Turnbuckle Zine

from prowrestling.net, RE: WWE Raw House Show in New Orleans

“Jericho then grabbed the mic … and cut a promo on how the crowd is chanting for Cena and ended with, “You better get a good last look at your champion because he’s going down in smoke just like this city after Katrina.” That got major heat, more than the McIntyre remark. Jericho got touched when he was thrown over the guardrail into the first row and he was furious about it. When Jericho was messing with Cena outside the ring, a fan threw a piece of ice right into his right eye. “

Day 10 -Least Favorite Male Wrestler

I never really “got” Sting.  Like a lot of things in the WCW, his character just seemed like a lame knockoff of other things that may or may not have been cool.  The lights would go out anytime he was teased to enter (like the undertaker).  He used the sharpshooter (I have read that he started using it before Bret Hart did but I don’t care / don’t believe it). He had ridiculous “the crow” style makeup.  Everything about him just sort of seemed cheesy and bland, yet he was one of WCW’s biggest names.

Ten years later he still has the ridiculous face paint… he still broods up in the rafters… luckily he doesn’t do the sharpshooter (probably at least figured that one out).  Boring.  Shitty.  I have no idea why people love this guy cause he just plain sucks.

Day 9 - Least Favorite Female Wrestler

Lacey Von Erich

I … guess since she is part of the Von Erich family she is allowed to have a career… that can be the only reason why.  There are some pretty piss poor excuses for “wrestlers” in women’s wrestling (or at least in WWE … not quite as much TNA), but this girl takes the cake.  When people chant “you can’t wrestle” anytime a personality steps in the ring, maybe management should think the whole thing through.

Day 8 - Favorite Angle

This is a tough one…

a) there were so many good angles during the attitude era

b) I was 12 so I was a mark for pretty much every angle

I could mention how I thought the Bret Screwed Bret situation was a work because I didn’t understand that anything in pro wrestling could be real (my parents never really “got” pro wrestling and would frequently remind me that it was fake as if that would lead to some sort of television renaissance and I would stop watching).

Bret’s anti-america angle was a favorite of mine and my friends, obviously the mcmahon/austin feud was fun, and the

nothing made me flip out as much as the Undertaker Kane feud.  With Paul Bearer as Kane’s mouthpiece (wrestling today sorely misses managers), I don’t remember liking a better angle with them as brothers, the “mysterious past” Paul constantly referred to, and the fact that it took Undertaker a few months to actually fight back (maybe it was just a few weeks, I really don’t remember).

I really can not think of a single tag team that I love / have loved more than any other.  So, after roughly a day of thinking, I’ll just go with the default Motor City Machine Guns

on to :

Day 7 : Favorite Stable

Raven’s Flock

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDzE9GpYqys&feature=related

(can’t get the HTML button to work with me on this one)

I was in middle school… I liked Pearl Jam and dirty scumbags.  Raven was always a favorite of mine, and I liked Kidman walking around scratching himself all the time (never got that it was a heroin addict schtick ).  Also, a friend called me Sick Boy in college but I don’t think he knew it was a reference but I thought it was cool nonetheless.

Post-flock, I loved how Raven got depressed
and wouldn’t wrestle in matches anymore and just quoted poetry in the corner and walked away.

(post-script, regarding the video, sometimes I forget how abysmal the announcing was in WCW… jesus christ, Tony Schivone or whatever sucked, and as much as I want to like Bobby the Brain, Tony is not helping him out much, like, ever)

dear eric bischoff,

please get the fuck out of tna.  i don’t like used car salesmen. 

-love, paul

Day 5 - Favorite Promotion

We can all thank ECW for the lack of matches nowadays that run the formula of:

taunt to the audience

walk around each other

side head lock

push against the ropes

maybe a clothesline

test of strength

repeat all

maybe a bodyslam

generic finisher (if you do not choose to ‘repeat all’ after the bodyslam)

This week on Raw Jon Lovitz hosted and there were some really great matches.  Boy when Randy Orton did that thing to Edge and Jericho used the word sycophant incorrect again, that’s what wrestling is all about.

