Falls Count Anywhere

02-27-04

Is Why Kurt Why like Right Said Fred?

Welcome to Falls Count Anywhere! My name is Chris and I've been waiting for this day to come…

SmackDown!
The show opened with Kurt Angle in a tight close-up saying that everyone was asking him "Why, Kurt, Why?" since his attack on Eddy. I like when they do these types of things.

Then it's on to a Fatal Fourway Cruiserweight match between Rey, Jamie Noble, Nunzio and Billy Kidman. It was supposed to be for a shot at the Cruiserweight title, held by Chavo Jr, at WrestleMania. It was fast paced, with fast changes and all sorts of spots before they cut to the back to deal with a Eddy promo. I hate when they do this, taking the focus away from a match that could easily be very very good. Eddy wanted to know what Paul Heyman had to do with the attack on him. Heyman brushed Eddy off to talk to Tajiri, Sakoda and Akio. He said they also had a point, but didn't explain about what.

Nunzio is a great foil for most of the guys on the cruiserweight roster, as he is more ground-based and sells brilliantly. The guys did a series of dives to the outside. Kidman and Nunzio were fighting on the top rope in a smart spot that saw Kidman take a bump to the floor. Rey and Noble took each other out with a pair of clotheslines. We come back and Rey is turning other people's attempts into his own offensive maneuvers. He did a great wheelbarrow into a bulldog on Noble. Mysterio hit a 619 that Nunzio sold like a hyperactive Terry Funk. Paul Heyman came out and annulled the match, announcing that since no Japanese representation found its way into the contendership match, they would be holding a Cruiserweight Open. As has been reported, Dean Malenko appears to be making his return. Rey then did a dive onto the Japanese boys.

For America.

They reviewed the Eddy beating at the hands of Kurt Angle, starting from Eddy winning the belt at No Way Out. This was a good package, though the music at first sounded a little like good 1990s porn music. They used a nice strobe effect with Eddy's offensive maneuvers. They then faded to sepia, the tinting of evil-doers. They made the beatdown look really deadly, and they did a great graphic showing Angle standing over Eddy with the words "Why Kurt Why?" good stuff.

The APA took on Scotty 2 Hotty and Rikishi for the tag team belt. Ron Simmons, aka Farooq, is slowing down, but is always solid. It hard to think that a little over 11 years ago, Simmons was WCW World Champion. Bradshaw is great, but he has an air of legitimacy about him. It wasn't a good match, but it didn't really feel like wasted time. The APA got the win with the help of the Bashem interference.

They went over the Vince announcements of RAW. This was a good review, and probably a good idea to do if less that 60% of the crowd watches both shows (as the WWE currently says, and there are at least 35% who don't actually get both shows). And they took it from the right part of the interview, especially with Austin, and reviewed Brock hitting the F5 on Austin. He then did a little promo, which wasn't great, talking about why he did it and his match with Goldberg.

Eddy Guerrero came out to a huge pop. He really looks like a major star right now. The decision to move the SmackDown! product to draw more Hispanic fans is a good one, as it gives the WWE a solid hold on a single demographic and has made big inroads into the other ethnic groups. He did a great promo talking about how he cleaned himself up, and then led into calling out Kurt Angle. Eddy went out to find Kurt for a brawl, and he was stopped by Paul Heyman and the HOT Dawn Marie. Eddy went to Kurt's dressing room, with Paul and Dawn following him. Kurt showed up behind a crew of cops, and Eddy pushed Paul into Dawn to get at Kurt. Dawn took a bump and as Eddy was showing concern, Paul went ballistic and ordered Eddy arrested…again.

Brock took on Billy Gunn in a match where the crowd was chanting Goldberg from the start. Brock seemed to play up the distraction by not acting like he was fully in the moment. They worked the ground a good deal, with Billy doing a nice arm sequence. Brock through a nice spinebuster on Billy. Brock won with the F5, as it should be.

On the streets, this is called "entrapment."

They went over the WrestleMania cross-promotional match-ups, which they need to do. The show will do pretty well anyhow, but it doesn't hurt to keep pushing. Torrie and Sable came out in evening gowns to promote stheir Evening Gown match at Mania with Stacey and Jacky. Sable did some talking (not good) until Cena came out. Torrie did Cena's hand in front of the face thing as Cena entered the ring. He busted some rhymes on how they are hot and how he played a bit of Punish the Bishop to the pages of their spread. Rey came out to replace Eddy as Cena's partner in the tag match against Chavo and Big Show.

Chavo did an awesome powerbomb into a face-first slam. Rey did a lot of selling, which is what a guy of his size tends to do. The match moved well, with Rey seeming to be the leader in the pacing. Cena got a great reaction for his Five Knuckle Shuffle and such. The match slowed with Big Show in, which is expected. It got better after the commercial break, but it was only so-so.

They showed another tight close-up promo from Angle. They didn't really need to do it, but it did make the following segment look better.

Angle explained the he attacked Eddy last week for America. He didn't do it for himself; he did it for us. How thoughtful. He said that Eddy was a drug addict, that he told children that it was OK to lie cheat and steal, and that the people of America were built on morals and character.

