the end of Josh (for now.)
It must suck to be Chris Masters. When you’re working 50/50 programs with VAL VENIS, it’s not a good sign. Maybe they wanted to program him with a good worker for an extended period of time to see if he improves. Maybe losing to Val Venis is the last we’ll ever see of him.
The fates must really not like Cryme Tyme. Or the bookers. They’re never going to get a title shot if they keep having the good guys as champs, and I think they could actually have a match the fans would get into - this match, right here from Heat, a few minutes longer.
The show has gone 4 weeks without an all-clip show week. I would not have suspected such things.
Tags: Heat, recaps, wwe
Charlie/Shelton
Flair/Carlito
Scotty/Funaki
MVP/Kennedy
Khali/Davari
the FBI
Super Crazy/Jimmy Wang Yang
Snitsky/Steven Richards Kane and Undertaker KC Jones and Idol Stevens
Chris Benoit/a broom
Tags: RAW, wwe
Aired 03/09. Val/Shelton felt like they were trying to remember a match they did, except they both didn’t remember the same parts of it. If they did it again a month, I think it’d be better.
I could stand going a long while without Eugene and Highlanders matches.
If Todd does end up with ECW, as the talk has been, at least Josh will be back around to be amusing.
Tags: Eugene, Heat, Josh Mathews, recap, Shelton Benjamin, Val Venis, wwe
03/02. They did a long Charlie Haas vs Val Venis match, which was a much better idea than sending Cryme Tyme long. Shad selling is as amusing as I’d been led to believe.
Last time Val beat someone on the roster (on Heat) was 09/30/06 - but that was Conway, so does it really count? He won a tag match with Viscera over Tomko & Snitsky on 02/10/06, and the last time they beat someone who is still on the roster was 12/05/2004 when he beat Viscera.
Tags: Charlie Haas, Heat, Val Venis, wwe
As seen in the quarterly-ish filling.
Events (in chronological order) December 31, 2006 December 31, 2005
Backlash® — 308
Judgment Day® 252 266
ECW® One Night Stand 304 333
Vengeance® 337 429
Great American Bash® 232 279
SummerSlam® 541 634
Unforgiven® 307 240
No Mercy® 197 224
Cyber Sunday™ /Taboo Tuesday® 228 207
Survivor Series® 383 375
December to Dismember™ 90 —
Armageddon® 239 280
This year’s Unforgiven had Edge/Cena in a TLC match and DX vs Vince/Shane/Show in HitC, so pick one of them for an explaiantion. Taboo Tuesday moved to (Cyber) Sunday, which explains that 10% bump (though I kinda would have figured more.) The voting concept isn’t a draw, but neither are any of the other PPVs that aren’t SummerSlam/WM/Rumble so it wouldn’t be the first thing to fix. Everything else was down or about the same, but since they were charging more for it, it may not be a big deal.
That December to Dismember number, wow. 90,000 buys is horrific. Between ONS and that massacre, they burned off 73% of the people who were willing to pay for ECW PPVs. That could not have gone more wrong. (And yet, wouldn’t it be better than any TNA number ever?)
Of course, everything else was the same
- tons of money from DVDs
- no money from films
- made more money than comparable period from last year.
Live event attendance was up 9%, or 27% when you take out the ECW shows they won’t be running anymore, and that’s the indicator that’s supposed to foreshadow a boom (according to Meltzer.)
Tags: buyrates, ECW, PPV, wwe
Mark Coale of Odessa Steps Magazine joins us to talk about wrestling DVDs, including all the recent WWE offerings and Heroes of World Class, plus all the future 2007 releases and what looks promising (and what doesn’t), WWE vs. history, problems with overlapping matches, plus Dave Meltzer’s old National columns, covering Wrestlemania VII in the cheap seats, and Mark gets yelled at by King Kong Bundy. Over 70 minutes of fun!