Ask 411 Wrestling 03.02.11: Haku Dancing, Rock Confessing, Women Sucking!

Heya, this is Ask 411 Wrestling, the only column on site written by someone who can legitimately claim he has a right to join the new Embassy!

Well, I don’t know, maybe Randle has some ties to Canadian Royalty I don’t know about. But my last name means “Son of Sforza”, and they qualify. I’m available for bodyguard and/or lackey work Nana.

Eh, I’ve been playing a lot of Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood recently. Weird having a Great-Great-Great-Great-Etc-Relative as a love interest.

What’s not weird is the Tom Tom Club. Some great discussions this week, as he looked at if the PG rating is the REAL cause of the WWE’s woes (Hint: No). Good points made, and not just by me!

And now onto other things not made by me too. Like Banner.

Oh, wait, my bad: Good luck to Tama Williams and the rest of Team Australia in CHIKARA’s King of Trios tourney. I’ve wrestled Percy, don’t know Kabel from a bar of soap, but Tama is a superb wrestler, and I look forward to riding his coattails following him to greatness at some point soon.

Now Banner.

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Backtalking

Cena V Rock: Yes, it’s not happening. I know this.

But hey… Could be an actor’s strike. Right?

RVD’s World Titles: He jobbed because of the bust, sure. But that’s not a stripping, that’s just a burial.

Here Comes The Rip, Here Comes The Off: …

Dammit, I had a good point going there!

All right, yes, Vince does occasionally rip people off. Blatantly. If he can’t get the guy, he might, not always, but might try and recreate it with someone else. LOD and Demolition being the classic example.

But I stand by my thing that he saw Warrior as being the equivalent of Sting.

And to clarify something: I don’t condemn Vince for ripping things off. I don’t condemn anyone for doing it. Wrestling constantly rips itself off, there’s nothing wrong with it. Hell, my entire act is half Andre The Giant, half Bobby Heenan, with a few spots lifted from a few other guys.

Women’s Wrestling: So basically most people who dislike women’s wrestling seem to be taking the viewpoint that they dislike it because it’s bad?

See, this further supports my theories. If something sucks, you either improve it or ditch it. But WWE can’t ditch it, they need women around for storylines, for publicity, and for appealing to broader markets. So you’re left with one alternative. If you have to have it, then make it worth watching. WWE has enough OK to good women under contract that, with a good trainer/agent put in charge again, they can produce good TV, until they get in the REALLY good women.

But mediocrity is probably cheaper for the WWE, so… Yeah. Unless HHH, in the list of things he’ll be doing once he takes over, includes “Get Good Women’s Wrestling On Show” on it.

Your Turn, Smart Guy…

Who am I? I once fought in a unification match in Japan (I lost), and was involved in at least one de-unification (and one de-undispution). I’ve been a machine, managed by world champions and posed for a Christmas card photo mid-ring. Every title belt I’ve ever held that wasn’t a world title was a once off, and even some world titles are also oncers. Currently still active in the business in some capacity, I am who?

Why, it’s Kurt Angle, it is! He unified the two IWGP belts by losing to Shinsuke Nakamura, he deunified the EuroContinental title at Wrestlemania 2000 and when he and That Guy won the WWE Tag Titles, that meant the World Tag Champs were no longer Undisputed champs. He was, for a while, The Wrestling Machine, been managed by Bob Backlund and Kevin Nash, and used the photo of him shaving Big Show as his Xmas Card. The rest explains itself.

Who am I? I once held a title that Kurt Angle also held, both of us only holding it once (although my run was longer). I was at the first ECW One Night Stand, and joined The Real WCW in 2001. I was a Dog at one point, and have sat on Abyss at some point. A former tag partner was named for a city when I tagged with him, and I am, at times, outspoken. Who am I?

Questions, Questions, Who’s Got The Questions?

All right, Kevin has a bunch of questions to cover.

