Ask 411 Wrestling: Should Lesnar vs. Orton Be A Title Match?

Hello, welcome to Ask 411 Wrestling and I am, finally, Mathew Sforcina!

Been a while since I did this, as I was off enjoying a couple weeks in New Zealand, and then just a week off, but I’m ready to get back to half-answering wrestling trivia questions! I’d like to thank Ryan Byers and Jed Shaffer for doing superb jobs filling in. Although that Watry line Jed… Tsktsk.

Anyway, got a question about wrestling? Can’t or won’t Google it? Well then, send it to [email protected] and I might answer it.

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I don’t talk about other guys work, although I will apologize if it’s needed, since in the sending and receiving of question lists to Ryan and Jed, if a question or name was lost, I humbly apologize in advance.

The Trivia Crown

None last week.

Who am I? A Wrestlemania veteran (multi-time if you include dark matches) and a Slammy winner, I had a decent run in WWE, although I never main evented a PPV. My finisher name finally made sense when I changed my name for a short while. I’ve gone after the IC title and the WWF title, I’ve wrestled in ECW, I’ve been a scab, a dual sports star and both working for and against the McMahon-Helmsley Regime. A free agent, I am who?

Getting Down To All The Business

Andron is the only guy who really got killed by timing.

Is money in the bank ppv the best place for Seth to reclaim his title or should wwe hold off on Seth winning this title for summerslam?

Well obviously this is the timing issue. That said, Seth ‘regaining his title’, I’m not sure is in the cards. I do think he might end up with a title, but either Ambrose if WWE is learning or Reigns if they aren’t will walk out as champ at Battleground, and then Rollins will be awarded the World Title by GM HHH on Raw. WWE isn’t going to pay off the Seth babyface quest anytime soon.

Will wwe ever get back to the point of having top faces the fans actually cheer about?

Sure they will, once they stop trying to force someone to be a new Cena and allow them to be their own man or woman.

You’d think that they would have learnt the lesson from the Luger/Hogan 2.0 debacle, but the problem is that Cena moves a metric ton of merchandise and thus there is a very tangible reason why they want someone to become a new Cena. And if that means being cheered by kids and being booed by adults, fine, as long as they sell the merch.

But it’s hardly a hot take to say that Reigns ain’t that guy.

So eventually WWE will give up and go with where the smaller money leads them, which is hopefully to a face people like. And then, more hopefully, they don’t immediately implode like Bryan did.

Was turning AJ styles heel to be the top heel of smack down a good call as compared to using someone like Kevin Owens?

We don’t know that for sure yet, The Club might be Raw. But yes, it’s a good move, you need a main event heel group, and since the Wyatts have the upward mobility of a concrete bowling ball, The Club work well in that role. Owens is a lone wolf, you need a group for tag matches and the like. AJ’s doing well in the role too, so yeah, it’s a good call.

So far.

Brian has a couple questions.

1. Couldn’t a good case be made for Brock v. Orton at SummerSlam to be for the Smackdown title? WM30, Orton loses without getting pinned and never gets a rematch. WM31, Brock loses without getting pinned and his rematch was marred by the Undertaker’s interference. Plenty of other championship-specific storylines (two youngest champs ever, Lesnar last Undisputed before the brand split/Randy first Undisputed of reunification, etc.). Also both men can work as heel or face following Summerslam. I realize they won’t want the Smackdown champ MIA, but they could pop some early big ratings entering the fall.

If WWE was (or just booked as) a legitimate sports company, then yes, there’s a solid case to hold off on the new championship for this match. But the issue is that they need to hit the ground running to establish Raw and Smackdown as sperate entities, and thus having Smackdown wait a month or so for a new champion to be crowned is… Gutsy.

It’s plausible, sure. Do video packages, sitdown interviews, maybe a couple in ring things… But no, I think this is just a one off for the buyrate, and they’ll keep the World Title away from it. Why muddy the water if it’s not needed?

Although making it for the #1 contendership…

2. Watching the “Wrestling isn’t Wrestling” video again reminded me that there were numerous matches that included HHH, Cena, and Orton together, as well as singles iterations for themselves. It lead to an idea that while not exact, you could think of a “Rock-Paper-Scissors” style game with HHH-CENA-ORTON in those places (Cena owned HHH, HHH won most of the important matches vs. Orton, and Orton has more wins over Cena than maybe anyone except for Punk).

