Hidden Highlights 07.02.07: Issue #96

Hidden Highlights
By JP Prag and James “JT” Thomlison

Issue #96

Intro

JP: Hidden Highlights: It’s about the little things that make wrestling better. More than that, it brings forth all of the good, hard work that goes into the product by everyone, showing all of the people who make a difference. And even more than that, it becomes concrete proof—something anyone can turn to and say—this is why I like wrestling. This is what these people are really made of.

Chris Benoit was one of those people who extolled the values placed forth here in Hidden Highlights. Whenever he went into that ring, he tried to make the moves look more real. He tried to put extra emphasis into everything he did. He tried to make the man he was in the ring with look better than he truly was.

I now find myself with a simple, yet extremely difficult, question: was Chris Benoit always a murderer? I’ve been thinking long and hard on this. Twenty-two years ago, was he murderer? Ten years ago in WCW, was he a murderer? In 2003 at the then Fleet Center in Boston, MA, Chris Benoit fought Kurt Angle in my all time favorite match. Not at any point prior or after have I ever marked so much and suspended disbelief. On that night, when Benoit sucked me into the product in a way I have yet to experience again, was he a murderer? Two, three weeks ago, fighting Bobby Lashley and Elijah Burke, was he murderer?

The answer, for me at least, is no. It was not until the horrific events of the weekend before last that Chris Benoit murdered two people—his own wife and youngest child—and then murdered himself. I have divorced the man that did these terrible, disgusting acts from the career I saw span over most of my life.

Will I still be able to watch my Chris Benoit: Hard Knocks DVD and enjoy the matches for what they are? Yes, I think I will. Have I lost all my respect for Benoit? Absolutely. Could I ever induct him into the Hidden Highlights Hall of Fame or truly memorialize his career? No, not ever.

So while I may be able to enjoy the moments (like the time I saw Chris Benoit give Hulk Hogan a chop across the chest, something I’ll never forget), I won’t be able to think about the man again without thinking of the murderer. His legacy and his ideology are forever tainted to me.

Worst of all, as bad as I feel, there are others who are much worse off. Little attention has been given to them, but Benoit has two other children. They have to live the rest of their lives knowing what their father did, knowing that he killed their brother and himself. How do they deal with that? How does that knowledge affect them forever? How do they ever trust anyone when their own father was capable of this?

I don’t know. I ask myself the same things. If someone like Chris Benoit was capable of this, can I trust another human being? What is ticking below the surface? I don’t want to be that scared, I don’t want to be that person who can’t see the people who are legitimately trying to do more, be better. Because of that, I look back to this article as a way to focus my positive side and as way to hopefully inspire others to do so. I’m not pretentious enough to see this as the solution for everything, but it is one of those tools that I hope others find as helpful as I do.

When the news first broke, and more as the details came out, I didn’t know what we were going to do today. I looked back to what we did for Eddie Guerrero (though this situation is totally different); I looked to my fellow writers to see how they handled the events; I looked to my partner in this endeavor to bring his thoughts; and I looked to our own inbox to see what you readers thought.

More that that, I looked to the industry we emulate and the answer became quite clear.

The show must go on.

It would be unfair to the wrestlers, announcers, refs, production members, ring crew, truck drivers and everyone else out there this week to forgot about them and concentrate on this terrible event. They deserve to be noted for their contributions of trying to help us get on with life.

I want to move on, and this is the only way I know how. If you hold it against me, I understand, but this is what I need to do.

JT?

JT: I haven’t done a lot of talking about the Chris Benoit tragedy this week. I did not talk to my parents. I didn’t talk to my friends. I didn’t talk to my co-workers. I didn’t talk to our readers. I didn’t talk to the forum. I haven’t really talked to anyone about it, and I’m probably not going to talk about it much with you now. In fact, I don’t know if I will ever decide that a man who could do something like this merits my discussing him, no matter what the circumstances may be. If someday I do, it will probably sound a lot like what Michael Weyer had to say on the subject.

What I will say is that I am certain that I will never be able to disassociate the terms “Chris Benoit” and “murderer; child murderer at that”; at this point nothing about his career, story or any of the circumstances short of new evidence clearing him will ever change that. Perhaps in the end that is a true testament to how deeply he was accepted into so many lives. To many, he was like a family member or a close friend, and human beings – I think oddly enough even more so family and friends – are simply not forgivable when they do something like this.

