The Wrestling Thread: WWE WrestleMania 31 [NSFW]

[sw26]

Holy gooseberry fool, a $100k battle royal being given away on free TV. Ace.

[Rog]

Why put on a free three hour show 4 days before a PPV

TNA Reaction live That's got massive disaster written all over it. To have it live it'll need to be done in real time too. So the show must end on a big event that will set the locker room talking. Can't just have all the guys in the locker room talking about their PPV matches or it will be a waste of a live hour. They're setting themselves up for failure.

[KK]

Why put on a free three hour show 4 days before a PPV

If the WWE is any precedent, 3 hour specials tend to hurt buyrates.

[Mafro]

How long do deliveries from Silvervision usually take? I just bought WMX7

[Cosmo]

How long do deliveries from Silvervision usually take? I just bought WMX7

I'd say you'll have it on Friday.

[KK]

Hulk Hogan teased a heel turn in a conversation with Bubba the Love Sponge. Actually, he hinted at it when he was lying on his back in the hospital vowing to turn TNA around and talked about the black beard maybe coming back. While hospitalized, Hogan called Bubba three times on his 9/8 show, and at one point Bubba told Hogan that he should bring back Macho Man to join his new heel group. Hogan played dumb and then Bubba awkwardly tried to cover.

Haven't seen Macho Man on TV in years. It would have a novelty factor, I suppose. Though going from photos he looks really old now.

The recent SmackDown tour of the UK was a massive bomb. Nothing was sold out, even with heavy discounting. The lowest point was the 9th September House Show in Aberdeen, which only pulled in 1,500 fans (which could be the lowest attendance in the history of the UK). Minehead drew 5,000, but was about 200 short of full capacity. What happens when you oversaturate a market when your product isn't very hot.

[Psychic]

I think X-7 was too overhyped for me when I bought it. I just can't seem to like it at all, I've actually thought about selling it.

[KK]

First hand report from a fan who went to the NXT/SmackDown Tapings:

The crowd was the lowest I have seen at the Joe at some time. Things were off to a bad start when I went to purchase tunnel bus tickets in Windsor and was told that she "expected more people would be going". My friend and I were the only two people on the bus heading to Detroit for wrestling purposes at the time - there's normally several more families with signs. At the arena, I overheard an usher telling someone they "sold more than they expected" with walk-up sales and had to move some of the tarp to make room, but when I entered the seating area I actually saw them pulling the tarp over more seats near the hard camera. The entire upperdeck was blocked off and I believe some scattered floor seats were available, but for the most part the un-blocked seats in the lower bowl were filled. I saw this one coming when the Over The Edge PPV had the stage moved up and people given seat upgrades to move them around, and SmackDown isn't exactly the hot show to go to right now. Lots of kids, which is to be expected, but a lot of kids in floor seats too. Just a quick comment to the parents out there if I may: Don't buy floor seats for your little kids. They're expensive and they won't see anything because people are always picking random times to stand up. Row 1 or 2 (and maybe 3), ok. You're looking at wasted money after that though. Sometimes I didn't want to stand up when the rows in front of me stood up because, hey, at 6'5" I'm a tall guy and the kids are already having a problem seeing, but then I couldn't see sitting down.

- With all that said, the crowd that DID show up was really into everything... except NXT. You would be amazed (or maybe not) at the amount of pure venom coming from some of these people, yelling things like "NXT ruined Raw" (ok?) people doing light "Waste of time!" chants, and as I'm sure was evident on TV, no one really wanted to give the Joke-Off much of a chance until Jamie. Cole calling NXT got some people to applaud him, but since it was Cole, people just loudly booed him anyway (even if they had previously agreed on his "NXT is a waste of time" stance).

- Just before NXT started and the pros came out, a mild "Goldust" chant broke out in my area. That was nice. The only other off-air NXT is (and I don't remember what the original announcement was) after the opening match everyone left, then everyone came back out and Chimmel re-announced Ziggler and Kaitlin was the winners of the match. Kaitlin and AJ stuck around for the Joke-Off.

- Because it was the opening match, people cared about Tyler Reks vs. Dudebuster. Tyler won with sort of an inverted F5 (basically an F5 but from a Torture Rack position).

- Videos to keep the audience occupied: WrestleMania XXVI video package, a video package with several Mania moments with the song "Ladies and Gentlemen" (people around me recognized this at the Mania 23 theme, which was in Detroit), a clip of the Kid Rock concert from Mania 25, and twice they aired a 2009 Tribute to the Troops recap video.