Can you think up a few other Rock-Paper-Scissors scenarios with three wrestlers (women or tag teams too!) in which they each dominated one guy but usually fell short against the other?

Bonus points for coming up with a Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock scenario (5 wrestlers, each of whom have the advantage on two and disadvantage against the other two).

My initial two thoughts were HHH/HBK/Y2J and Rock/Austin/Foley, but looking at the numbers HBK actually batted only just on the right side of the numbers to be considered beating HHH but losing to Jericho, while Foley didn’t beat Austin that much, but it was still more than most people…

The problem is that guys don’t tend to get to have strong runs on people anymore, everyone is all 50-50 and thus this sort of thing doesn’t tend to happen.

I’ve sat here for a while and I keep failing to find third guys, based on one sided feuds I know of (Dreamer/Raven, HHH/Y2J, Hogan/Savage). So I wave the white flag and ask you, dear readers, if you have an idea or two.

Hello, HellloooNewman, you’re on the air!

I vaguely remember sometime in the early to mid 90’s the WWF pushing “Radio WWF”, some sort of syndicated program on (duh) radio. I remember trying to find out where it aired in my area to no avail. What were they doing on that program? Was it a talk show? Were there matches? First run, or rebroadcasts of already aired stuff? Am I out of my mind and this never existed?

No, it existed.

The idea was for a syndicated talk show of sorts, where, originally, Jim Ross alongside Johnny Polo would take callers, and interview wrestlers. Ross would of course put over the WWF product, but he was also honest and did do some inside stuff, which for the early 90’s is amazing. Heck, it even brought up other companies occasionally! (The Arn/Sid incident got talked about, for instance).

The PPV thing was an experiment, as I understand it, to see if that would have people tuning into the radio show, if it went over well or not. Obviously the whole thing fizzled out eventually, as not enough stations picked it up. And worse still, when Ross was fired Vince McMahon took over as host and he was a lot more… Vince like. It became more shilly, the humor went full bathroom, and the questions were screened a lot more to be less interesting.

That said, there was one very interesting edition, as the semi-famous Savage Shoot On Hogan V1.0 occurred on Radio WWF. The following is a transcript I found floating through the series of tubes.

“It should be noted that it was pretty obvious the way Savage, Jim Ross and Johnny Polo were interacting during the segment that all three knew what was about to be said.

Savage’s comments started with: “Have you ever heard the name Hulk Hogan? The five time WWF champion. Hulk Hogan became at one time the biggest superstar in the history of professional wrestling. I personally used to look up to Hulk Hogan. But that was a big mistake. I really thought he was a friend. But he’s definately not. He’s the worst prima donna I’ve ever met in my life… Hulk Hogan’s ego went so far out of control that Hulk Hogan consummed Terry Bollea, which is his real name… Let’s just say I’ve lost a lot of respect for Hulk Hogan aka Terry Bollea, both as a man and as a human being. That’s an extreme understatement that I’m saying right there. A lot of people out there might be thinking it is professional jealousy. But putting professional jealousy aside, if there is any, which I’m not saying there is, I lost respect for Hulk Hogan big time. Number one, when he completely lied on Arsenio Hall, denying the use of anabolic steroids except for rehabilitation for an injury.”

At this point Ross asked Savage if he had ever used steroids. “Yes I have. I used anabolic steroids and when I was on Arsenio Hall, I told the people I did, when they were legal. But it’s like putting poison in your body.” Ross asked Savage if he currently uses them. “No, I sure don’t. Nobody does in the WWF. But at the same time I was asked about it I told the truth. It was prevalant at the time, not just in wrestling but in all sports, baseball, basketball, football, you name it, it was there. It was in the gyms. It was legal at the time. But at the same time, if Hulk Hogan is the guy he says that he is, if he’s leading the Hulkamaniacs down that tunnel where there’s light at the end of the tunnel, and he’s showing them the way, hey, the children are our future and if you’re going to lie to them, if your lying to me, your lying to everybody, brother because thats just not the way it’s happening. I remember being in the car with him the day before he went on Arsenio Hall in St. Louis, Missouri and I begged him for three hours not to go on and do that.”