I too wanted to mention touch on two people that I really feel bad for in this situation, them being his other two children. They are 10, and 14 years old. The fact is that they can only be sheltered for so long. They are eventually going to have to deal with and accept what their father has done. Not only that, they are entering a time in their lives where the people around them (kids) are at their cruelest. It is unfair to them and I do not envy what they are going to have to go through not only now but for the rest of their lives because of this. My prayers and thoughts most certainly go to them, along with the rest of the Benoit and Toffoloni family.

JP: Thanks JT. I know this has been rough and I didn’t want to put you on the spot. This issue will be a little awkward, but at the end of the day we’ll have something here and go on to the next, better issue. Now, as promised, there is only one thing to do. For all of our sakes, let’s get on with the Hidden Highlights.

Hidden Highlights for WWE RAW, SmackDown!, and ECW present Vengeance: Sunday, June 24, 2007 by the Readers via JP

JP: Either you readers were not impressed with Vengeance or were too overwhelmed with the events that unfolded afterwards, but we did not hear from you on this. Either way, I understand.

JT: Quick note here from the editor in me. When Lashley was being interviewed about Mr. McMahon, he said, “…not because I like him…”. Isn’t he dead? Not because I likeD him, Bobby! I’m not giving him grief here because he really has improved by leaps and bounds, but we watch for little things like this and it shows that he still has a LONG way to go to be comfortable on the mic. We here wish him the best in doing so!

Hidden Highlights for WWE RAW: Monday, June 25, 2007 by JP

JP: If it’s quite all right with everyone, I’d rather skip RAW this past week.

Of interest, though, I watched most of RAW after the story unfolded a lot more. The question has been asked: can you look at a Benoit match the same? Can you watch the man and still enjoy the performance?

As I was watching him face Elijah Burke on ECW on the same week as his crime, I was looking for the signs of a murder. I was looking for the intention, the depression, the lack of caring… anything. I couldn’t find anything; nothing seemed out of the ordinary. I then watched him fight Dean Malenko at Hog (Road) Wild ’97 and realized that the match was good and I enjoyed it. So yes, I can look at a single event and enjoy the match. But I’m always going to be looking for the signs and remember what this man ended up as.

JT: In time, I will probably feel the same. In fact, I hope that eventually I do. But, at this point I have no desire to see a match. To me, it is unfair to Nancy and unfair to Daniel to “enjoy” anything from his body of work this soon after this happened. That being said, that is a personal choice, and I have no problems with those who are able to immediately separate career and character from incident and person. To me, however, the anger and disgust over him killing his wife and child far outweigh any plans or desires I have to think about his career or wrestling legacy. For now – to me – there is no legacy. There are simply 3 dead bodies, all cowardly taken from this Earth long before they should have been.

Hidden Highlights for ECW on SciFi: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 by JT

JT: Vince gets our minds back on wrestling (and I thank him for it), Cena and Nitro give it their all in a pretty good match, Piper sings Happy Birthday to Matt Striker (and Boogeyman pops in with a surprise birthday gift… worms!), and Punk is your new #1 contender!

(3) Conversations with the ref:

In his first match as ECW Champion, we are giving Johnny Nitro some credit for something! During his match with Cena, he was using his knee to drive Cena’s throat into the bottom rope. The ref backed him up and warned him about it. Nitro then paused to pull back his hair, and as he did you could BARELY hear him utter “I know the rules”. I mean, it was really inaudible, and took me three viewings to confirm that is what he said. Just serves as a reminder that these guys are ALWAYS in character out there, and that the interaction with the ref is more than simply bitching about a two count. People are high on Nitro right now (and others like us have been for a while), and the way he remembers to do the little things like this do nothing but add fuel to the fire that is our argument in his favor.