- MVP vs. Luke Gallows: Before the match, Gallows (whose entrance video wall still included the SES logo) said he was going to make it on his own. His tights had no SES logo, just "LG". MVP said he should come up with a new name, like "Big LG", because it's better than what they call him in the back - "Big Dummy" (said like Dumb-E). I think the idea was for us to chant "Big Dumb E" at Luke, but it didn't really take though some kids did try. MVP won with his old Playmaker finisher, then hit Luke with the Paydirt when he pulled the double cross on a handshake attempt. Match was about 11 minutes, longer with the pre-match Big Dummy talk.

- Christian got his entrance before SmackDown officially began being taped. Good pop - people actually popped when they saw the ring crew changing the mat and putting up the "Peep Show" signs on the ring posts. Alberto Del Rio got awesome heat and is an awesome man. Christian began introducing Alberto as his guest, but ADR's official ring announcer found this quite inappropriate and ranted in Spanish about it. Del Rio also called the PPV "Night of THE Champions", so I guess I can't get annoyed if/when Bryan does it now. Good segment.

- Hart Dynasty vs Cody and Drew was a solid tag match that went a little under 10 minutes. Biggest surprise here was that at the Over the Edge PPV, when the Hart's were in theory a much hotter act and had stars the level of Jericho and Miz to work with, no one cared at all for them. Maybe because they were too into Jericho, but on this night, with a smaller crowd, people LOVED the Hart Dynasty and were always doing the rally-claps and hot for the comebacks. DH Smith was pinned when Tyson was on the floor and Natalya seemed to have some concern over his condition, but I don't think it was an injury angle.

- People were into Kofi's promo about his quest for the IC title. I also thought a fight was going to break out when his shirt landed in my section as the woman who caught it at the same time kept tugging the shirt while the man explained he wanted it for his kid. The man got it in the end.

- Kofi vs. Swagger: I think this match will be awesome on TV if they can add some noise and put in a well placed commercial, but up until Kofi FINALLY went on offense, it came across very flat live. Basically, Swagger beat on him, Kofi tried a rally, the crowd got behind him... then he did nothing and Swagger was still in control. I could sense on the floor, people were getting tired of this quickly (as I was thinking that, two people behind me started yelling "THIS IS BORING"). This also seemed to lead to a large heel section in the lower deck behind the floor seats loudly chanting "Let's Go Swagger!" (they also immediately began chanting for Punk in his match). 10 minutes into the match Kofi nailed Swagger with a sweet kick on the apron and that got people back in, and the match was pretty great from that point until the end where Jack kept going for the Ankle Lock but Kofi kept getting free. Kofi won at the 14-15 minute mark. The match itself was perfectly fine, but as I said, I believe a break during some of Swagger's rest hold offense and some added crowd noise will help this one greatly.

- Awful Hornswoggle comedy, and this is coming from a guy that normally tries to laugh and give them a comedy pass. The gist was a nun was trying to teach him and Teddy English but Swoggle played some tricks and got Teddy in trouble (he drew picture of the nun as the Devil when he was supposed to be writing ABC, then switched papers with Teddy). At the end she was going to use a ruler on Teddy's wrist, Hornswoggle confessed, she was going to hit him, Teddy kicked her out. I've spent far too may words describing this.

- I have nothing of note to add about the Divas match as the standing usher blocked most of my view of what I would assume was Rosa's bad wrestling. It was only 3 minutes.

- Punk vs. Christian was a good, solid match that lasted almost 10 minutes. Del Rio came out to do commentary during the commercial (between Punk and Christian's entrances). Punk also still had "Straight Edge Society" branding the video wall during his entrance, but he was by himself (Joey Mercury was nowhere to be found on this show). When Christian set Punk up for the Killswitch, Alberto began talking on the mic as if he was going to accept Christian's challenge. Punk hit the GTS and won, Alberto put a chair on Christian and sat down... then told him the answer is still no.

- Kane spent 4 minutes telling us he was glad his brother suggested a No Holds Barred match because that's exactly what he wants. After he finally acknowledged this stipulation, Undertaker came out. When the lights went out, Kane snuck up behind him and spent a few minutes beating him up before giving Taker a Tombstone, then doing the Undertaker's victory pose to set of his pyro. As silly and drawn out as all this was, Kane was pretty good at delivering all his material. Speaking of...