The WWF was fairly prosperous early in 1996 or so I have heard that they were not terribly bad as they did less live shows, had fewer wrestlers on contract and ratings were not terrible yet, but I am in July of my written history of the Monday Night Wars (rawwrestlingrants.blogspot.com) and I have noticed that all the RAW’s in between PPV’s are taped at the same arena….when does this change, I am assuming it was a cost cuttin measure? Though it harms WWF immensely as Nitro is live and with the coming of the nWo there is this aura of anything can happen, which is RAW’s tagline….but it does make a difference. I notice that there has to be voiceover work because the WWF went to great pains to bring up newly released movies, sports events and gossip, well it was Lawler’s job.

Well… 1996 was the turn around year, the year where they rebuilt from the failed New Generation into what would come to be known as Attitude, sure. But 96 still, financially, wasn’t great. However, the Raw taping schedule was, while variable, also constant, in that they would often tape two shows on the same day. Occasionally they’d only do the one, live, but most of the time it was two shows a taping, one live, one recorded afterwards. But even with this, it was expensive to do. So, starting at the end of September of 1993, they began to tape in 3 and then later 4 hour blocks, the first show live, and then each subsequent show after the other. Add in Shotgun and the like, and yes, by the end of the taping the fans were dead and things weren’t great. But the costs, which had to be kept down given the financial troubles of the company, were needed.

But once WCW went live each week, and began to really hit WWF hard, Vince went to USA Network and struck a deal. USA agreed to give Raw 2 hours, the first of which was the 2nd of February 1997, and to pay half the costs in going live each week. Thursday Raw Thursday marked the beginning of this transition, and after a couple of weeks that were odditys, thanks to the European Tour and the ECW Invasion, Raw became Raw Is War on the 10th of March, and away they went.

And yes, to hide it was taped, Vince would dub over any current hit news story he could over the tape to try and fool the audience that it wasn’t weeks old.

Question numero dos: What really happened with the Ultimate Warrior during his 1996 return. He was not used well and I have read a lot….I find it funny they had him in a taped match against Owen Hart on RAW and yet had him suspended for missing live dates but still “allowed” him to wrestle “live” with a heavy heart knowing he was suspended…..being live does have its perks. Anyway your opinion on this?

Ick. Warrior in 96 was… A mess, really. But you have two issues there.

In terms of his booking, Warrior was brought in to try and increase ratings, since WWF was desperate at that point and Warrior had been very popular at one point. But WWF, for better or worse, wasn’t about to give him the title or make him the focus, and went in hoping his mere presence would be enough. Of course it wasn’t, thanks to the fans being burnt by Warrior before and the business having changed too much since he was big, and thus he didn’t do anything to the ratings.

Now, his leaving… Basically both sides agree that Warrior missed dates, and then WWF fired him because of it. At the time, he claimed he needed time off because his father had just died, which did happen. WWF didn’t buy it and canned him. WWF claims that, but Warrior maintains that he didn’t show because he was negotiating with the WWF after they sold Warrior merch without giving him a percentage.

So pick your truth there. Reality’s somewhere in the middle I’d bet.

Number three: This is a two parter, so I am cheating…..why did the WWF stop pushing Vader? He is pushed fairly strongly now but I know later they stopped. When and why?

Depends on your viewpoint as to if they pushed him at all.

Well, OK, that’s not fair. But it wasn’t so much a sudden stop as a long, slow slide. He came in injured, so he worked the Rumble and the Raw afterwards, and then they did the suspension angle with him attacking Monsoon.

Then after he came back from the surgery, they pushed him fairly strong, right up until Summerslam. Although he did job on the house show circuit leading up to that match (which he blames for Summerslam failing), the fact is that most people agree that Vader was meant to win the title there, to begin the bungee cord daisy chain of title switches that was supposed to happen in 96/97 (From Shawn to Vader to Bret to Vader to Shawn and then, maybe, Bret wins it at WM). But then Shawn threw a fit, and got the booking changed, and so Vader lost.