(2) A chuckle is certainly welcomed:

Nothing about Matt Striker is necessarily Hidden, but that doesn’t mean we can’t give him his own HH as a birthday present! Seriously, the whole thing. I think just about every one of us could use a good laugh at that point, and they provided. From calling Roddy ‘Rockerick’, to knowing the full first name of the grip (Nicholas), he was on point. I mean, did you see how effortlessly he managed to get the definition of remised in there (which I REALLY loved because he used a LONGER word to describe it [negligent] )? The 96 candles / Fire Marshall joke. Surprisingly, there was even a big “HAPPY B-DAY STRIKER!” sign. And Piper calling him a mark after Striker professed that he was his favorite was GOLD. Just a great segment. Not many can be in the ring and share mic time with Piper and come off just as great as he does. Striker made it seem as easy as blowing your nose. Happy Birthday Matt Striker, here is your Hidden Highlight!

(1) A distraction? Thank GOD:

I’ll be honest with you. There wasn’t a single bone in my body that wanted to look for Hidden Highlights on Tuesday night. Actually, there wasn’t a single bone in my body that wanted to watch a wrestling program. That being said, we still have a job to do here, and I was actually pleasantly surprised by the show. Therefore, I will give some love to Vince McMahon and any wrestler, ref, or worker who worked the show. Vince comes on, in a way apologizes for RAW last night, and promises that tonight would be nothing but an entertaining wrestling show; and you know what, that is exactly what it was. We saw the RAW and ECW Champion in a Champ vs. Champ match that went twenty minutes in a damn fine match, we got a great segment with a legendary fan favorite and a bright up and coming superstar, and then we got a very entertaining 2 out of 3 #1 contenders match. As weird as this sounds, Tuesday’s show was about the only hour during my day where I was able to distract myself from the prior 30 hours. One of the few times where I didn’t have the pink elephant in the corner in the back of my mind. Just good, clean, fun wrestling. Kudos to Vince and company for handling this one perfectly. At a time when so much of the attention wrestling is getting is negative, this show was a small reminder that there is also a lot of positive.

JP mentioned it earlier, that the enormity of this tragedy should not take away from the fact that these guys are still out there doing there job. I personally would like to thank them even MORE so this week. I know I said it for ECW, but honestly the thanks goes all across the board. The four hours of wrestling we got this week were such a pleasant distraction with the constant focus being on the entire Benoit situation. They were one of the few times this week that it wasn’t somehow on my mind. I was able to legitimate immerse myself into a “wrestling” show and it was more than welcomed.

JP: I agree, I had a really rough time convincing myself to watch wrestling, especially in Hidden Highlights mode. But when I did, I was glad I had done so because there was so much great stuff. I loved how they interviewed Nitro on his loss to Cena and how that would affect his upcoming title defense, and the first thing he did was cough and come up with some lame excuse that was completely believable. Classic heel stuff that made me realize that “Hey, the show is really going on. This is all part of ‘continuity’ now, and that’s kind of awesome.”

Hidden Highlights for TNA iMPACT: Thursday, June 28, 2007 by JP

JP: In one of those rare benefits of being taped in advance, TNA did not have to deal with the consequences of the Chris Benoit situation. Instead, they were able to go out there and put on one, long, blockbuster match. Though I was amused that Don West got really mad at James Storm for interfering at the end of the match, saying he had “ruined” it. This was after Samoa Joe, Abyss, AJ Styles, Tomko, Chris Harris, and Sting has all already been involved! Oh West, sometimes you just go a bit too far.

(3) Wait, why is he helping?:

In another interesting moment of the night that had me scratching my head, Samoa Joe was beating Angle all the way to the back. Once they got there, a slew of wrestlers surrounded Joe and Jim Cornette had him thrown out of the building. But did you catch who one of those wrestlers was? Yes, it was former X-Division champion “Black Machismo” Jay Lethal! Just “last week”, Machismo had lost the title to Joe, so I was wondering why he would be one of the people to come over there. Then I realized that this was a chance for him to get in Joe’s face again and remind him that he will be back for his championship that he didn’t really lose (Chris Sabin did). At least that’s what I’m telling myself.

You can actually see Joe shoving Machismo here.

(2) Get off of him:

As we all know, this three-way dance was no DQ, allowing all of the crazy interference we saw. It also meant that should our participants do anything illegal, there was nothing that referee Rudy Charles could do. Early in the match, Christian and Angle were taking turns choking Rhino in the ropes. Since it was no DQ, Rudy Charles did not bother giving them the five count (his first point here). But just because Rudy Charles had no power here, did not mean he was going to allow an illegal maneuver to take place. Instead, Rudy Charles got in there physically and pushed the men out of the corner, breaking their holds. Major props to Rudy for being an effective referee and doing what needed to be done instead of just counting.