At this point Ross, attempting to act surprised by the last statement, said, “You knew he was going to go on there and lie?” Savage responded, “Exactly. I knew that he was going to do it and lie about using anabolic steroids. I told him that he could be a leader among men if he would tell the truth. But he was worried about the image of the character of Hulk Hogan a.k.a Terry Bollea. I said, ‘brother, listen, we all make mistakes. Be honest. The world is more forgiving then you think.’ Steroids were legal then. But he said, ‘Not a chance.’ He went on Arsenio Hall and lied big time. He hurt himself. I’m not worried about him hurting himself. But he hurt all of the WWF, because like I said before, he was a leader. He was a big-time, 5 time WWF champion. When he talks, people listen… Yeah, but when he went on Arsenio Hall and lied and then everything came down after that. You realize that he hurt himself. That he cared about. But I guarantee you from heart-to-heart right now, he couldn’t care less about hurting any of us at the WWF.”

At this point Ross interjects, “Are you saying he’s selfish?” Savage said, “To the umpteenth degree. And I’m not perfect. No doubt about it. This guy is really not even perfect, though he wants you to believe it.”

Ross then brought up his celebrated marriage and divorce with Liz Huelette (Elizabeth). Savage’s comments were: “There was a time I fell in love. I got engaged and got married, and it was to Elizabeth. Then it got to a point that some of the kids out there can relate to. Maybe it happened to their mother and father or uncle and aunt. Sometimes it just doesn’t go forever. Elizabeth and I were married, but we were having problems. It happens that at the time Elizabeth and Hulk Hogan’s wife were very, very, very best friends. And they were running around together. I didn’t think it was healthy for our relationship, but whatever’s whatever. A lot of people can have different kinds of friends. But there was a time when I was wrestling on the road while we were having problems and I would call home and Elizabeth wouldn’t be there. During a certain segment of time, I would just get another phone call. Being the master of the phone that I am and I would have conversations with Hulk Hogan. And he would give me swerves and curves, but never tell that Liz was over there… She was either out with his wife Linda or hiding out at their house. Later on, while I was wrestling on the road, basically when I would call home and there was no answer for four days and Elizabeth was MIA, Missing in action for four days, I was worried about my wife then, and I still am now. I can’t help that. Because in my heart I’ll always love her. It’s very hard to let go. But you’ve got to let go. That’s for people out there who have situations like that. But no doubt about it, being honest, four days went by and Liz called me and told me to get a lawyer because she wanted a divorce. That was end of story right there.”

Ross then asked Savage if he thought Hogan knew about the divorce and what was going on at the time: Savage responded, “Like, Hogan and his wife were in Miami filming that movie that bombed,” at which point Ross asked him which one that had bombed and Savage responded, “Mr. Nanny. He’s a three time loser. He starts out with No Holds Barred that did about $10 million. Then Suburban Commando did less. Then he broke his own record for doing less then that with Mr. Nanny. Not to say there’s anything personal right here. It’s kinda like Crush. A Hulk Hogan situation. I was making calls and going comletely out of my mind because I didn’t know where she was and couldn’t even talk to her because she wanted the lawyers and all, but he gave me curves and swerves again saying he didn’t know where she was but said, ‘Brother if I hear anything, I’ll let you know.’ But in desperation I flew to Miami at the Jockey Club where Hogan was staying and where they were filming the movie Mr. Nanny and there I found Liz, shockingly (the word shockingly was used sarcastically). Obviously by this time, only half shocked ye dig… Honesty and friendship between Hulk Hogan aka Terry Bollea and the Macho Man Randy Savage aka Randy Poffo, brother I’m out there in front of you. Hit me with your best shot. The honsety and friendship wasn’t there and possibly it was never was. And right now, talking on Radio WWF, I would tell you it was never there. I was fooled. I didn’t know it and Liz didn’t know it either. She thought she had a best friend with Hulk Hogan’s wife. But now we both know,. Seperately of course, because we are legally divorced. Can you believe the fact that Hulk Hogan’s wife and Liz don’t even talk now? So what kind of friends do you think they were? It’s almost like they got the job done. This is a worst case scenario, broke us up, did what ever they had to do. They’re not even friends now. I think Liz realizes alot because as time goes by, you know what I mean, and I wish the best for her. But a lot’s changes and the trust is broke… I’ve changed a lot in my life time.. A WWF match, if Hogan didn’t like what I said over the airwaves and wanted to do that in front of the WWF in any arena near by or in a garage of his choice, that would be cool for the Macho Man Randy Savage, because you can beat me, but not eat me. And I don’t think you could beat me.”