…

Ok, I’ll fess up.  I didn’t watch Raw this week.  Instead while Raw was on I was talking to a girl about needles while a friend was retrieving a moped from under some stairs.  Then I petted a dog and a cat in a very warm apartment before taking the train home.  I don’t feel bad about it so stop judging me.

-Brayton Cameron

Day 3 - Favorite Male Wrestler

Mick Foley was always one of my favorites.  As a twelve year old, I’ll admit I was confused and disappointed by WWF dropping the hannibal/brown body-suit Mankind in favor of Dude Love and Cactus Jack (I didn’t know who Cactus Jack was yet and the Dude Love thing seemed silly and I didn’t understand that those JR interviews were actually sort of real regarding Mick’s dreams of becoming a heart throb wrestler).  The original Mankind was right up there with the Undertaker as far as being creepy, theatrical, and engaging.

Fast forward thirteen plus years and the Undertaker has a creepy baked out tan and is still pretty much doing the same exact thing he has always been doing.  I feel like Mick Foley is a wrestler I have grown up with… almost the dad of my pro-wrestling life, and has evolved as a personality in the ring.

I saw Mick speak at NIU as a junior and I think it solidified that he is my all time favorite wrestler.  Obviously not in regards to skill level/moveset, but just that he has always been someone I believe when he is on camera, and in wrestling that is important.  He’s a smart guy, self-deprecating, passionate, and I think someone who will be viewed as a significant contributor to modern wrestling.

The best.

Day 2 - Favorite Female Wrestler

I guess it’s mostly a “look” thing.  Awesome Kong was unlike anything I had ever seen in the sheltered WWF/E, and when I saw her on TNA I was in love (yep).  My friend John and I talked about how it must have been difficult come up with storylines to explain why she didn’t always have the championship belt.

I really wanted to like TNA.  I still do. 

After getting back into wrestling two years ago, I found TNA and felt like it was a great option against WWE.  With an aging Undertaker and Shawn Michaels, poor and seemingly endless feuds between John Cena and Randy Orton (I want to write an I.E.D. entry but have not come up with anything yet), and a worthless tag team and women’s division, TNA seemed to have everything WWE didn’t.  A young talent roster (A.J. Styles, anyone in the X Division, Joe, etc), an exciting and diverse tag team division (the Machine Guns, Beer Money, LAX, etc), a talented (and a refreshingly just as diverse) women’s division (Awesome Kong, ODB, the Beautiful People sans Lacey)… I remember flipping out over the Captain Justice, Curry Man, and Shark Boy skits.

Their matches were usually pretty great, sometimes the writing was inconsistent, but compared to the snorefest that was Raw (I had not been able to commit to six hours of wrestling a week at this point so I was not watching smackdown) it felt like a cool refreshing Smint.

Since January 4th, things have gotten steadily worse, as I wrote previously. Now we get to watch Abyss do his Hulk Hogan impersonation, Jay Lethal do his Ric Flair impersonation (that was kind of funny, I guess), The Band do their 1999 NWO impersonation, and watch the women’s, tag team, and X Divisions get slowly sifted away.  With TNA announcing talent cuts, I’m guessing most of the future stars of the country are on their way out while Hogan, Bischoff, and Flair will continue to be paid to essentially bleed the company to death, not unlike Ric Flair blading and bleeding himself dry.

With all this going on, WWE must have sensed a small dog biting their heels, cause they put their texas mud hole stomping boots on and didn’t look back.  Smackdown just this week featured a (albeit short) botch free, entertaining and engaging “divas” match with women that they have actually built up and given characters and personalities!  Their tag team division is expanding to the point where I need more than one hand to count all the teams. Aside from Bret Hart, the majority of the active roster I think is at least under 35 (I had no idea Batista was so old).  The story lines are getting better (there isn’t too much better going on than C.M. Punk for the past year). 

