The Happy-Go-Sucky Wrestling Report: 6.04.08

Something many of you may or may not know is that I write this column while juggling my job. So basically what happens every Tuesday is that I start writing this thing around 6pm, and finish right around Midnight or so, pushing the deadline and turning Larry Csonka’s hair grey. But no more!

So now, maybe just maybe I will be able to put out a not so Go Sucky Happy-Go-Sucky each week! No promises though!

But anyway. You don’t care about me. So let’s rassle!

News: The WWE draft returns with a 3 hour special on Monday Night Raw.

This is LONG overdue. While I understood the idea of the King of the Ring was supposed to change things up for Raw by pushing a midcarder to the main event, it obviously was wasted on someone who had proven to not be able to keep himself clean.

The WWE is doing everything it can to get itself out of this slump it’s been in these last few weeks. Ratings for wrestling in general are steadily dropping for each major show. This will help a little, but not a lot.

If you take a look at last year’s draft, Oi! What a nightmare. I mean think about this for a minute.

Ric Flair- Raw to Smackdown (Retired)
King Booker- Smackdown To Raw (Gone)
Bobby Lashley- ECW To Raw (Gone)
Torrie Wilson- Raw to Smackdown (Gone)
Chris Benoit- Smackdown to ECW (Dead)

Then there was the great Wellness suspensions that followed Benoit’s death.

Mr. Kennedy- Smackdown to Raw (Suspended)
Snitsky- ECW to Raw (Suspended)

And of course there was Khali and The Boogeyman, who are currently not actively wrestling.

Honesly, I know that King Booker probably would have had a big push as would Mr. Kennedy had they not left and/or been suspended. Bobby Lashley probably would have been WWE Champion. And of course Chris Benoit probably would have been ECW Champion rather than Johnny Nitro.

But with hindsight as our vision, we can officially say that the biggest impact the draft had on one individual was none other than Viscera moving over from Raw to ECW and dawning the Big Daddy V gimmick. And even HE is not currently actively wrestling. But the draft never really helped anyone except him, as he get a semi main event push on ECW feuding with C.M. Punk, The Undertaker, and Kane before being sent home to lose some weight. None of the others drafted that day in the televised draft or the draft on WWE.com had a bigger turnaround in their career, and to call the Big Daddy V gimmick a “turnaround” is a stretch.

John Morrison was also moved over from Raw to ECW in that draft and had a great turnaround as well. He held a World Title and currently holds the WWE Tag Team titles. But why wasn’t he the biggest turnaround of the draft? Because he was already a midcarder on Raw, and despite his ECW title reign, remains a mid carder on ECW/Smackdown.

With that being said, let’s hope that the WWE redeems itself from last year. I’m even going to go as far as stating which 10 wrestlers should be moved, and to what roster they should be moved to!

#1 Carlito- From Raw To Smackdown

Carlito’s career on Raw has been buried in a bunch of embarrassing angles. By moving him back to Smackdown, he can start over fresh against a fresh Smackdown roster he’s never wrestled with before. Carlito could immediately feud with U.S. Champion Matt Hardy and really regenerate his career and show everyone he has the charisma everyone says he lacks.

#2 Hardcore Holly- From Raw to ECW

Hear me out on this one. Hardcore Holly has bounced around in all 3 lately and chances are, his latest run is about to end soon so that he can return to ECW and be buried on their midcard again as an individual wrestler. What I see here is by splitting the tag team champions, Cody Rhodes can keep his title while allowing Ted Dibiase Jr to come in, thus, forming the new Second Generation stable we’ve all been expecting to see.

#3 William Regal- From Raw to Smackdown

He was “fired” from Raw, so Regal shows back up on Smackdown to raise hell on their roster instead. They can keep him on the upper mid card there and maybe that whole King of the Ring mistake can have SOME sort of payoff.

#4 Finlay- From Smackdown to ECW

Finlay will be this year’s Chris Benoit. That of course in the sense that Finlay will be sent over to teach some of the new, younger guys on ECW how to wrestle. Don’t be surprised if Finlay gets himself an ECW Championship reign over on Sci-Fi.

#5 MVP- From Smackdown To Raw

MVP has proven himself to be one of the top rising stars in the WWE, meaning he’s A list material. So I fully expect him to show up on the A show and get into new, better feuds. I’d love to see future feuds with John Cena and Triple H. And I fully expect to see MVP beat Y2J for the IC title that night, if not the next week. I’d go ahead and book this one.

