wrestling / Columns

The Wrestling 5 & 1 05.16.10: Excuse Me…I Said EXCUSE ME!

May 16, 2010 | Posted by Ryan Merholz

BEFORE WE BEGIN…
Hello everyone and welcome to the Wrestling 5 & 1!!!

I am your host Ryan Merholz, and if you think I’m as swell as I do, you should follow me on Twitter!

www.twitter.com/411RyanMerholz

Learn cool things about me maybe, and at the very least, stock up on real life wrestlers to follow yourself!

Probably follow the rest of the fine 411 Twitter feeds as well…

http://www.twitter.com/411mania
http://www.twitter.com/411wrestling
http://www.twitter.com/411moviestv
http://www.twitter.com/411music
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http://www.twitter.com/411mma

I’m still looking for suggestions as far as new features you’d like to see added to fill the weeks when Worth Your Wealth doesn’t appear. Post those comments and let me know what you’d like to see!

Alright, let’s get this show on the road!

WHO SAID WHAT?

In a recent interview , the Hero of Time himself, Cody Rhodes, specifically pointed out that he and his character on television are nothing like that of his father, “The American Dream” Dusty Rhodes.

While Cody was obviously just trying to say that he’s trying to pave his own way in the business, could this have also been a shot at former Legacy cohort Ted DiBiase, Jr?

Nah…

VS.

Last week’s contest was between recently drafted – Divas, Kelly Kelly vs Rosa Mendes. The result was the closest competition we’ve had yet, as Rosa Mendes edged out Kelly Kelly by a final count of 24 – 20!

Thanks to everybody who voted!

This week’s contest feature’s the pair of ladies who has caught the attention of one Zach Ryder on RAW…

Gail Kim VS. Alicia Fox

VOTE IN YOUR COMMENT!

5 THINGS YOU DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT…ROB VAN DAM

Tonight at TNA Sacrifice, RVD is set to make his first PPV title defense. Here are a few other things about RVD you might be seeing for the first time:

1. RVD first appeared on WWE television waaayyyy back in 1987, appearing in a skit with “The Million Dollar Man” Ted DiBiase. Rob was paid $100 to enter the ring and kiss DiBiase’s foot.

2. During his first run with WCW, RVD wrestled under the name “Robbie V” because Bill Watts hated his name.

3. RVD used to own his own comic book store called “5 Star Comics”.

4. He was trained to wrestle by the original Sheik.

5. RVD appears in the upcoming movie “Wrong Side of Town” alongside The Animal, Dave Batista

And 1 Things you Definitely Knew About…ROB VAN DAMN

WRESTLING TWITTER A-GO-GO

Your Olympic Hero, Kurt Angle, is apparently on his way back to TNA after taking a few weeks off. He tweeted earlier this week:

“I’m on the road- going to san antonio to meet with network reps for pay per view, then to orlando for tna impact this wk.”

It will be nice to see Kurt back. There aren’t enough people in the main event of TNA yet, after all.

VIDEO A-GO-GO

This weeks video comes from Tuesday night on WWE NXT. After being eliminated from the competition earlier in the show, Matt Striker got a few words from Daniel Bryan…

Dunno why everybody shits on Danielson for his promo work. He’s not the super intense type of promo like you see from John Cena or Edge or the like, but is that necessarily a bad thing? I freakin’ loved this and I can’t wait to see what Danielson does now that he’s returned.

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Alright kids, tuck in with a snack because it’s time now for the legit Wrestling 5 & 1, that’s 5 tasty tidbits of news from this week, & 1 smokin’ hottie to send you all home happy!

TNA Sacrifice – Less Weird-Sounding Matches than You’d Think

Tonight is TNA Sacrifice, headlines by Rob Van Dam defending the TNA Championship against AJ Styles. The card is rounded out by a few solid matches and some others that fit the standard, zany TNA booking style.

Case in point? Abyss vs. Desmond Wolfe in a “Chelsea vs. Ring” match. If Wolfe wins, he gets to keep the coveted Hogan ring, if Abyss wins, he “owns” Chelsea for 30 days. Despite the fact that Wolfe is over and the TNA “cast members” that the front office claims to listen to picked him over Abyss for a title match in the polls, does anybody not see Abyss winning this match? Being Hulk Hogan’s chosen protégé trumps common sense and popularity, after all.

Also on the stupid side of things, we recently saw the legs sawed off of Matt Morgan’s one-man tag-team championship reign for the sake of getting the titles onto The ~~Outsiders~~ Band. In 2010. They defend against lifetime barely-on-the-carder Shannon Moore and his new partner Jesse Neal, Ink Inc. So yeah, guess which way that one goes.

Finally we have Tara taking on Madison Rayne for the TNA Knockout’s title in a Career vs. Title match. If you’ve been reading this site at all in the last 2 weeks you probably know how this one is gonna play out. The weird thing here is this is a heel vs heel match and Tara beat the shit out of just about every other face knockout on the show heading into this match. Why put her over half the knockouts just for her to leave? Oh wait, it’s TNA.

Now let’s pause a moment here for me to address all the readers who are itching to bitch in the comments about how I am a WWE mark and I don’t give TNA a fair shake and blah blah blah.

Do I prefer WWE to TNA? Yes.

Do I think TNA is shit? Yes.

Do I think TNA is shit BECAUSE I prefer WWE to TNA? Nope!

Just wanted to point that out. Maybe we’ll discuss it further someday.

On the bright side of the card, RVD/Styles has the potential to be wicked awesome, Jeff Hardy and Mr. Anderson can hopefully pull a good match out of one another, despite little build or reasoning, and maybe if we’re really lucky, a black hole with open up and simply swallow both Rob Terry and Orlando Jordan before they waste anymore of anyone’s time.