(1) A surprise to us:

I’m a big fan of kayfabe and not letting the audience know that the ending is predetermined. A great example of this is that when Nitro went to break during a match (which was rare), Tony would say, “Should this match end during the break, we’ll show you what happened.” Nowadays, you’ll hear Michael Cole say, “We’ll continue this match when we come back from the break.” That always leaves a sour taste in my mouth because it screams that wrestling is predetermined, something I never like the product to show or admit.

This week, two things happened that lived up to the kayfabe I enjoy. First off, at the beginning of the show, Mike Tenay praised management for putting on the triple threat match “first”. Despite knowing that the match was going to go long, Tenay still acted like this was just one of the matches that were scheduled for that night. Then, around the forty minute mark, Mike Tenay let us know that because this match went long that the “Eric Young match” was cancelled. That brought it around all full circle for me! If I had not read that there was only one match on iMPACT beforehand, that entire night would have been a surprise and those two lines would have kept the kayfabe alive.

JT: Really enjoyed it this week, again, it was a distraction, and a 40 minute one featuring three of my favorites at that!

Hidden Highlights for WWE SmackDown!: Friday, June 29, 2007 by JT

JT: Ric Flair continues to teach Carlito lessons despite being on different shows, Matt Hardy ties up the SmackDown vs. RAW score with continuing wins – this time over Lance Cade, Chavo retains his cruiser title, SD’s version of Cade & Murdoch is COMING SOON!, the SmackDown champs “steal” a win from Cryme Tyme (or so they think), Kane humbles MVP, I again get robbed of a Widow’s Peak, Khali has some good, friendly fun, and we bust out the P words as Batista “Punishes” Edge in a match he was “Protesting”!

(3) I have to be sure:

Man, for 96 issues it seems like we’ve had a lot of firsts lately. Which of course leads me our next HH, which I do believe is a first! I am going to give some credit to the same ref two weeks in a row! Last week, we pointed out that Jimmy Cordaras had a bit of a black eye, and talked about how the refs are out there just as often as the wrestlers, and face some of the same dangers of performing in a wrestling week. Well, no danger tonight, just clarification! After one of Cade’s pin attempts on Matt Hardy, Hardy kicked out and Jimmy threw up the “two” signs for the bell-keeper. Nothing unusual there:

What happened next though is our highlight. He stood up, moved closer to that side of the ring, turned around to keep his eye on the action, and just out of the top right of your corner you could see him throw up the two, just for good measure! Just in case! I LOVE this. This is uber-Kayfabe at its absolute finest. Everyone in the building – bell-keeper included – is in on the fact that it is scripted, but you still have to keep up appearances, even as little as these.

(2) Hey! Unf-hair!:

In the opening contest between Ric Flair and Carlito, Carlito had the upper hand for the first few minutes, getting several pin fall attempts. During one of these attempts, he had Flair’s leg hooked (nice work), but the lean got his head a bit too close to Flair. What does Flair do? Well reaches up with his left hand and pulls his hair to break up the of course! I’m actually surprised we don’t see this more from Carlito’s opponent. This is, however, the dirtiest player in the game. If you’re going to wrestle Ric Flair with hair like that, he WILL find a way to get his hands on it and use it against you. WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

(1) Meshed segments:

So my second favorite tag team, and not-seen-enough-at-all-on-TV personalities Cryme Tyme showed up on SD this week (again, big ups to the E for pulling the roster together and just putting on a nice, distracting, “wrestling” show). After losing to the tag champs Deuce and Domino, they decided to get a little revenge by stealing their car. D & D, not wanting this to happen, rushed towards the back and… anyone notice this?

WHOOPS! Why was this already out there? I know his match was next, but since they had JUST taken a commercial, could this not have been timed a little differently so that it could go skit, commercial (so they could set up), THEN come back and have the MVP stuff? I’m not complaining, really I’m not. It just struck me as odd and humorous when I saw this that Deuce and Domino had to literally run around his entrance “tunnel” to get to the back.