#6 Mark Henry- From Smackdown to ECW

Mark Henry & Big Daddy V vs. Colin Delaney in a Hardcore Handicap match= Ratings!

#7 Rey Mysterio- From Smackdown to Raw

He’s spent his entire career in the WWE on Smackdown. There’s nothing left for Rey to do there except move over to Raw and start some new, fresher feuds that don’t involve him fighting Chavo Guerrero for rights to Eddie’s remains.

#8 C.M. Punk- From ECW to Raw

He’s got nothing left for ECW. He’s got the money in the bank contract and they sure as hell aren’t going to waste that on the ECW Title. Punk’s one of the few wrestlers on this roster that I can see as the future of the business once the Triple H’s, the John Cena’s, and the Shawn Michaels are all gone and retired.

#9 Elijah Burke- From ECW to Smackdown

Burke has had an up and down career in ECW, mainly due to odd booking on his part. A move for Burke and a major feud for a major title could really help push him over the hump WWE creative has put him in.

#10 John Morrison- From ECW To Raw

Another tag team split puts the tag title situation up in the air, and will leave the door open for any other tag teams that were not drafted to unceremoniously be moved over to Smackdown like Cryme Tyme or London and Kendrick. Morrisson has had a monster career since being IC Champ on Raw last and could have the chance to be a great midcard heel on Raw.

If you’re printing a checklist to see how right I am…here’s a printable version.

Carlito _____
Hardcore Holly______
William Regal______
Finlay_____
MVP______
Mark Henry______
Rey Mysterio_______
C.M. Punk __________
Elijah Burke __________
John Morrison _________

I know, it’s not the best group of guys to “save the ratings”. I couldn’t bring myself to expect guys like Shawn Michaels, Batista, and The Undertaker would switch brands at this point, as much as I’d like to see it. But if things remain the way they are now, this group seems to have the least problem

News: Randy Orton broke his collarbone during his match with Triple H at One Night Stand and will miss up to 3 months.

Happy: It’s never good when someone hurts themselves, but this is probably a bit of a relief for Randy Orton. Orton had been asking for time off, and the WWE wasn’t cooperating. So now, they have no choice but to let him go home and heal his wounds.

On top of that, Orton seems to always return in great shape and with a big push when he’s held off WWE TV for awhile. He’ll be returning after the draft, which will open up the possibility of new feuds or perhaps, a new brand. The timing is perfect for him to return right at Summerslam and mess something up big time.

Go Sucky: Orton has had a fantastic push these last few months and having to leave WWE TV could cause him to lose some of that momentum. On top of that, how well will Orton be when he returns? Your collarbone is a big part of being a wrestler when you’re lifting 300 pound guys over your head.

News: WWE.com is reporting that The Big Show will have an MRI for his injury at One Night Stand was worse than originally thought. The idea is that Big Show’s gash may have swollen up due to a broken bone.

Happy: Again, never happy when someone gets hurt. I guess the happy here is that One Night Stand was apparently more hardcore than expected. And unlike Randy Orton’s injury, Big Show’s injury probably won’t keep him out of the ring that long. That of course given the MRI doesn’t show something we don’t know about yet.

Go Sucky: Other than the Big Show getting hurt, you can look at this in two negative lights.

#1- The fact that the Big Show and Randy Orton were injured at One Night Stand is more reason why the WWE never does the Hardcore matches anymore. By running hardcore matches, the WWE risks injuring one, or in this case, two, of their major WWE stars. This isn’t like Lance Cade and Mark Henry getting hurt. These are two former champs who will likely be champs again at some point. Because of this, any rumor about the WWE bringing the Hardcore title back to ECW can probably be laid to rest for good.

#2- This happened because the WWE doesn’t run enough Hardcore matches. You have to think that maybe just maybe these guys aren’t exactly used to or conditioned for hardcore matches the way they used to be. Even ECW isn’t training guys for Hardcore matches anymore. It was a truly gutsy call to have EVERY match be hardcore, but I doubt they’ll ever do that again now.

News: Rob Van Dam has opted to work for the Nu Wrestling Evolution (the N.W.E., the same company the Ultimate Warrior is wrestling for) instead of AAA.

Happy: Does this really surprise anyone? If you haven’t seen this classic YouTube clip, check it out.

Obviously, RVD is getting himself attatched to the Warrior’s return. And to be honest, this new wrestling company is the place to be if you’re not in the WWE or TNA. I am really impressed and intrigued by this company and will be watching intently to see what comes of the Warrior’s return, and the apparent return of RVD to wrestling.