To everyone ordering the show tonight, hope you enjoy it. And let me know how it was.

WWE Exec’s Need Love Too!

One of the more discussed stories this week seemed to be that of WWE Executive Vice President, Jared Bartie. This fine, upstanding gentlemen was given the axe, reportedly, for getting completely schnockered during Wrestlemania weekend and hitting on a rather attractive female specimen.

WWE has of course denied the claims that this was the reason for his departure from the company. Honestly? I’d believe it. Granted, none of us were there, but unless the guy was getting loud or aggressive with this woman, I can’t believe WWE would fire one of their major suits for hitting on a woman at the bar.

In an interesting development, it later came out that the woman in question had ALSO been fired by WWE after being caught being a Naughty Nellie with another employee on company property and time. This punches a hole in the whole sexual harassment situation, as you really can’t go around getting down with people at work and then turn around and accuse others of harassment. Even if Mr. Bartie DID act inappropriately, this can’t really help this ladies case.

Look, I’m not saying this guy did or didn’t do anything wrong, I’m just saying if you’re going to start pointing fingers at people you’d better make sure you aren’t involved in the same type of thing yourself. It makes you look like kind of a skeezer.

Remember kids – having sex at work will likely get your ass fired.

Or a mega-push.

Some Douchebag is a Gigantic Moron

From Mr. Landsdell earlier this week:

“Oklahoman David Laird, 28, has been charged with felony child abuse for powerbombing the 4-year-old son of his girlfriend.

According to a report on TulsaWorld.com, Laird “repeatedly slammed the child into a doorframe while baby-sitting him.” The child was taken to hospital with skull and chest fractures, a large bruise on the back of his head and bruising of the shoulders, back, legs and genitalia.

Laird originally claimed that the child was injured when he fell off a clothes dryer, but later admitted that he had picked the child up and thrown him into the doorframe several times. He is being held on $100,000 bail. The child is out of the hospital but continues to have medical issues.”

Last week some guy threatens to blow up WWE HQ and now this guy? How have these people not heard from anyone in the last 20 years about wrestling being a work?
And since when does a powerbomb involve a door frame?

Kidding aside, this jackass deserves whatever happens to him. It always boggles my mind when I see these sorts of stories, especially when its an adult involved. I can KINDA understand two kids hurting each other imitating wrestling because they might not know any better, but a grown man repeatedly slamming a small child? No excuse other than stupidity. I wonder how the conversation went with the cops on this one…

Cops: What happened?

Idiot: He um, he fell off the dryer…

Cops: He fell four feet and wound up with multiple fractures and a bruises literally all over his body?

Idiot: Yes sir.

Cops: *facepalm*

Bravo Mr. Laird, I very much hope that you drop the soap.

Vickie Guerrero is a Heat Machine

Despite the fact that she announced her resignation at the close of this past weeks RAW, WWE brass was reportedly very impressed with Vickie’s performance as the GM. Though, call me crazy, wasn’t she already the GM of RAW a year or so ago? Doesn’t matter…

Anyway, they’re actually considering having her take back the resignation and stay on as the GM of RAW, as they definitely want somebody in the role to help out the guest hosts and make sure they don’t fuck up wrestlers names when they stop by for the easy pay day.

Normally I’d be like, “hell yeah keep her on!” but I see one problem with this scenario – Edge. If Vickie DOES stay on RAW for good, that means we can look forward to yet another extended angle in which Edge pretends he’s in love with her and uses her to get whatever the hell he wants. How many times have we gone back to this storyline already? And why the hell does Vickie keep falling for it?

SERIOUSLY?!? AGAIN?!?!

I’m all for having a permanent GM on RAW – its good for consistency between the shows, it will be good for giving the guest hosts a crutch, and it keeps the power in the hands of somebody who is there week to week. But honestly, I don’t want it to be Vickie.

Vickie is great in her current role with Team LayCool, she’s really one of the more interesting things about the tandem. But the major reason I say NO to Vickie as RAW GM is because of the guest hosts themselves.

Whoever gets this GM job is going to need to interact with the guest hosts every week, and I just can’t see Vickie’s character playing nice with most of them. Can you imagine Vickie pandering to “ROCKET HERO” Buzz Aldrin this coming Monday?

Oh, and again, there’s that whole thing with Edge again.

Take your pick really – they’re all pretty good reasons.

Apparently There are Some People Even TNA Doesn’t Want

Taz is reportedly pretty high on recently-released WWE Superstar Mike Knox. He has personally suggested to Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff that Knox be brought into the company.

Only problem? Hogan and Bisch had no idea who the hell he was talking about.

Really? REALLY.

These are the same guys that are giving Orlando Jordan and bigger push than he deserves simply by putting him on TV and they haven’t even heard of Mike Knox?

Look, I know the guy didn’t exactly make headlines with his WWE stint, but you can’t deny Knox showed a lot more prowess than most of the big guys that come up through the WWE ranks. He put on good matches, was a believable monster, and even went so far as to try and come up with a unique gimmick for his character.

He’s honestly the kind of guy who would probably do well in TNA, like a Tomko but talented. Maybe a Matt Morgan kinda guy. TNA was made for guys like Mike Knox. It’s really a shame that they’ll bring in any old talent these days but won’t give good young guys a shot.

Sure they’ll bring in the chick who hurt Daffney in her try-out match and make her into the next Awesome Kong, but a legitimately talented guy like Mike Knox gets scoffed at because the folks who run this WRESTLING COMPANY apparently don’t watch much wrestling.