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I'm in over my head.

Chairshots
10/24/01

Raw Thoughts
Monday Night Raw will go down in history as a turning point for the WWF. Only time will tell if that's a good thing. For weeks the WWF has need to change things around because the current product had grown stale, they were losing fans by the droves and it was getting hard to write anything positive in this column. The show opened with the McMahons agreeing to a winner take all match to settle the invasion once and for all at Survivor Series. Finally, someone raised the stakes. Finally, a reason for an invasion. Finally, some long term focus. Next, Raw had four title changes. The Dudleys, who had gotten stale, lost the tag belts to The Rock and Chris Jericho. Giving the tag titles to two men that have issues is an old Vince Russo bit, but it works here. Billy Kidman, who returned to action last week with little fanfare, lost his cruiserweight belt to the very popular Tajiri. Olympic hero Kurt Angle beat Rhyno for the U.S. title. I guess Angle won't be in the main event for a while, so why not? The Hurricane lost his European title belt to Bradshaw. This one only makes sense because of an angle that plays out on Smackdown. Anyway, the show was far from perfect, but did show signs that the WWF realizes that they need to shake things up. Mission accomplished. My money is on Rock vs. Austin at Survivor Series to settle it.

Ratings
As good as Raw was, a whole lot of wrestling fans missed it. Raw drew a dismal 3.9 rating. That is down 0.2 from last week's 4.1 rating and is the lowest rating for the show since March 30, 1998 (3.8). During the heyday of the Monday night wars, the combined rating for Raw and Nitro was often over 10.0 and now the WWF has slipped under the 4.0 mark. I've been pointing to the warning signs for weeks and now the WWF has hard, undeniable proof that fans are uninterested and sometimes pissed off. Let's hope this is as low as it can get.

Chilly Willy Joins Army
No, not the cartoon penguin. Former ECW star Chilly Willy has enlisted for three years in the United States Army. Willy will be leaving on November 1st for Fort Benning in Georgia. He will be there for 16 weeks at which point he will be sent to Fort Drum in New York. "I would like to thank Paul Heyman for my chance in ECW and Tommy Dreamer for the shot he gave me. I'd like to thank CW Anderson for the training and his friendship. I would also like to thank all the guys in ECW who I worked with and all the guys in the indies. Thank you to Vince McMahon for the dark match he allowed me to work recently." Willy's highest profile match was in ECW at the November to Remember 2000 PPV in Chicago, where he teamed with Balls Mahoney to defeat The Baldies in a Flaming Tables match. Just think of the money that could be made by having a Chilly Willy vs. Osama Bin Laden: Flaming Tables Match.

Austin Got a Boo Boo
Shane McMahon mentioned on Monday that Steve Austin needed 12 staples to close the cut he suffered at No Mercy and he wasn't lying. Austin suffered the cut near the end of the match when Vince McMahon entered the ring and hit him in the back of the head with a chair. My boss did the same thing to me the day I broke the fry machine.

Double J…Jeff Jarrett
Jeff Jarrett's AOL Time Warner contract is apparently over with, but there is little chance he will join the WWF. Jarrett didn't leave the WWF on the best of terms in 1999. Jarrett's contract expired on a Saturday and he had a PPV match on Sunday against Chyna for the Intercontinental Title. He held the WWF up for nearly $200,000 to lose to Chyna before jumping to WCW, though that was partly Jim Ross's fault for not getting Jarrett signed to a contract extension by the time his heavily hyped match with Chyna rolled around. More importantly, Vince McMahon does not view Jarrett as a top tier player, and the WWF does not feel Jeff would be happy in a low card role, nor would he be worth the money in such a place. I tend to agree. Jarrett never really buttered my toast, if you know what I mean.

More WWF Shake Ups
Peter Doyle, the WWF staff member responsible for writing WWF Heat, is apparently gone from the company and has been for several weeks. Paul Heyman, Bruce Pritchard and Brian Gewertz have been writing Heat for the last few weeks in his place. In addition, Corey King, who was a low level writer for the WWF, has also been let go. He was reportedly "in over his head" as a WWF writer. I bet they get that a lot.

Whoo!
The WWF recently had some talks with Ric Flair's lawyer, John Taylor, about Flair coming into the WWF as a performer. However, Flair is still earning guaranteed money off his AOL Time Warner contract and the WWF would be unlikely to match that money, especially without Flair in a regular wrestling position (cause he's old). Flair would probably come in as some sort of figurehead/promo guy, wrestling a very rare match here and there, but not likely until his Time Warner contract expires.

A Sad Note
FMW star Hayabusa (real name Eiji Ezaki) landed on his head Sunday night when he slipped on the ropes while attempting a moonsault during a PPV main event against Mammoth Sasaki. Ezaki remains paralyzed in a hospital in Japan today. The match was immediately stopped and he was taken to the hospital. Reports are that his body, arms, and legs remain numb today, although he has regained consciousness. He has been given medication to relieve pain. Doctors say that his brain was not damaged, and it is just his spine that concerns them. Best of luck to Hayabusa. That's all for me today. Join me here again on Friday for a special announcement about the future of Chairshots!