Now, Vader was kept strong, albeit a step below the main event, into 97, and he was all set to win the IC title from the Blue Chipper Rocky Maivia. And then Kuwait happened.

And while it wasn’t that bad, in that he was under house arrest in a luxury hotel, and the only reason he was stuck there was due to an Islamic holiday causing a delay in paperwork, it did mean his chance at the IC title was gone, as it went to Owen instead.

At that point, WWF clearly didn’t have that many plans for him. He was still useful, but by that point he wasn’t getting a major push. And eventually, after losing the weight they had asked him to, and not using him in the same way as Japan would, he asked for his release and got it.

Also, I never did see the mythical Austin signs right after King of the Ring but when did they know that he was going to be something…..the fans were clearly behind the Undertaker after the PPV and he dominated most of the match before Goldust came out. Elaborate on when or is it like most things a gradual push?

Well, yes, like most things, the idea that “The next night on Raw, there was hundreds of Austin 3:16 signs” was a metaphor. It didn’t happen literally overnight, but it did happen pretty quick. About the time he began to target Bret Hart in promos is when the Austin bandwagon took off.

And as far as 3:16 goes… WWF briefly renamed the Stunner as the 3:16 before they woke up and just made it into the highest selling T-shirt in wrestling history. I think they knew that line was golden pretty much as soon as he said it.

Finally and I do have more but I will ask those later…..when did WCW know when Hogan would turn heel? I have heard it was last moment and that it was planned for months. After his abrupt departure in March what were the plans for him….I could see him coming down later to take out the Giant or the Outsiders.

Pretty much when he agreed to it, a couple weeks prior. See, the plan to have Hogan as the third man was there early on, but Hogan had to be convinced of it. This can be seen as being Hogan as a selfish political bastard or Hogan as a legitimate wrestling mind here, in that Hogan as All American Face had been going well for so long that no-one dared change it. Yes, some WCW fans were booing him, he wasn’t totally beloved, but it was still a risk, bad guys didn’t sell merch, what about all the Hulkamania merch that wouldn’t sell?

But eventually he agreed, and they went ahead with it. But, given the creative control clause the WCW lawyers had given him, he could have pulled out, and thus, supposedly, Sting was in place as the back up. So there was both the long term plan but also the short term thing, since while Eric had decided to go with it long in advance, Hogan had to agree, and that took him a while, given how big a jump it was.

One thing that has been bothering me in the WWF was the Shawn Michaels and Bulldog feud that started after the In Your House PPV where Shawn fought Diesel…Apparently Shawn propositioned Diana Hart-Smith but the angle never went anywhere (in July now in my history and nothing yet and this was back in April) he said he would answer the accusation and never did and Clarence Mason put out a restraining order that lasted one match and Cornette said he had a bombshell that proved to be nothing and they even showed a silouhette of a woman claiming she slept with Michaels and then it just died…..what happened here.

The angle all ended at King of the Ring, when Shawn beat Bulldog to retain the title. But the whole angle was filmed on the one night, April 29th, when across 4 Raws, Diana announced Shawn had made a pass, then did the restraining order bit. Then, after Beware of the Dog, they explained it away by saying that Clarence Mason’s lawsuit against Gorilla Monsoon (and with it, seemingly all the other stuff with Diana) would be dropped in exchange for Camp Cornette being allowed to pick the ref at King of the Ring. They chose Mr. Perfect, and that didn’t go well for him.

So basically they used up all their ideas in one taping, and then moved on.

I lied….one more. When did Vince find out about Diesel and Razor leaving and how upset was he as they were two of his top stars and I found Diesel’s heel turn after Survivor Series to be effective. Still, he kept them in the main event. Diesel had a good match with Michaels and Ramon after his suspension never had to be put back on but had a good match with Vader. Were they just used for short term buyrates and ratings and to put others over…..Vince could have had them squashed, or not used them….anyway I could continue to speculate but your thoughts?

