Falls Count Anywhere

07-12-05

No, the editor doesn't understand me, either...

RAW
Another pretty good episode, marred slightly by a few of the Diva Search contestants. It opened with an amazing video recap of Shawn Michaels attacking Hulk Hogan. It’s one of the things that the WWE does so well, and this one was great.

That led in to Carlito’s Cabana. Carlito came out and talked about his show being the one that would break the biggest news of the week and he called down Shawn Michaels, but instead, Chris Jericho’s music hit and he came down. The two of them riffing on each other was Hi-Larious, especially when Chris Jericho said “I know what cool is, I’m Canadian! Call me Chris Canadian Cool!” I was dying.

Later, he called Carlito Sideshow Bob, which got a huge laugh. Jericho said that The Highlight Reel was the originator and I totally knew that would bring out Piper faster than a producer shopping around a B-Action flick. He said that his was the original, called Carlito "Buckwheat," and said that he would get Michaels in Piper’s Pit. That got a great pop and Piper looked better than he has in a while. Really strong mic work here.

Masters and the lappy are together at last!

Chris Masters had his best match to date (not saying much, but still) by taking on Tajiri. Masters had control to start, but Tajiri came back with a bunch of great kicks. After he had his lead, Masters dropped Tajiri on his face and then got the Masterlock. It was a simple, and short, match that allowed Tajiri to do most of the work and I wasn’t bored. For Chris Masters, that’s a big win.

Kane will be at ComicCon this Friday. Derek, you better get me an autograph!

Edge and Lita are lounging around in the back, watching their wedding video. Gene Snitsky comes in and watches with them as they talk about the ploys they pulled, especially the Matt Hardy tease. Edge had the line of the night: “He should thank me for getting the biggest pop of his life.” Edge then said that he wanted Snitsky to watch his back, and also mentioned that the big man had a foot fetish and that Edge might let them play across Snitsky’s back if he watched Edge’s. This was low comedy, and up close, you can see the ‘roid acne all over our pal Gene.

Shelton Benjamin and Carlito had a match that was pretty good. Shelton is going to be the next Bret Hart. Bret took years to get to the main event and had to endure a lot of crap to get there. Shelton is about a year away from that and they are using him pretty smartly to get him up to that level. There was a great segment pretty early where Carlito dropkicked Shelton. Shelton kipped up while Carlito had his back turned. He then stumbled back into Shelton and when he realised that, he hightailed it out of the ring. Nice touch!

After the commercial break, things pick up in pace, including Shelton doing this Facebuster thing into his knee TWICE! Sweet. Carlito gets his belt, but the ref tosses it outside. Shelton shows that he loved Jake the Snake as much as I did and he give Carlito a couple of Short-arm Clotheslines! They do a great series of suplex blocks, with Carlito trying to suplex Shelton out and Shelton trying to bring Carlito in. They block each other and eventually it ends up with Shelton getting the Whip Kick. Carlito ends up on the outside and is counted out to give Benjamin the win, but not the belt. Really good match.

Cena comes out to a really good pop and starts to run down Bischoff. Bisch comes out and says that Cena ain’t the man and that Bischoff makes the rules. This brings out Chris Jericho who says that Cena doesn’t deserve the title. It’s not a bad segment, as all the guys involved can talk, but it was pretty standard. Great ending line: “Welcome to the new RAW, bitch”

The Diva Search was next, with the first girl eliminated being the one who said ‘to be the woman you have to beat the woman.’ Good-bye Alexis, we’ll see you in the Hugh Grant police report. The remaining ladies did their stuff, including a body-painting that was awful. The two who are obviously being pushed for this round are Ashley and Leyla. Ashley said that she was there to be a wrestler and actually gave Christy Hemme a nice Monkey-Flip! She may not win the contest, but with that one move, she won my heart. Leyla danced for Earl Hebner, but then gave him a low blow for covering her up last week. Nice touch. The rest sucked. Vote Ashley!!!

He doesn't look sick to me...

Kurt Angle had his challenge and when he asked the guy what his name was he said Matt Martell. Kurt then said that wasn’t his name and that his name was Matt Striker and he was the guy who had been fired for lying about sick days and wrestling instead. The two then had a little match where Striker looked pretty good. The WWE loves to have the guys who are in the press right after they get their name out, but I could almost see this being an angle that runs for a while. Kurt won the Three Minute Challenge in 2:59 seconds with the Ankle Lock. Fun take on the Angle Invitational.

