Impact

Posted on 6/11/08 8:15 PM

Is making huge strides in my view.
I'm not entirely sure why the WWE has decided to create a second Women's Championship to complement RAW's WWE Women's Championship, but my guess is that they've come to realize that women's wrestling is quickly gaining more and more respect from wrestling fans, as women wrestlers (I do not, have not ever, and will never refer to them as "Divas") are improving more and more every year.

Also, TNA Wrestling has been mostly benefitting from their Women's division, as it's often the highest rated portion of their shows.

Now, I'm a WWE fan over TNA, however, I do tend to give much more respect to TNA's womens division for the following reason:

TNA Wrestling pulled a great deal of their talent from SHIMMER Women's Athletes, while the WWE continues to pull much of their "talent" from modeling agencies and things that are nothing more than beauty contests.

Now, I have a great respect for the WWE's following women WRESTLERS in Mickie James, Beth Phoenix, Natalie Neidhart (all three of which I followed in the indies long before their WWE debuts), Victoria, and Melina (who in my view has come a long way in her training, much like an early Trish Stratus when Trish began to really learn pro wrestling).
I will always view Trish Stratus as being one of the best women's wrestlers in the history of the business, as she went from knowing nothing about it to being one of the most spectacular in-ring performers I've ever seen out of a women's division, and a future Hall of Famer.
I will give Amy "Lita" Dumas her fair share of respect as well, for reinventing women's wrestling with the luche libre style in her in-ring work, which was seldom seen before her out of women wrestlers.

I do NOT respect the "Divas" of the WWE such as Kelly Kelly, Michelle McCool, Ashley Massaro, Cherry, etc. They show little if any improvement and have no business competeing on live television most of the time.
I particularly don't like Maria or Candice Michelle. While they may know basic wrestling moves and are slightly more talented than the other Divas, they're nothing near the talent of their women wrestlers, and their extremely small and skinny frames in my view will make them more accident prone in the ring with women like Phoenix or Victoria (example: Candice Michelle's broken collarbone).

TNA Wrestling has a good amount of women I give a LOT of respect to for either their TNA Wrestling work, their work in SHIMMER Womens Athletes (and with some, Women's Extreme Wrestling and other promotions), or their work in all of those promotions, such as Roxxi Laveaux, ODB, Velvet Sky (Talia Madison on the indies), and Awesome Kong. Their acquisitions of Jacqueline and Gail Kim have also proved to be good moves. While I'm not big on the very few women in that company that can't wrestle for nothing, such as Christy Hemme, or Traci Brooks, they still put a great deal of effort into their attempts and their respective gimmicks, and in turn make very good ringside managers/valets.
I personally despised Hemme until she got hooked up with the Rock 'N' Rave Infection, and as lame as they are, they really do work their gimmick exceptionally well.

At any rate, I believe the bottom line is that the WWE is realizing the draws that women's wrestling are only just now starting to reach. Many of you will disagree with me I'm sure, but pay close attention. All women's promotions in the country are starting to gain massive popularity, and not merely because they're all women in tights. Women's wrestling is going to become bigger and bigger draws for shows, simply because the women are trying harder and are becoming more and more talented as time goes on. And now that the WWE realizes that, they're bringing in another women's championship to jump start an official Womens Division on SmackDown!, so that a Draft will no longer hinder a women's wrestler (like it did Victoria for so long, or newcomers like Neidhart), and will allow for more spots for more talented women wrestlers.

Now they just need to get rid of the horrible acting, terrible in the ring Divas like Kelly Kelly and Layla and the WWE will maybe be back on their way to achieving better ratings... at least as far as the Women's Division is concerned.

Thank you again for reading my blogs, sorry it's been so long since I've posted, been busy. I'll likely put up my thoughts on the rest of the things I feel hinders the WWE rather shortly.

If you would like to contact me to comment on my thoughts and opinions on wrestling, or to just b.s. about professional wrestling, you can reach me in the following ways:
Email me at rockstar.dlind@yahoo.com
Message me at http://myspace.com/dlind1984

I'll try to get on here and do more posting but the summer is going to be hectic, as I myself am planning a return to pro wrestling training here in Ohio as early as August 2008. I trained very briefly in 2004 and was offered a professional debut after less than a month of training, but instead chose the Navy and a fiance that only wound up stabbing me in the back and was a mistake... so now four years later I'm going to give my dream a real shot... because I know after that brief time in a run-down ring in the basement of a bingo hall that there's nothing else I want more, and nothing else I'm more naturally gifted at.