RVD returning and wrestling anywhere is great news for just about anyone who is a wrestling fan. Plain and simple

Go Sucky: I’ll admit this much, I’ve never seen a AAA show and wouldn’t have a clue what to expect other than what I’ve read from a hand full of reports here on 411wrestling.com But to see a guy like Rob Van Dam wrestling against some real, true, luchadors would be a treat, and it’s a shame we will have to see him in the ring with guys like The Ultimate Warrior and Orlando Jordan instead. I feel like that’s a missed opportunity there with the chance that maybe Rob Van Dam has gone lazy on us.

Or maybe he just wants to be closer to Amsterdam. I dunno.

News: Sabu needs rods placed in his back and may never wrestle again.

Obviously, there’s nothing good here. But can anyone really be surprised after some of the crazy shit this guy did? To YouTube again!

And who could ever forget this epic bout?

Wrestling is truly losing a hardcore legend here but in a way, we can all be thankful that they were able to catch this before he would have had to live the rest of his life in a wheelchair.

News: The Wrestling Observer reports that if William Regal is fired from the WWE for good, he would be in danger of being deported back to England due to him not having United States citizenship.

Happy: If you’re William Regal, do you really care? I believe that Regal currently lives in the Atlanta area but would it be so bad if he had to move back to England? And if he truly doesn’t want to move back, then maybe he can use this as some motivation to clean up his act and get rid of whatever the hell he’s been using.

Go Sucky: What is it with the snowball effect on the guys getting the 60 day suspension? Hardy gets the suspension and his house burns down. Regal gets it and he faces deportation. Come on guys. Look at the consequences here. Clean yourselves help and do your damn jobs!

As for Regal, there’s always TNA, that of course if Regal wants to wrestle in TNA. With TNA’s current product, there’s no room for a wrestler that actually…well wrestles. So Regal better shape up or be shipped out.

News: The Undertaker was removed from Smackdown’s page on WWE.com and moved over to the Alumni section.

Happy: I didn’t see the match at One Night Stand with Edge but apparently this match was brilliantly done and let Undertaker nod out in style. But, is anyone else confused about all this? There was nothing and still is nothing going around about The Undertaker’s career being over. So I’m assuming that the Undertaker will return, and will probably return on an episode of Raw. That’s what I’m hoping for anyway!

Go Sucky: I thought that The Undertaker was supposed to get a really long title reign here. This kind of makes his historic match at Wrestlemania null at this point. True he went 16-0 and won the World Heavyweight Title at the show two years straight, but both of those reigns ended so quickly.

And if The Undertaker indeed moves over to Raw, that’s taking yet another A-list talent from Smackdown taken away, leaving them with pretty much nobody who would be able to replace him. Who honestly could replace The Undertaker at this point?

Rapid Fire!

-TNA wanted former WWE Women’s Champ Jazz to be the bodyguard to Velvet Sky and Angelina Love but they couldn’t get in touch with her in time.

Jazz? The Beautiful People? HAHAHAHAHAHA!

– House shows are pulling Scott Steiner from their house shows. Steiner may be injured.

So Big Poppa Pump and Little Petey Pump are both injured now. Do you think it’s because Rhaka Khan was having them sign her trading cards again? Or maybe Scotty pulled something doing all that match a few weeks ago.

-Raw pulled a 3.1 rating this week, up from a 2.9.

Where did the days where 5.0 ratings were considered “low” in wrestling? 🙁

-Kamala, Koko B. Ware, Jake “The Snake” Roberts, and George “The Animal” Steele will be a part of the wedding of Jay Lethal and So Cal Val at Slammiversary.

Just so everyone knows, Kamala is still fat, Frankie and Damian are dead, and The Animal’s back is still hairy enough to put a coat on half of the Inuit population in Alaska.

-The following celebrities have been confirmed as participats on Hulk Hogan’s Celebrity Championship Wrestling reality series that will air on CMT.

— Todd Bridges (TV’s Different Strokes & Everybody Hates Chris)
— Butterbean (boxer & fighter)
— Dustin Diamond (Screech from TV’s Saved by the Bell)
— Erin Murphy (Tabitha from TV’s Bewitched)
— Frank Stallone (Sylvester Stallone’s brother)
— Tiffany (80s pop star)
— Nikkie Ziering (former Playboy model)

Of course, the Hulkster made sure nobody more popular than him made the cut! Except maybe Tiffany.

And with that, I bid you all farewell. We’ll come at ya live from my new job next week! Until then my friends…

May your lives be Happy…or Go Sucky.