Edge and Lita are walking to the ring, but MATT HARDY jumps him and beats on Edge until Johnny Ace and co come out and he runs off. Edge and Kane have their match and it’s pretty typical. Snitsky comes out and hits Kane on the outside with a chair to give him the DQ win. Matt Hardy runs out and again and beats on Edge until he’s run out of the ring. Matt then grabs the mic, calls Lita a whore and has security and all the agents on him, handcuffing him. They totally played it off like a Brian Pillman angle from 1995.

Piper’s Pit closed the show. Piper called out Michaels and asked him why he did what he did. Michaels rambled and said that he wanted Hogan’s One Last Match to be against him at SummerSlam. Piper took back the mic and said that Michaels didn’t answer his question (which I think he did) and then went old school face on him. He was really working in a Bill Watts style here saying that he wanted Michaels to tell him why and just as he called him a coward, Michaels Superkicked him! Nice touch. Great way to end a really good show.

NEWS
Brock hasn’t signed, but he’s talking about signing on the WWE website, which means that they’re probably just trying to hammer out details.

We're waiting for THESE Hardy Boys to return...

Matt Hardy’s return was a last minute deal, though they had been talking about it, and he will honor all the engagements that he set up as an Independent, which includes Ring of Honor this Saturday against The Fallen Angel, Chris Daniels.

Japanese Hall of Famer Shinya Hashimoto died on Sunday at the age of 40. He was a giant star during the period of New Japan’s greatest success. He was the pudgy guy who kicked people really hard. He came up with guys like Muto and Chono, and held the IWGP title a couple of times.

FlashBack
I got a video from Blockbuster that I had no idea about. It was called Southern Discomfort, a documentary about an Outlaw wrestling show in Alabama. I don’t remember adding it to my queue, but I must have. It turned out to be a documentary that disappointed and made up for it at the same time.

The doc starts out following the promoter, Col. David F. Freidman, as he tacks posters up on the sides of barns. He talks about running the show without permits and where the best places to put up signs are. It’s an interesting portion, as it looks at the promoter and tries to show what these outlaw guys go through. Sadly, we don’t stay with the Colonel too long as the director seemed more interested in the wrestlers and the wrestling.

Most of the wrestlers that you see are so small time that you’d have to dig through Observer show results to find any mention of them. This show was done sometime in the 1990s (my guess is 1995, but could have been as early as 1993 or as late as 1997). The wrestlers are interesting, as we have guys like Bullet Bob Armstrong, The Iron Sheik, Shanghai Pierce, Bambi and Peggy Lee Leather mixed in with local guys like The Flame, Power Ranger and Rick Montana.

Wow. It's a blow-up Luchador.

The strange thing is that all the wrestling is terrible. There are crap moves, terrible selling, the ropes are loose and the guys move slow, but at the same time it’s a throw-back to the old days when heels acted evil and the crowd got so mad they’d stand up and yell at the wrestlers. There’s a great moment, when The Flame, who runs a Senior’s Buffet when he’s not wrestling, is being taunted by a group of kids and when he turns and growls, they scatter. That’s old school.

When they stick with the matches, it’s a weak DVD, but when they talk with the wrestlers, it gets good. There are some great Southern promos going on. These guys would never have a chance to make the big time because they’re too old and don’t have the bodies that Vince and Eric were looking for at the time, but they know how to talk and to get a rise out of the crowd.

Talking with The Flame and Rick Montana (who sets up the ring) is a highlight, showing how much love and passion there is for the art of wrestling. The Iron Sheik does and interesting discussion saying that he ‘love America, kids, don’t use drugs’ and then does his hell bit later. One of the ways I dated this back to the 1990s is that Sheik still wrestled without a shirt.

The best sections all involve Bullet Bob Armstrong. He’s the dad of The Road Dogg Jesse James and Brad Armstrong, who used to be a good tag wrestler with Tim Horner as the Lightning Express. He’d been around for 30+ years and he had all sorts of stories, including how The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase almost killed him when he was working out and how they reconstructed his face. He talks about the sport, what it means, why he let his sons get into the business and much more.

He does a great little segment where Bambi, also known as Selina Majors, cracked a rib and Bullet Bob is standing around talking about how it’s much harder when you crack one in the back where you can’t hold it to help you breathe. It’s hilarious because she’s sucking wind and he’s having a jolly ol’ time chattin’ her up. It made me laugh.

There’s a little bit of bad direction, like when he pulls back on Bambi through a door, and the cuts tend to be too late or too soon, but overall, it’s an amazing look at wrestling that flew even lower than anything they covered in Beyond The Mat. It’s not as good as that, or The Backyard, but it’s a fun look at an interesting part of wrestling that most of us never get to see.

That’s all for this edition. Next time I’ll do a look at why the WWE is on solid ground, and why that’s bad.

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Chris Garcia