Before we go, as you may all remember a week or so ago we gave some HH props to a guy in the crowd with a Cena sign that basically mocked all those that openly hate and boo him for absolutely no reason (this clip is from Vengeance by the way). Keep in mind, if you recognize his talent and the fact that he is a victim of Superman booking, yet still just don’t dig him, that’s fine. No, this sign went to those who spent 40 bucks for no other reason than to show up and boo him and will attest his lack of talent no matter what anybody says. For those people, I have yet another sign, in what may become a regular thing around here. That being said, let me present my:

HAHA, YOU’RE A CENA HATER FOR NO REASON AND HERE IS MY SIGN! …sign:

Take that haters. Sign says it all.

JP: And of course, a much better sign would be:

MY SIGN IS A HIDDEN HIGHLIGHT!

That one caries much more weight in these parts. Still, I’m usually scanning the crowd for a good sign or two. That “JP” one from last week was classic!

Reader Write-in Hidden Highlights

Hidden Highlights aren’t just for us to find and tell you about, but for you to spot and share with us. Don’t just sit there and stare, but be a more active, attentive, and engaged viewer. Appreciate all the hard work that goes into making the wrestling we have the privilege to watch and then let us know what you caught this and every week.

This week JP gets to pick our Reader Write-in Hidden Highlights of the week.

JP: The inbox was full with a lot of thoughts and a lot of moot points (Mr. McMahon’s limo stuff, Christian’s list, tag ropes, etc…), so I’m also going to push this section ahead. If I skipped you this week, my apologies, but I do want to keep the tempo and flow going. So, *GENERAL WARNING*:: some parts of the following Reader Write-in Hidden Highlights may be edited for grammar, spelling, and English translation…

To make myself feel better, we’ll start off with my main squeeze Catherine, checking in from Korea:

It’s Catherine again. By the time you guys hit the triple digits, I’ll be back in Canada, huzzah. And JP, you’re right, I do have needs.

JP: Well, Canada is off the beaten track for me, but for you honey, no problem.

JT: All ready? Well, since I know you are going to skip it, I’ll put in the next part of this letter.

And overpowering need to smack you upon the head on sight. You’re lucky though; I haven’t seen the Miz in months and still want to punch him in the face on sight.

JP: Oh JT, you always try to make our little games look so salacious. I won’t let you ruin this, so let’s let my lady talk.

Anyway, I wanted to point out not a specific highlight, but an overall one. This one actually goes to Charlie Haas and it’s something I’ve noticed about him since practically the beginning. He has got to be the most vocal guy in the ring. Not necessarily trash talking, but screaming. A lot of guys yell when they’re synching in a submission move, but Haas tends to be screaming during most points in the match and I think it does get across how intense he can be during a match.

Even when he’s the guy getting hurt, he’s yelling. Usually, when a guy gets hit with a big move, they lay there writhing and kind of gasping.

During One Night Stand, Haas got superplexed off the ladder and he was screaming in pain. It just struck me as utterly realistic. I mean, if you get slammed like that, it undoubtedly hurts like a bitch, so it makes sense that some people would scream.

Anyway, just thought I’d share.

Love to you both,

Cath

JP: Nice catch there, Cath. Charlie Haas does not get enough props for this even these pages, so I’m glad to see that. And of course, we all know that your love for JT is just platonic, unlike your undying affection for me. Manu Bumb sent in a bunch of stuff this week, but I’m going to peer it down to a couple of his best. Also, the shortest, because Manu forgot how to capitalize again and I refuse to do excessive editing:

Jamie Knoble got to the ring before Chavo, then looked behind him to see where Chavo was, because he didn’t want to enter the ring before his partner got there and be outnumbered by the faces.

JP: I’m surprised he got into the ring at all! But it was a good save on his part. You can’t trust those faces.

Okay, this is a personal hidden highlight, but JBL, while talking about Finlay’s dad (or perhaps Finlay himself) said “he used to get drunk 3 days straight – yesterday, today and tomorrow”. Who was Finlay fighting? Matt Hardy. Where was Matt Hardy last Sunday? Raleigh. What was last Sunday? Father’s day. Who was in the front row at the RBC center? Matt Hardy’s dad. What did Mr. Hardy say when the hardy boys brought him into the ring after their match? “I’ve been drunk 3 days straight – yesterday, today, and tomorrow”. I’m sure its a fairly common saying, but the first time I ever heard it was last Sunday, and hearing JBL say it now while Mr. Hardy’s son is in the ring got a laugh out of me.