Again, thank you for reading and sharing your thoughts.
We all are what makes professional wrestling what it is today. And that is the greatest form of entertainment in the world.

3 comments Permalink

Posted on 3/11/08 3:15 PM

You've all seen my constant standing up for Jeff Hardy. I've been a Hardy fan since the first match I watched in the WWE. The very first match I ever watched from start to finish was on the Sunday Night Heat prior to WrestleMania XV, The Hardy Boyz versus Edge & Christian. From then on, I was a Hardy fan, particularly Jeff Hardy.

So to see him leave in 2002 kinda killed things for me. To see him flounder in TNA Wrestling then disappear from there, made me a little skeptical he'd ever return to wrestling.

Then he comes back to WWE with this massive intensity, and in the last several months gets the main event push of a lifetime. And what does he do? Relapses. F**kin' relapses and fails a drug test. Drops the Intercontinental Championship early to Chris Jericho, gets removed from WrestleMania XXIV's Money in the Bank Ladder match, and suspended for 60 days.

If he had passed that test, I bet you just about anything I have that the company would have felt confident they could give him the WWE Championship. The ONLY reason he didn't win it up til now, was because they were fearful he could relapse. And then he did.

So what's that mean?

Well, you can't at all keep him low on the card, because the fan response won't die down from this. Most casual fans won't know why he even disappeared. Some won't care.

But I'm pretty certain now that he will NOT get a WWE Championship this year like he was pretty much scheduled to get. I'm not even sure he'll ever get it now. He'd have to really, REALLY prove something to the WWE now. To screw up in that kind of a push, that sort of situation. It really disappointed me.

Jeff Hardy's been my idol in professional wrestling for nearly ten years now, and that just killed me.

And I'm more worried about him failing another one than I am about him getting back into the title hunt. Because now, it's one more failed test and he HAS to be fired.

Way to screw up Jeff. Way to really let down the real Jeff Hardy fans out there, that have backed you up every step of the way even when you were screwing up, just to fix yourself up, start to get to where you need to be, and then decide you can't stay clean.

This is one fan who's entirely not happy at all right now. And for once, it's not because of John Cena, or Triple H, or the WWE at all. But because Hardy continues to selfishly not care about his career or his fans one bit. Or at least, he doesn't seem to want to show that he does.

5 comments Permalink

Posted on 2/24/08 6:03 PM

I keep reading the same stuff about Jeff Hardy and his bad mic skills. Okay, what's your point?

Are you watching wrestling to watch wrestling? Or hear people talk?

I'd much rather have someone like Hardy come out and give a two line promo and then win virtually every match he's been in since Armageddon, than listen to someone like, Chris Jericho, who went on and on and on before Armageddon and then didn't even win his match. I can't stand the talking. I want to see action.

Hardy is talented enough to be world champion. I know it, the company knows it, and the company is giving him his shot at a run later this year. Not EVERYONE needs to be good on the mic to be a champion. Sometimes it's better to have a champion that just gets the job done rather than talk about it and then half the time not even win the match anyways.

I don't know about all you guys giving the SAME arguments about why Jeff doesn't deserve a shot simply cuz of his mic skills are watching, but I WANT to watch WRESTLING. Not a damn talk show.

16 comments Permalink

Posted on 2/21/08 3:29 PM

Now before you all start saying "Jeff Hardy sucks" just listen for a second -- he's main event, he's staying main event, and all the little subtle signs that most people completely miss and don't even realize are signs of a future major run are clearly evident to me. So if all you're going to do is continue to bash the first guy to step up that's actually DIFFERENT from all the other tired ass main eventers, then just stop reading now.

I thought of this a few days ago, and this is honestly how I'd book WrestleMania 24 just for the fact that nobody would expect this, and that's a big part of what's been lackking in the WWE -- unpredictability (I completely called it when I said weeks ago that the Elimination Chamber would come down to Triple H and Jeff Hardy with HHH barely defeating the Intercontinental Champion, and sure enough, that's how it played out, and my credibility for knowing this industry continues to build).