A side note for ye… it should be noted that Randy Savage was the one responsible for giving Hulk a black eye before Wrestle Mania… “

I should also point out that Radio WWF did make a return in the late 90’s/2000, although I believe that was more because the American/Armed Forces Network, the group that broadcasts American TV/Radio to the various peoples serving in the US Armed Forces, surprisingly enough, across the world. The AFN wanted something for those members who loved wrestling, and any syndication they got that time round was a bonus. (Possibly that was a factor for the first time round, but syndication was certainly a focus that time as well)

So yeah, unless you were a Marine you just had to hope it got syndicated in your area, which for most people didn’t happen.

Captain Greatness writes in from Parts Unknown for some food-related questions.

A quick one (or two), while you’ve been away, as I sat down to tuck into my breakfast of hard boiled eggs, a thought popped into my head. The ceremonial salt that Mr. Fuji used to throw in peoples eyes, I assume that was flour or talc? Also does that spot actually require Bret/Yokozuna or whomever getting talc into their eyes? Although relatively low risk, seems there could be some potential for vision damage especially since you need to sell it and are unable to rinse it right away.

When you get down to it, professional wrestling is a bit silly at times, in the sense that people go out to a ring and do all sorts of stuff you’re not supposed to do. The human body doesn’t like being dropped on the neck, or flying through the air onto other bodies, there’s inherent danger of injury, both major and minor, every time you step in the ring. Hell, I have a big bruise on my thigh right now from a ring rope on the weekend!

Anyway, the vast majority of the time, powder or salt in wrestling is indeed just talcum powder or something similar. So while there is some very minor chance of an issue, the fact is that most of the powder goes into the air, and whatever does go on your face, you’re supposed to know its coming and thus your eyes are closed, and even then, if you do get some powder in the eye? You carry on, that’s nothing. You just move on, maybe wipe it clean with some sweat.

Unless you were wrestling Mr. Fuji’s clients every night and he did it every time, the chance of incident is so small as to be statistically insignificant.

Also, Green/blue/red mist is from what I understand created by concealing a capsule and biting it just before spitting But when they do spit, I will presume that its actually spit they are spitting into the opponents face. Give the amount that ends up in their faces, how can they be able to produce so much spit after wrestling for 15-20 minutes prior? I’m looking for a beverage after 5 minutes on an elliptical.

You presume wrong, but that’s understandable. It’s reasonable to assume that poison mist is like a blood capsule, a small tablet like that that dyes the spit in your mouth. But that’s not how it works. Mist (and internal bleeding blood) in wrestling is made of food coloring or equivalent and water, mixed together and then put in a small bag or equivalent. They either hold it in their mouth all the time (discouraged, as you might choke) or they carry it on their person and slip it in at the right moment, or more commonly, the ref will hold it.

See here, this match, see if you can spot where Tajiri gets his mist from.

Spot it?

Answer is after these videos.

3:30, on the outside of the ring.

Anyway, yeah, the mist comes as a liquid, so drymouth isn’t an issue.

So this went well.

Bob wants to know who Jerry Lawler’s mother was.

With Titan Screwed coming out, Ive gone back to read the other Titan books by James Dixon and for some odd reason Ive decided to go back and watch the PPVs from that year, I know Im sick in the head. But the question I have is, Who the HELL was Lawler’s Mother from IYH 1?

Here’s a picture if you want a reminder.

Sadly, I was unable to find any source as to who she was. She seems to be just some local model, she wasn’t a future wrestler or wife of someone or a future actress or anything. Unless a reader happens to know this one, it’s a mystery lost to the ages.

Jon asks about Vince maybe wanting to be more than a wrestling promoter.

As we all know, for many years the parent company of WWF/E was Titan Sports. What was Vince’s logic with that? Where did the name come from and when did he start using it? When and why was it ended? And could it be fairly looked at as an early warning sign that Vince wanted to take the “wrestling” out of pro wrestling.

Actually, it’s not quite that simple. Because while we all have this notion of Vince always having owned WWE, there was a time when he didn’t.

Titan Sports (the name of which I wasn’t able to find a reason for, although I tried Tweeting Vince, so let’s see if that gets me anywhere.

…

Nope. So let’s just assume he chose it because it’s so manly!) was founded in 1979 and officially incorporated on February 21, 1980. The name lasted until 1998, when it was changed to ‘World Wrestling Federation, Inc.’ But the thing is, the WWF was owned by a holding company, Capitol Wrestling Corporation, which was the company set up by Vince’s father alongside Toots Mondt back in 1952. Titan Sports didn’t own CWC until 1982.