JP: I don’t recall ever hearing it before either! But I like your personal connection to an unrelated coincidence. A personal Hidden Highlight at its best. Going back to one of our favorite topics is Marshall Burke:

My hidden highlight for the June 18th edition of RAW was London and Kendrick. If you noticed, their trunks were red (the colors of RAW), as opposed to their prior colors of the trunks (blue for Smackdown).

JP: Oh classic color schemes, how many times will we talk about them? A million and seven, I suppose. Why, here’s one more from Jeremy Haston:

I know that one of the HH biggies is colors and I wanted to point out a few I had noticed. And the second one may surprise you. The first is London and Kendrick. I know that most of the time when they were on SmackDown! they wore blue trunks of some shade or another. But in their debut on Raw this week I noticed that they were wearing red shorts. And since SmackDown!’s general color is blue and Raw’s red, it made sense. And the exact same thing happened with, of all people, Chris Masters! He usually wears red trunks but this week on SmackDown!, they were blue!! And so was his robe which has always been red!! I don’t know if it was the costume department who did it or the individual stars but I thought it was great.

JP: Like I said, the color thing is classic! And Chris Masters keeps showing up in these pages. I wonder why. Anyway, keep these future classics coming!

JT: Also just to note, after JP had this uploaded, we got another email from… another JP! J.P. Martinez chimed in with the same observation regarding London and Kendricks’ red attire, so props to him as well as the others.

JP: See, us JP’s know what we’re doing! Fixxer315 would like to go back to Vengeance… 2002, that is:

I just got done watching the HITC match between Jericho & HHH, and the hidden highlight here has to go to the referee. Near the end, the ref joins the wrestlers at the top of the cage and does several counts. What is interesting about the two or three times that he does a count was that he makes certain to hit the steel bar and not the mesh. I suppose that is to make certain that the count is reasonably audible. Also, after one of the two counts, he shakes his hand, as hitting the steel with his hand would have hurt him when hitting canvas in a normal match would not have.

JP: I swear we’ve talked about this one or one like it before. Bonus points for anyone who tracks it down! Sticking to the classics, Stephan Straka says:

Your talk with Brian S. last column about the tag ropes brought back one of my favourite moments of Eddie Guerrero. During a tag match years back (I forget the details, even the other members of the match), Eddie was on the corner outside the ring. So he paces around on the apron and the ref yells at him to get back to the corner, holding up the tag rope and telling him he has to be holding onto it. So Eddie unties the rope from the turnbuckle and ties it back on the rope itself and continues pacing! It just got better after that as the ref yelled at him again and Eddie held up the rope saying something like “What, I’m holding the rope!” Priceless.

JP: It absolutely was, and I distinctly remember that moment as well. I believe he was tagging with Chavo on SmackDown!, though I can’t remember the opponents either. I’m pretty sure they were heels at the time, so that should narrow the timeframe. More bonus points go out, track it down! Me, I don’t have time to write this section at the moment. In the same vein yet not really is Chris Jacobs and, well, I have no idea:

Reader Write in, on Mick needing help, I have that tape, it is an older one called “Three Faces of Foley.” Mick was upset when JR asked him if he enjoys pain, Mick went off, “THIS HURTS, *hits himself in the head HARD* does this look like fun to you, *WAM WAM* DOES THIS LOOK LIKE I’M ENJOYING PAIN *WAM* IT JUST HAPPENS AND I CAN DEAL WITH IT, DO YOU THINK I ENJOY NOT BEING ABLE TO GO PLAY FOOTBALL WITH MY CHILDREN BECAUSE I AM TOO BUSY ENJOYING THIS PAIN” Then he slapped on the mandible claw only to call out for help for JR as in, He’s going to need some help…JR needs some help. JR gets beat up a lot by interviewers, Mick did it, HHH did it, Kane set him on fire once, lol.

JP: Uhhh… were any of those sentences? I have no idea what was just said. JT, can you translate?

JT: Yes, what he said was “See last week’s HH where we ended it with someone who was apparently jabbering on nonsensically. Same thing here.”