What happened?  Raw used to be an endurance test, and now, aside from the guest host sideshows, its tolerable/enjoyable.  I really wanted to like TNA, but they have not been doing themselves any favors for the past five months.

Of all the superstars of the Attitude and Invasion Eras, I think I may have had the most fun watching Shane McMahon. Sure, he was an awful technical wrestler, and his matches were hardly “classics”, but he had amazing draw potential. I was always drawn to Shane matches because they were fun as hell. Why do I like a moderately talented athlete that would have never gotten the chance had he not been the bosses son?

First and foremost, Shane had one of the coolest finishers in the business. His coast to coast dropkick (with optional trashcan!) was amazing. He also had an elbow drop that he used to use from the top rope through a table, which was also rad as shit. Growing up with only basic cable and mostly exposure to WWE’s product, any little taste of “hardcore” always got me excited, and Shane McMahon was not above sacrificing his body for a good spot. This idiot fell off the stage against the always intimidating Steve Blackman which ended his first hardcore title run (somehow he held the European belt too), and even landed his elbow drop from the scaffolding against the Big Show. He was like RVD, but, you know, had no real talent and was not really a wrestler. He took a great bump, and even though I will get a lot of shit for saying this, I always liked how he flopped around like a dying fish after he got hit with the Stone Cold Stunner.

Secondly, Shane always seemed to wrestle in no DQ matches. Historically I have more fun watching these matches. I know the “traditionalists” out there want to pretend they are better than that and want to watch technical wrestling, but you are a liar if you didnt chant “HOLY SHIT” when Shane went through the announce table at Wrestlemania 17. All of his matches had gratuitous interference from members from some awesome faction (Corporation/Alliance/Spirit Squad/Mean Street Posse), which for some reason gave the WWE carte blanche to just put him in the craziest matches with real wrestlers. It still amazes me that Shane O Mac didnt break his neck wrestling in his matches with some fucking super heavyweight goliaths, especially his “Ambulance Match” with Kane at Survivor Series 03 where he did his coast to coast kick off the top of the ambulance.

Finally, the crazy awkward tension between him and his sister, Stephanie. Sure, I would never want to improperly infer that there was McMahon family incest, but that certainly doesnt mean there wasnt a lot of fucking weird looks they exchanged during their run as co-owners of the Alliance. While getting sexually aroused by Stephanie McMahon-Helmsley is impossible given the pitch and frequency of her voice, Shane and her developed an awkward kayfabe business relationship that made me feel erotically uncomfortable until some dumb motherfucker from WCW like Hugh Morris would interrupt and say some stupid shit like “Its time to show the WWF that we mean business!” before he went out and jobbed to Albert.

With that said, Shane McMahon wrestled some awesome matches and as of this year, is no longer with the company. However, he was one pseudo wrestler I never minded having to sit through. At least he wasnt Hugh fucking Morris. I think Im gonna go watch Survivor Series 03 again. 

-Tony Martin

Saw this and thought it was a great idea!

Day 1- Favorite Wrestler Growing Up

(unintentional crotch shot)

while I have not been a fan of anything Mean Mark has done since roughly 2001 (the “American Badass,” as I have noted, was the reason I quit wrestling for roughly 7 years), the five year span from when I started wrestling to that time was pretty great.

I probably liked him for the same reason most everyone did: the theatrical nature of the gimmick, his look, his size, the tattoos… even his feuds were really engaging (i.e. those with Mankind, Paul Bearer, and pre-shirtless Kane).

His methodical, calmed mannerisms were totally up my alley, too.  I remember a friend in seventh grade saying they didn’t like him cause he never did anything when he won a match.  At the time I realized that was another thing I specifically liked about him.  Business as usual, total badass (not an american one, I guess).