So we've got WrestleMania 24, with these key matches:
WWE Championship match
Triple H versus John Cena versus (c) Randy Orton
Money in the Bank
Includes Jeff Hardy (who is going to win it, whether you like it or not or believe it or not)

So here's what I would do for WrestleMania. Now Jeff Hardy clearly wants to main event Mania, and deserves it really. And he was just shy of winning the Chamber match. Triple H is practically a lock to win the WWE Championship at WrestleMania because Cena has a movie to film around Mania time... hence my confusion on his return so early... so I figure that with the triple threat, no disqualifications, the three beat each other bloody, and Triple H wins, while Cena gets "reinjured" and Orton's just beaten and unconscious. So Hardy, who's going to win the Money in the Bank anyway (he was after all the only one originally even discussed to be in the match a few weeks ago, they hadn't even considered anyone else yet so he's clearly winning), and wanted to main event Mania, and has the right to use his contract for a title match anytime within a year of winning the briefcase... cashes it in directly after Triple H becomes the champion, takes advantage of an already battered new champion, and wins the WWE Championship in the unexpected main event match of WrestleMania 24, leading to a continuation of the feud the two will likely have either way thru the summer (as I'm expecting Jeff Hardy to win the WWE Championship around SummerSlam more than anything else).

I HIGHLY doubt that the WWE would push this sort of twist, as they've become far too predictable, HOWEVER, that's how I would book it, because no one would see that coming.

28 comments Permalink

Posted on 2/17/08 5:55 PM

Okay, Hardy can't cut a promo? Well you know what? He's doing a lot better than he did years ago when he wouldn't get on the mic at ALL. Give him some credit, not everyone's a good talker.
He CAN put together a good match, and he's going to be beat down in every match to make a comeback because that's the type of gimmick he HAS. He's not big enough to have the upper hand all the time.
His push was NOT just for the Rumble, because if you haven't noticed, Hardy is STILL getting a push. And he'll continue to get it. The management of the WWE is fully behind Jeff Hardy and intends to give him a title reign in the future.
He's worked his ass off for the company for over 10 years, so yea, I think he deserves a shot at the title.
He's had amazing matches in singles competition also. Does NO ONE remember the Undisputed Championship Ladder Match with the Undertaker? That was a hell of a match and he almost won it there.
Hardy has massive fan support. I've heard bigger pops for him than even HBK on some shows in recent months, so it's not just one demographic behind him. People have been behind Jeff Hardy for years, and not the Hardy Boys, because Matt Hardy has never been given a push even remotely like Jeff has. Because the fans are into Jeff, he's talented as hell. Maybe not in every aspect, but he is. And most people are sick and tired of Orton, Cena, Triple H, Shawn Michaels, Undertaker, Batista, and Edge. It's been the same main event talents for a while now, and some of them just don't know when to hang up the boots and retire. Some people should take after Stone Cold Steve Austin, who if he wanted to, COULD wrestle full time again, but chooses not too.
Jeff Hardy's gimmick is unique, he doesn't necessarily have the common look or even ring style of a world champion, and that's some of the appeal. He's different. He's not the same boring crap that the company's been feeding down our throats for the last 5 years. We need someone like Hardy in the main event.
Yea, the guy ain't PERFECT in every aspect, but he's by NO MEANS bad either. If anyone deserves a shot at the top of the ladder, it's him. He's earned it. If you ever pay attention to history and past matches at least. And his push was unique. It wasn't the ordinary one-month push for a one-shot feud. He had a very unique push because normally, at least ONCE, the other guy gets the upperhand in a feud. There was not one single time from Armageddon to the Royal Rumble that Orton gained the upper hand on Jeff Hardy. And attacking Matt doesn't count. Furthermore, Hardy's push continued after the ppv, and still is continuing, so he's not out of it yet. Also, it wasn't until that weekend that the company even made a decision on who was winning that WWE Championship match. And Hardy's been featured on the last two ppv posters (Rumble and No Way Out) and believe it or not, ppv promo posters usually hint at future pushes and future champions.
My question is why does John Cena deserve the title? What's he really done in his short WWE career? Why does Batista deserve a title? He's got all of 8 moves in his move set. Why does Rey Mysterio deserve to main event at all? He's not even near the weight limits for the championship (which of course no one pays attention to in that company anymore).
Jeff Hardy deserves a chance more than most. The company believes that, I believe that, and I'm pretty darned sure that by the end of the year, Jeff Hardy will have been WWE Champion.

9 comments Permalink