JP: Thanks, much better. By the way, Josh from Washington, DC wants to help you out with your Kevin Thorne question:

It looks as though he is in front of the WACHOVIA CENTER in Philadelphia (you can see the Flyers logo in the background). I think this was one of the first things he did when ECW restarted last summer. Philadelphia was like the 3rd show they did on Sci Fi.

JP: I like that he’s come less about “bite clubs” since then and more about brooding guy that will kick your butt. Still, it was funny during the breakup with the new breed he started talking since he never really talked before except to say, “Ariel, what do the cards say?” Thanks to Manu and Scott for similar info. Aaron Hubbard had the same info, and another though:

The Thorn shot on the Titantron is from an early promo like in the first 3 weeks of WWECW. He was stalking around the arena, and then a camera found him, so he spat blood in the camera. Quite a cool visual actually. Anyway, just thought I’d tell you, since I knew where it was from.

Oh, here’s something for your hidden highlight vault. It’s from Against All Odds 06. The opening match between the Naturals and Austin Aries-Roderick Strong. I’ve always believed that heels should have more toned down offense than babyfaces, even X-guys (looking at you, AJ) and there was an excellent example of this in this match. We all know that Strong is the Messiah of the Backbreaker, and has several awesome variations. But as soon as he gets a chance to go on offense, what’s the first wrestling move he does? A plain-old, run of the mill, textbook side backbreaker that we’ve all seen thousands of times. I found this hilarious. Great heel.

JP: Chris Sabin has also been doing a great job of toning down his flashy stuff to be a heel, and I think it’s working. I also remember a couple of weeks ago Don West was talking about how phenomenal AJ can be, so he didn’t understand his need to take shortcuts and do what he does best. It was quite good. Speaking of quite good is my main gal Amber Johnson:

I was able to find a great hidden highlight while watching the Judgment Day dvd the other day. Considering once that Judgment day was an exclusive Smackdown PPV, Raw dominated the show heavily with JR and King opening the show and with the bulk of the matches not to mention Raw’s main event finishing the show. However, the ring ropes were donned in the traditional SmackDown blue. Good job by the set up crew to acknowledge the originator of this PPV event.

JP: Well da—

JT: Hey, wasn’t Catherine your main gal at the beginning of this article? And who says “main gal” anyway?

JP: You know, you are the worst JT. Luckily for you, Jonathan “Fray” Fraysure is better than you:

On this past Tuesday’s ECW, during the C.M. Punk/Elijah Burke two-out-of-three-falls match, near the finish, Punk and Burke exchanged many back-and-forth pinfall attempts, the last of which happened right before Punk hit the G2S for the deciding pin. What was the hidden highlight to me was just after the last of the however many pins there were, during the break just before Punk’s finisher, the ref sold his hand that he had been using to count all the 1-2’s, shaking it as if he was in pain. Good thought on the referee’s part!

JP: Second time today the ref has been shaking his hand in pain. Seems to be a theme today or something! Sean from Australia writes in for the first time with a couple of thoughts:

I have a few Hidden Highlights from ECW this week:

1) During the Piper/Striker/Boogieman skit, once Boogieman had given Our Teacher the Double Handed Chokeslam, as usual, Boogieman spat Worms into Striker’s mouth. Usually, he’ll spit them onto the squashed opponent’s chest, yet this time, he spat them in Striker’s mouth. But this isn’t the HH. It was visible that Striker was chewing them, rather than spitting them out. It adds an element that he’s so breathless he can’t spit the worms out, but rather has to move them out. That’s devotion to your craft right there.

JP: Oh, totally grossed out. That’s not usually why we like to highlight Striker in these pages.

2) CM Punk has tape over the first two fingers on his left hand recently, ALA Triple H. However, I noticed during the Burke/Punk match that there were letters on each finger. F on the Index Finger, and R on the Middle finger. While this may seem random, think about the Tattoos Punk has on his hands, his knuckles spell DRUG FREE. Punk is so devoted to the Straight Edge cause, he’ll still have Drug Free on his hands, even if he’s got tape over them.