He kept them in the main event because he had no idea WCW was going to run an invasion angle. Had Vince known what WCW was planning, he would have just taken them off TV or had them jobbing to the Brooklyn Brawler and the like. But since he just assumed WCW would use them as normal debuts, he had them put over two of his big names, Vader and Shawn.

Well, actually, Razor was suspended in the weeks leading up to the job to Vader over drugs, but Nash was the bigger name, so he did stick around and was used to put over Shawn in a big way. But in both cases Vince knew several weeks ahead.

Ben has a couple questions as well.

Hey Mathew,

love your work

Regarding Battle Royals, Royal Rumbles and such, has anyone ever slipped or lost their grip and been eliminated when they were supposed to hang on, get back in and play an important part in the match? On a similar note, has anyone accidentally touched the ground with both feet when they were only meant to touch one foot on the ground and get back in a la Shawn Michaels?

So Alex Riley for the first part as the most recent example, and the only example I can think of, beyond the Cena/Batista debacle of 05 that was actually important. The second part, no-one famous, to my knowledge. You don’t do that sort of spot without being sure you can do it. I wouldn’t do anything like that, anyone who isn’t damm sure they can keep their feet off the ground.

Henry has a question.

Hey this is Henry with a question for Ask411 column. I was recently watching the Wrestlemania XX DVD reminiscing about the better days of wrestling when I noticed something from the Triple Threat main event. Before the start of the match Earl Hebner inspected Triple H, HBK and Benoit’s gear like they do in a boxing match, I didnt think much of it until I realized that I havent seen it much since. My question was this done purely because it was the main event of the biggest Wrestlemania yet and it added to the prize fight feel of it? And, how many other times recently has this been done in a championship match?

It’s supposed to happen in front of every match, it’s to check for hidden weapons, to make sure no-one has snuck in a metal plate or steel chain. But I can’t say the last time it was done, it’s supposed to be done all the time. But if WWE doesn’t do it much, then they did it then since Earl’s old school and the match was the main event, so they were building to it, making it seem like a big deal, like it was the most important match in history.

Shame it never happened.

Adam asks about a little known team.

Hi, thought i’d hit you up with another question, hope you can find the answer.

Shortly after Summerslam 1990 (where HBK had a kayfabe injury to write him off shows so he could recover from his legit injury) Marty Jannetty started teaming up with Shane Douglas as “The New Rockers” on the house show circuit, the team was by all accounts pretty good and even made the PWI top ten tag teams. Was there any plans for the team to be a permanent thing?

Thanks

Actually, their matches together were BEFORE Summerslam. August 11th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th and 23rd they wrestled the Orient Express in one form or another. Their run was short lived, and was never intended to be a permanent thing, it was just a way to build to the match without Shawn being there, and Douglas had his own issues with the Express. After Shawn came back, the Rockers continued on as normal.

Doesn’t say much for the tag team scene in 1990, does it?

This shouldn’t amuse me as much as it does.

This one’s actually got a beat to it!

Jonathan wants to also talk about Beward Of The Dog.

You do a job. In 96 at the In Your House: Beware of Dog pay per view a transformer blew up causing a black out and 3 matches were wrestled in the dark. Then the following Tuesday the then WWF basically did a redo. Not seeing the origt nal I had a few questions.

1. In the Savio Vega VS. Steve Austin match, Ted Dibiase put his WWF career on the line in the second match but not in the first one. Of course Austin lost and Dibiase left to join the NWO. Why wasn’t this stipulation in the first match? Was his leaving a suprise or did they just have something else planned.

No, that was added to the second match after the first. Between the blown PPV and the redo that was done in the replay slot on the Tuesday, there was a Raw. So at the failed PPV, Savio won the strap match, so they had Ted challenge him to a rematch at BOD where, if Austin won, Savio had to become Ted’s chauffer, and if Savio won, Ted would leave the WWF.