- After the show, Kane said we were going to see a title match. He then proceeded to do his and Undertaker's match introductions on his own, and I have to say, it was pretty awesome. This was 4 minutes long and mostly Kane dominating, but Undertaker had a comeback that led to a chokeslam. Kane bailed - teased beating the 10 count - then left. As short of a flurry as Taker's offense was, it legitimately got the loudest cheers of the night.

So, that's that - apologies if I'm being a bit lengthy about a show no one really cares about, but that's how I am.

Take care,
Stephen Gray

[Mafro]

I think X-7 was too overhyped for me when I bought it. I just can't seem to like it at all, I've actually thought about selling it.

Die.

[Psychic]

- Videos to keep the audience occupied: WrestleMania XXVI video package, a video package with several Mania moments with the song "Ladies and Gentlemen" (people around me recognized this at the Mania 23 theme, which was in Detroit), a clip of the Kid Rock concert from Mania 25, and twice they aired a 2009 Tribute to the Troops recap video.

lol

[KK]

Night of Champions is on Sky Sports 3.
WWE Hell in a Cell is on Sky Box Office (After last year, I refuse to purchase this).
And WWE Bragging Rights on October 4th has been relegated to Sky Sports 4.

I wonder how many screwy finishes are going to occur at NOC what with Hell in a Cell two weeks later?

[sw26]

http://www.silvervision.co.uk/products/WrestleMania-17-DVD-2-Discs.html

£8.99 tommorow. Posting this today because I'd probably forget otherwise.

Go on then. I already own the original release, but you can never have enough copies of the best PPV of all time I suppose. Plus I think the original release is a converted NTSC DVD because it's quite blurry when watched in 50Hz. That's my justification for double dipping anyway.

[Mafro]

Night of Champions is on Sky Sports 3.

Is that this Sunday?

[KK]

Is that this Sunday?

Yep.

[Saint of Killers]

Night of Champions is on Sky Sports 3.
WWE Hell in a Cell is on Sky Box Office (After last year, I refuse to purchase this).
And WWE Bragging Rights on October 4th has been relegated to Sky Sports 4.

I wonder how many screwy finishes are going to occur at NOC what with Hell in a Cell two weeks later?

Only two weeks?! ...

[Prototype]

Hell in a Cell is 3th Oct, Bragging rights is the 24th Oct.

[Return_of_the_STAR]

The X-7 under-love isn't my fault. I was told over and over how great it was and... it just felt flat as a result, and always has. I do however realise it has to be good... I just can't seem to be enthused by it like some of my other old DVD's.

Oddly, I think I'd rather watch an older, shitter Wrestlemania nobody talked about and I think I might fall in love with it. Hmmm.

In time, I'm sure I'll lose my non-caring for X-7 which undoubtedly had a great card.

I understand your explanation, if it has been built up too much then you expect too much. For me WMX7 was the greatest WM of all time. It was at a time where i was more into wrestling than at any other time of my love. I used to look forward to every Friday night so that i could watch RAW, i even used to cancel doing stuff with my mates because that's how hooked i was on wrestling at the time. WMX7 was also the first time i stayed up to watch a ppv live. My then gf (now wife) even stayed up to watch it with me, although she slept through the Austin V Rock main event.

This period was also aided by the lack of spoilers. At this time i had only just got the internet and hadn't discovered spoilers or wrestling chat rooms. This made the product fresh. Austin turning heel at the end was so out of the left field for me, the shock i think made the show even greater. I'm sure had this event happened now that there would have been tons of rumours on the net before the event about austin turning heel.

[KK]

Big changes to WWE's Wellness Policy:

Coming out of issues over the weekend, World Wrestling Entertainment has confirmed that the drug Carisprodol (somas) have been banned as part of a new amendment to the current drug testing policy. Use of the drug by performers has been banned even with a doctor's prescription.

It is one of a few changes made to the policy. The policy changes made have yet to be updated on the company's corporate web site.

Somas, a muscle relaxer, have been a major party drug in pro wrestling dating back decades. But numerous embarrassing incidents where talent has passed out in public have been linked to taking too many of the drug.

Due to the popularity of the drug with a certain segment of the talent base, this is probably the single most significant change to the policy since its inception.

[Corazon de Leon]

Is Hunter a big fan?

[Return_of_the_STAR]

Is Hunter a big fan?

Don't think it matters, i can't imagine him ever being tested.