JP: Oh, I get what you are saying! I really had to think about this one. You are saying the tape covered the “F” and “R” in “DRUG FREE”, so he wrote the letters in. Very cool. From new to old with regular Josh Lankton:

During the opening introductions for the triple threat match on Impact, as Jeremy Borash was introducing the three respective wrestlers, he would say, ‘he weighted in this morning at ‘. I like this as it makes it seem as if every wrestler weighs in before the taping begins thus making the matches seem that much more important. I just thought it was a cool touch.

JP: Did you also notice he was wearing a full suit, buttoned up, with a white shirt? Borash was taking it seriously! Also, this is the second time we talked about weigh-ins in TNA. I’m all for more sports elements and would like to see that more regularly in TNA. If they want to be more “wrestling” than “sports entertainment”, that will help distinguish them. On a totally different note, Greg W brings the sports entertainment:

So, not sure if it’s been mentioned in the past but just a little something that I’ve noticed. In the video that runs before WWE programs start (I guess you can call it the WWE signature?) that shows moments from the beginning as Capitol Wrestling to the WWWF/WWF to present day. Well, we know that Good Ol’ JR is pretty knowledgeable about the history of the business and at the end of the video, he says “The world is watching!”. If you recall, back in the early to mid 80’s, the intro to any WWF program said “The World Wrestling Federation, what the world is watching”.

JP: Oh, I’m sure JR has that ingrained in his head somewhere.

Oh, I’m pretty sure that everybody has mentioned this to you, but they have already taken that moment at the end of WMXX from that intro as well… Out of sight, out of mind… well, so to speak anyway.

JP: Yeah, I read the news-blip on it. The WWE production crew has to be given a lot of props for all they did to put the Chris Benoit special together and to get rid of all of the references of him when the details came forward. They are on the road, too, and have to face so much. Lest we forget, though, there are other involved this week as well.
Finishing us off this week is Chuck Lipsig memorializing one of those people:

One of the best hidden highlights I’ve ever caught, was by Woman, when she was with the Four Horseman. It happened, when the NWO attacked backstage, laying out Arn Anderson, Rey Mysterio, and the American Males.

I’ll quote my USEnet post (with a slight correction) from 1996:

“The touch that I really liked was that when Bagwell was taken into the ambulance with Flair, Anderson, and Woman, Woman, moved over and held Bagwell’s hand until Sting got into the ambulance. Really nice touch, with a heel comforting a face in that moment.”

Woman was one of the hottest women in wrestling of any time, in my opinion, then and now. This touch of kindness made her that much hotter.

JP: Woman was always amazing outside the ring and put the focus on the wrestlers without stealing the match. It was a rare ability that few women valets get today. We hadn’t seen her in the ringside area for many years, but that does not take away everything she had done.

JT: Just want to thank everyone for our patience this week. We’re just trying to get back into the swing of things, and I’m sure we’ll be back at full speed next week.

Do you have a Hidden Highlight from this or any week in history that you would like to share? Please e-mail JP..erT…er…us at [email protected] with your thoughts! Send them by Saturday afternoon to be considered! And remember, they can be from any show, live or taped, or any house show, or anything you saw… we just like to know!

Exit, stage left!

JT: Such a sad week for wrestling families, wrestling fans, and the sport in general. This is easily one of (if not) the biggest non-in-the-ring wrestling related story of my time as a fan. As big as it is though, I really think the best thing – at least for me – is to get back to what makes me a fan in the first place; the wrestlers, the shows, the matches, the storytelling, all of it. I’ll be watching RAW tonight, hopefully Chris Benoit is the farthest thing from my mind. Have a good week my little Canadian nickels!

JP: I completely agree. I want the shows back on track, the storylines to advance, the PPVs to be set up, and to catch a bunch of Hidden Highlights. This has not been our greatest issue, and I look forward to putting our best foot forward next week. I hope this issue helped you, too, in however you decide to handle things. Stay safe, and hope to hear from you this week as you get back in the groove, too. I should be back in the east coast by the time you are reading this, so special thanks go out to m California peeps for putting me up and putting up with me.

Thank you for joining us for THE 96th ISSUE of Hidden Highlights! Be sure to drop us a line and let us know what you think and all the other Hidden Highlights we missed. Plus, we want to hear your Reader Write-ins for all the moments you see this and every week.

We’ll catch you next time in the reader approved most positive article in all of the IWC: Hidden Highlights! Until then!