Thus the logic was that Vince needed a company to do business from before he actually owned the WWF. At the time, Vince and Linda owned the Cape Cod Coliseum as well as the Cape Cod Buccaneers, an ice hockey team in the Atlantic Coast Hockey League. As well as this, Vince promoted some concerts, as well as wrestling.

So actually, the name makes sense, as it was chosen at a point where his owning the WWF wasn’t a sure bet. His dad could well have decided his son couldn’t pay up and sell to Gorilla Monsoon instead or some such. The name was generic as it needed to be so whatever Vince decided to do, he could. It’s just looking back, the time it owned the WWF fills the perspective. But when it began? That wasn’t a sure thing.

Speaking of parents and childs, Jimmy?

I’ve read that Paige, a second generation wrestler, has actually had matches in which her opponent was her own mother. Are there many other instances of a wrestler having a match against their parent?
There’s been a few. Shane McMahon fought his dad Vince a bunch of times including Wrestlemania X7, while Vince also fought Stephanie McMahon at No Mercy 2003. Ric Flair fought his son David at WCW Great American Bash 2000.

Own the WWE Network before clicking play on that, of course.

Jerry Lawler fought Brian Christopher a bunch of times in Memphis, trading the USWA title back and forth, although I’m not sure why I’m bringing that up right now.

…

Wait are we admitting that now? I lost track.

Angelo Poffo, under a mask as The Miser wrestled Lanny Poffo a bunch of times, although he never fought Randy, apparently.

But there’s a whole bunch in lucha, as Chavo Classic wrestled Chavo Jr and Spike Dudley on Smackdown once, as well as Juventud Guerrera wrestling his dad in tag matches, and Perro Aguayo facing off with his son in tag matches too. Probably a bunch more.

There’s probably more, but that’s enough to show that it happened. Feel free to add more below dear readers!

Adam asks about THAT list.

During the famous 1004 holds promo Jericho repeats ARMBAR several times. Was this intentional or did Jericho repeat it by accident once and just kept going with it.

…

It was intentional for the purposes of comedy since Jericho was lying and he did not, in fact, know 1004 holds.

Evil Jeff wants to bring us back to mist in a way.

just a quick one that I’ve been thinking about from time to time – How did/does Japanese wrestling promotions book the Great Muta & Keiji Mutoh characters? Were they acknowledged as being the same guy? Is/was Muta the dark and cheat-y side of Mutoh?

It’s a complicated situation that is similar enough to Mick Foley that you can be forgiven for assuming it’s the same deal, but it’s not, sort of.

Leaving to one side the fact that different companies have booked Muta differently as the character has evolved, the basic conceit is that Muta and Mutoh are separate people, but they share a body. Unlike say Jushin Thunder Liger who, if pushed hard enough, becomes Kishin Liger, of Mick Foley where the personas can and do switch into each other at will, Mutoh is not in control of Muta. Muta turns up when he likes and does what he likes. And while there is a bit of wink and nudge about it, when Mutoh gives interviews, Muta is spoken of in the third person (‘Muta said he’s going to eat his opponent’s babies with a red wine jus’) given that as an alien ninja he doesn’t understand English.

…

That’s the backstory.
Own NJPW World before watching these, btw.

So yeah, everyone knows Muta is an alter-ego of Mutoh but the two are separate and do their own thing. Which has led to some unique storylines, like when Mutoh was feuding with the Japanese nWo which had, as a member… Muta. Or in 1995 when Mutoh was striving to become IWGP champion without resorting to the Muta persona.

Officially, Muta =/= Mutoh, like how Brian Christopher isn’t Jerry Lawler’s son.

Or wasn’t in the past but is now. I think.

Uzoma asks about Byron Saxton.

Yay.

Based on Kevin Owen owning him on commentary, his chair getting taken thrice for Bray Wyatt to sit on (in addition to forcing him to wear their sheep masks), and even his commentator colleagues Michael Cole and JBL seemingly not liking him, is Byron Saxton somewhat of a chew toy of the WWE Commentators?

He’s the FNG, F’ing New Guy. New guys in wrestling get ribbed until they break or prove themselves. Announcers are no different, wrestling is this weird mishmash of high school locker room and professional sports league. With that comes ‘tradition’, i.e. being a dick to those below you like those above you were dicks to you previously. Saxton isn’t getting away from this any more than any other FNG in wrestling.

And on that note, I bring this edition to a close.

Hey, gotta ease back into these things.

See you all next week! Unless I need another break…