It wasn’t part of the original plan, it was a way to explain why Savio would accept a second go round of such a harsh match, given that he won the first one and had nothing left to prove, which also gave them a way out for Ted, who was going soon anyway.

2. Were there any other changes made to the second show compared to the first and did any storylines change because of it?

Well yes, the first show was rebooked on the fly, since the lights and feed went out, they had all the faces go over to make the fans happy, except for Goldust since that was an IC title match, and thus they had to have him beat Taker. But the matches that occurred at the second go round was the originally booking, the first one got changed.

3. Did WWE in further storylines act like the first show didn’t happen and just go off of the second.

No, they admitted that the first show happened, but they focused on the second one for the matches that occurred there since, you know, they were visible and such.

David is all over the place.

Hi Mathew,

Got a few questions for you:

1) I would imagine your fellow AWF wrestler Jarrad Slate is a pretty
big Dragonball Z fan? Anyone with the Majin symbol gets an automatic
thumbs up, since Majin Vegeta was super bad-ass.

I guess so. He’s not a regular so I don’t know him too well. But sure, let’s go with that.

2) Back in late 2000, in the lead-up to Steve Austin returning, I would swear on any religious text that The Rock admitted that it was him who ran Austin over back in 1999. He was in a sit-down interview with someone, and basically said he could talk his way out of anything he did. That did happen right?

I believe you mean this ‘interview’ ‘The Rock’ ‘gave’ to Kurt Angle, from No Mercy 2000.

My Damm Opinion

David had one last question.

3) After WM X7, Austin turned by aligning with Vince. It always sucked that he said he didn’t have to justify his actions, and wrestling fans must have wrestler’s motives clarified. I always thought it would have worked if he came out, became a sobbing wreck, and said he realised he wasn’t the bad-ass of old since his return.
Despite this, he still wanted to be WWF Champion, and if he had to sell his soul by aligning with Vince and HHH, and waffle people with chairs to keep the Championship, he would. Would that have made him too sympathetic a figure for a bad guy?

Thanks, keep up the good work

They did that in the lead up, to be fair, in that he did make it clear just how badly he needed to be champ…

Hey, any excuse to post this.

The moves hit on the backbeat for Tara’s sake, outside of History of WWF Desire, the best damm video ever made for wrestling…

But yeah, after the pop Austin got for winning, they had to make sure Austin would get booed, so they had to have him go more overboard than they could have. Had he come out and told the fans, after losing to HHH at No Way Out, he realised that he wasn’t the same Austin, that the fire and anger that drove him, he left some of it on the cold concrete back in Detroit, so that he had to turn to Vince to get the title… People might have understood, and empathised with him. So they had him beat up Jim Ross instead.

Ben is back.

(apart from yourself obviously J) Who do you think was the most legit tough guy in the wrestling business 1985- Now?? I’ve heard Haku was ridiculously strong and also that Rick Rude has knocked guys out with open hand slaps……Whats your damn opinion??

Meng/Haku is indeed one tough bastard. I mean, look at this man, how can you not be scared of him?

But there’s plenty of tough guys in wrestling history, but Harley Race is pretty much seen as the toughest bastard in wrestling history. But I’m sure the comments section will disagree with me.

And I’m not a tough guy, I’m a marshmallow dude.

Joshua ‘asks’ about the Hall Of Fame.

Hey man it’s “Wrestlemania Season” which means more bitching from the IWC about the Hall of Fame. People are like “How could KoKo B Ware and Jim Duggan be in there before Randy Savage and The Ultimate Warrior” Like I explained to my friend, there are plenty of retired wrestlers but only so many marquee names left. If in the first 3 years of the Hall of Fame WWE inducted all the top stars from all time who would they be inducting now? Jim Duggan would be your Class Leader. WWE is only going to induct one marquee wrestler each year. So to the people who are bitching about Savage and Warrior, give it time. They will end up in there because sooner or later WWE is going to be in need of a big name to headline the Hall of Fame. I know this is ASK411 and I’m not really asking a question, by what is your opinion on this?

