TNA Knockout Tara (formerly known as Victoria in the WWE) had an affair with Chris Benoit before the tragic murder suicide that ended the life of Benoit, wife Nancy, and son Daniel. Tara got wind of the report and denies everything, even challenging the site that started the rumor to come to her hometown and watch her take a lie detector test. It’s about time somebody who didn’t like something somebody on the internet said about them actually did something about it.
That’s about it for this week, but before I go, an interesting couple of tidbits – Batista’s win at Extreme Rules was the first time in WWE history that the WWE Championship has changed hands in a traditional steel cage match. Also, the span between last Monday (June 1st) and this past Sunday (June 7th) is the first time that the WWE, ECW, World Heavyweight, Intercontinental, and United States Championships all changed hands within a week.
That’s it for me folks, stay tuned tomorrow for an all new Random Randomness from JT!
Hello, folks! I’m not planning on reviewing the PPV in real-time tonight (WorldWrestlingInsanity‘s Aaron Wood will have you covered in that regard), though I will be trying to watch it. Since I got all but one match right at Night of Champions a few months back, I thought I’d try my hand at tonight’s Unforgiven PPV.
My picks, after the jump! (more…)