Kurt was great here, partly since his speech fit in so nicely with the current controversy surrounding Gay Marriage, the Stern suspension, and so on. Well done interview. Kurt ended his interview and Eddy ran in through the crowd. Bad Boys Bail Bonds must work fast. Paul Heyman again ranted and raved to get Eddy arrested…again! They led Eddy down a tunnel to the cop car. I half-expected Jack Ruby to jump out and shoot him. Kurt followed him, taunting him as they put him in the car.

This was a good, story-advancing episode. There wasn't a lot of wrestling, but the stories they built up were solid and the Kurt stuff was really good. I like the way that Eddy works this sort of thing, and Kurt proved that he is the best interview in the WWE right now.

NEWS
The Rock making his appearance at the Atlanta Raw has started a run on tickets. There has been a string of live shows doing very well over the last couple of weeks, and The Rock's name coming up in ads added fuel to the fire.

Ken Shamrock is in a movie called Scarecrow Gone Wild! I'm not sure what it's about other than Shamrock is in it and it's got bikini beach scenes.

Cody Runnels, son of Dusty Rhodes, the American Dream, won the Georgia State High School Wrestling championship, ending his high school career with a 101-2 record. He has always wanted to be a pro wrestler, but he's kinda small.

Bubba The Love Sponge got fired this week, which means that Hulk Hogan, who is close friends with Bubba, won't have a platform to launch his often imaginary challenges and comebacks.

Mike Jackson, the Alabama State Junior Heavyweight Champion, will be defending his title in Foley, Alabama. Read about Mike Jackson here.

The Observer this week has a great article on the Steroid Scandal of the early 1990s. It covers everything that happened in the period where wrestling may have been in more danger than any other time in history. Coming from Dave Meltzer, who was there on the famous Donahue episode, it was very effective. I've always believed that if you aren't giving the people what they want, you're not going to survive. It's obvious that for much of the last thirty years, wrestling fans have wanted the types of physiques that almost require steroids to exist. The success of Superstar Graham, The Road Warriors, Hulk Hogan, Sycho Sid, The British Bulldog, and The Ultimate Warrior certainly speak to that. Even after guys like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels proved that smaller guys could work effectively as a headliner, there are guys like HHH. Hell, Eddy Guerrero had to "bulk up" to get any notice. Still, if I had to choose between not having wrestling around or having steroids in wrestling, I'll take the latter.

FlashBack!
Every year, Pro Wrestling Illustrated puts out the PWI 500, a listing of the 500 best wrestlers in the World. It's a worked list, with the editors making it seem like a big deal when really it's whatever comes to their mind. Though, among the less-smart, or more obsessive-compulsive, fans, they are quite meaningful. I thought I'd go over the first five years and do later years in a follow-up down the road. Also, it should be noted that the fun isn't just at the top of the list, but the guys on the bottom are an interesting story in themselves.

In 1991, Hulk Hogan was WWF champ, though his power of draw was slipping into the past. The editors, probably thinking that Hogan was still the guy most folks thought of as the biggest star in wrestling. The top ten was a pretty reasonable mix, with Lex Luger, Ric Flair, Sting and Randy Savage all in there. At the end of the list, #499 was Duane Gill, who would gain fame later as Gillberg, and Zeus, whose run at Hogan would return in the late 1990s. This year was the safest, and few would argue that it wasn't a good way to start out the annual tradition.

1992 was a really bad year. There was always an NWA emphasis to PWI, I believe for a while it was official, and this year it showed with Sting getting the top spot. Ric Flair was in the middle of a great run as WWF Champ. Randy Savage was number two, followed by the Nature Boy. Bret Hart made his first Ton Ten appearance, as did Jerry Lawler. On the low side, Andre the Giant and Bobo Brazil were both in the bottom ten, I believe the last time either was listed.

1993 saw the rise of Bret Hart to the level of everybody's favorite. As WWF champ for a good portion of the previous year, Bret worked great matches and earned number one for the first time. Shawn Michaels also made the top five for the first time. Big Van Vader was number two, and Flair was down at number 6. Garbage Man, who would go on to be Duke The Dumpster Droesse in the WWF, was #500.

Bret repeated in 1994, with Hogan taking number two, mostly due to having returned to wrestling in WCW. Flair was three, Michaels took number five, and Steve Austin, then the WCW US Champ, was sixth. Donn E. Allen, who had a bit of fame working with the Blue World Order in ECW, was #500.

In a fit of awful forward thinking, Diesel, aka Kevin Nash, won the number won spot in 1995. True, he had been champ for a long while, but gate receipts were way down and he hadn't had many good matches. Shawn Michaels, Diesel's running buddy, was second, followed by Sting and Bret Hart. Sabu, then the star of ECW, became the first wrestler of the non-WWF or WCW crowd to place in the top five. At the time, he seemed poised to become the next huge wrestling superstar, but injuries and the inability to get along with folks put an end to that. Mitsuharu Misawa, then All Japan Triple Crown Champion, was the first Japanese wrestler to crack the top ten by placing number 10. Donn E. Allen moved from 500 to 499.

These are the easy years, when things were starting to come together and the smart fan hadn't really exploded. Coming after 1995 was a wave of lists that were often argued about.

That's the (Falls Count Anywhere for Friday. Next week I write about my own steroid use in an article entitled "Dude, Where's My Walnuts?" -- like a Mad Lib, Garcia submitted this article with only those two words at the end -- "That's the." This should teach him to finish his sentences. -- editor.)

Chris Garcia