Agreed, although it should also be pointed out that WWE can’t forcibly induct someone. Well, legally I guess they could, but so far they haven’t done so and I don’t think they want to. It’s all well and good to say that they should induct Savage and Warrior, but they won’t agree, Warrior’s pulled out a couple of times now. Your point is correct, but it’s not the only one. Warrior, Bruno, Owen… Unless they (or the widow) say OK, they won’t go in.

Oh, and let’s try and call next year’s main star: Foley.

Shady isn’t a fan of the King.

Dear Matthew

Great column, seriously. Is there any chance we may see a book featuring all the “Evolution Schematics?” If Scott Keith found a publisher for his “books” I don’t see why not.

…

You just made my mother very happy, she’s been bugging me to do that even since I started doing those things. But I suspect that I might run into trouble since the Schematics aren’t really opinion, they’re Alternative Character Interpretation, according to TVTropes, but they rely so much on the on air product, which is stuff you can’t use… I mean, I probably could get away with it, but it’s a fairly niche idea… I dunno. I’m lazy, really. Besides, I already have a great idea for a book, The Time Traveller’s Guidebook, which would be a great little bathroom reader type thing…

Anyway, my real questions are about Lawler. Jerry “The King” Lawler has uttered some of the stupidest things I have ever heard come out of a human being’s mouth. For example, on the Eddie Guerrero tribute show, he makes mention of all the times HBK and Eddie wrestled each other, just seconds after Shawn said that he never had the chance to wrestle Eddie. He has also made comments about Carlito being deported (Carlito is a U.S. citizen, Puerto Rico is part of the United States). When Gail Kim returned, he refered to her as a “newcomer who was turning a lot of heads” instead of a returning former champion. I could go on and on. The point is, half the things he says are beyond idiotic. Children don’t say things as stupid as he does. The other half of the time he’s speaking as though the wrestling audience is a mass of mindless retards. Why does no one ever call him out on this? Is it just that no one wants to pick on a poor old simple minded man? Or is it that he’s not really that stupid, and he’s just an ass who thinks that this moronic persona is a good fit for the “WWE Universe?”

It’s not what he thinks, it’s what Vince thinks. I mean, some of that is him, sure, but mostly it’s Vince in his ear telling him what to say, or at least the gist of it. Vince wants to sell Gail as a newcomer, Vince wants a certain story told, Vince tells Jerry how to do his job. And Jerry does it. And occasionally this will mean rehashing something or spelling something out for the kids and/or inattentive and/or morons, sure, but that’s the point of a commentator, to explain and to enhance. Sometimes you need more of one than the other. And often you don’t need one but get it anyway.

And don’t worry, no matter who it is, someone online will pick on them.

Sameer has it right on the money, probably.

With the whole Cena and the Rock thing, I just get the feeling they are trying to pull another Wrestlemania 14 with HBK-Austin-Mike Tyson. You think we will see a surprise twist at Wrestlemania and Rock go in, count the Miz out of the title and lift Cena’s hand in victory? Maybe Kind of passing the torch in a non-wrestling way? I know most of IWC wants ‘heel Cena’ and all. But this way, Cena character gets a fresh feel next two months, stays face to sell merch and then comes out of wrestlemania looking ‘awesome’. So, WWE is happy & for a period IWC can say ‘Thank god, they threw the PG crap out’? What way do you see it? Sorry for the repeat if someone already touched on this before from this perspective…

Thanks.

Well, how much of a surprise will it be now? Thanks a lot, jerk! Now the whole thing is ruined!

No, seriously, I think you have it right on the money dude. Rock being the guest enforcer seems the most logical way to go, and that would give you the WM end, which is something that they don’t really have without it (Del Rio going over doesn’t work, and HHH losing doesn’t work either).

If this was a fantasy land where Dwayne was willing to risk everything for one big payday and they were doing Rock V Cena at Extreme Rules, then he’d give Miz but the win, but since this is reality, that’s probably what’ll happen.

Unless The Fink is reading this and they decide to have Rock go heel and endorse Miz. Which would be, well, Awesome.

Of course.

Following on from last week, Adrian from Ireland is back, and seeks to clarify his question.

…what I was really getting at was why didn’t Vince rip off the Crow Sting look from 96-98 when WWF was getting ass kicked in the ratings thanks in a big way to the Sting / Hogan year long feud.

Because it would have been blatantly obvious and come off as lame. I mean, I can see your point, but you might as well ask why they didn’t have Austin start ripping off his shirt and call everyone ‘Brother’. Ripping off a gimmick has to be done in the midcard at best, and then if they catch on then you push them. Having someone at that point rip off Sting would have been an obvious attempt and been laughed out of the ring.

I hope.

A quick second question, when Vince bought out WCW in 2001 why didn’t he get Jef Jarrett on board ? I know he still beared a grudge from Double J’s last WWF run but the guy was solid in the ring and on the mic and would have hughly boosted the Alliance side much more than DDP or even Booker, he would have been money in that run I think, thanks.

Shhh! The IWC doesn’t like people who like Jarrett! Didn’t you get the memo?

But ignoring the semi-justified hatred of Jarrett, you are VASTLY underestimating Vince McMahon’s Grudge Holding Powers. Remember, this is still within a couple of years of Jarrett’s ‘Putting a Gun To His Head’ by demanding the money he was legally owed up front as opposed to in several months time so that he knew he’d have it while he worked for Vince’s opposition. Even if Jarrett was able to shit gold and piss Dom Pérignon Vince wouldn’t have brought him back in.

And, on the flip side, Jarrett had a nice big fat guaranteed paycheck with Time Warner for a year or so, he got to sit home, go fishing, and get paid thick wads of cash to do it. So why would he give that up? Especially after seeing the start of the InVasion and how badly it was going, why on earth would you want to attach your name to that disaster?

So basically it would have cost too much money to bring in a guy Vince hated and who wouldn’t have been able to do that much to help the angle along. By all means, Jarrett would have been a great guy to have there at the time (if anyone could speak with passion about how WWF had screwed him over), but it was never on the cards after how he left and how WCW folded.

And finally, Carlos has a few questions.

Hey Mathew as usual great column this week. With the way the Wrestlemania 27 card is building up do you honestly think it’s going to be worth the $60 charge?

No, but then that’s far too much money for a PPV regardless. Short of Tara bouncing up and down with nothing on but a smile for 3 and a half hours, there’s very little I’d think worth putting down that amount of coin for a PPV. The DVD afterwards should be good though. I think there is potential in the show, Edge-Del Rio will be interesting on a few different levels, Cena-Miz-Rock will be hot, I’m expecting Rey/Cody to surprise people, Sin Cara will I think wow a hell of a lot of people in MITB, and HHH V Taker will be… interesting.

Also were you at all disappointed that 2-21-11 wasn’t Sting and do you think that Taker’s Wrestlemania streak should end this year?

No, I wasn’t disappointed, since I never really believed it was Sting. I mean, sure, it’d be a great story, but the match would blow and it’s just not something I was desperate to see.

And no, I don’t think the Streak should end, although this is a rare case of it actually being under threat. Maybe HHH has been quietly plotting for a decade, waiting for the day he finally gets the win he should have had a decade ago. And HHH is a guy you know isn’t going anywhere, which is my main reasoning behind my belief no-one should ever break it. But I can see the arguments for the breaking.

What do you guys think? Should the Streak end at the feet of the Game? Let me know below, and we can discuss it next week. If we remain civilised.

And I can be bothered.