Matt Dawgs
T.G.I.F. with Matt Dawgs: Shane McMahon's China Syndrome, Vince McMahon's Panic Button, The TNA-AJ Styles Clash, Shane Douglas vs. "Dic" Flair, Doing the Hangover Before Doing The Drugs, and More
By Matt Dawgs
Aug 6, 2010 - 9:02 AM

Matt Dawgs Presents: Thank Goodness It's Friday!!!!!

Hello all. Welcome back and Happy Friday. Let’s just get right to it. In my previous column on this site titled “Matt Dawgs’ Random Thoughts, Opinions, Questions and Observations”, I wrote exactly what the title says I wrote. While this column will definitely hit you with that from time to time, I am also going just basically switch up the formula a bit with my random thoughts from each wrestling PROMOTION this week. Of course I will also throw in some thoughts on real world news, sports, entertainment and gossip. Please feel free to provide any thoughts or feedback on the new format. Enjoy.

WWE News and Notes

- Vince McMahon is definitely going to hit the panic button soon. The WWE announced their 2^nd Quarter results yesterday and EVERYTHING was down in a big way compared to both last year and last quarter. McMahon blamed the downfall on a number of contributing factors including the fact that last years Mania fell into the 2^nd quarter when this year that number was included in the 1^st quarter. He also stated that while they planned for Shawn Michaels retirement, they weren’t prepared for Batista’s departure as well as injuries to the Undertaker, HHH, Randy Orton and CM Punk on the top of the card which caused them to change main event slots. He did say that almost everyone is healthy and that with the new talent initiative of Nexus getting favorable reviews as well as injuries healing up, Summerslam is expected to be the kick-off of improved storylines for the company. My 2 cents is that Vince McMahon is going to do what he always does when business is bad and that is panic by either hitting the reset button or doing something drastic like either returning to television or bringing back “older” stars because they equal ratings in his eyes. Hopefully I am wrong but that normally tends to be the case when he panics and with the Nexus story hitting its stride and younger people finally getting a chance in the spotlight, I hope he stays the course and continues on. WWE has been good because of it.

- In what could be potentially BIG news for WWE or BIGGER news on the relationship of the McMahon family, Shane McMahon has been named CEO of China Broadband Inc. The company will provide PPV, Video on Demand and premium content for cable providers in China. This has the potential to be incredibly big for WWE since they have been trying for some time to crack the market in China as many see China having a ton of untapped revenue since they are so limited in what they offer yet have such a huge population. Shane can either help WWE get in or he can shut them out completely which will tell where the relationship between Vince and Shane stand.

- Next week’s RAW main event is Chris Jericho and Edge vs. John Cena and Bret Hart with Nexus acting as lumberjacks. My bet is that this match is what forces Jericho and Edge back on Team Cena for Summerslam since they both “quit” on the team this past Monday.

- I HATE THE EMAILING GENERAL MANAGER GIMMICK!!!

- Taped RAW’s, while not better from an entertainment standpoint, are normally better from an in-ring standpoint since WWE tends to give matches more time. The Orton vs. Miz and Cena vs. Jericho matches were pretty damn good.

- BTW, I read on several message boards that Jericho looked weak by tapping out when immediately put into the STF. As a heel most of my independent wrestling career, I “got it”. A lot of fans didn’t seem to get it and since Cole and Lawler are incompetent, it wasn’t explained. Jericho immediately tapped because the loser of the match with Cena had to quit the team at Summerslam and Jericho didn’t want to be on the team with Cena. So he tapped thus lowering Team Cena’s membership to 5 (since Edge quit earlier) so it becomes 7 vs. 5 at Summerslam. Good heel move by Jericho.

- Undertaker is expected back at Summerslam and will be involved in the Kane/Mysterio match; possibly costing Kane the title.

- Sheamus is AWESOME.

- The tentative plan right now is to have someone on Team Cena cause them the victory by turning on the team. The obvious choices are Jericho and/or Edge since I believe they will be put back on the team on Monday. My guess however would be Morrison. Hence why he has the beard and they scrapped plans to reunite him with the returning Melina against DiBiase and Mayrese.

- Shawn Michaels has been very vocal on Twitter since creating his account. He has been tweeting daily about various things. He also mentioned that he was backstage at RAW last week in San Antonio and watched the show backstage with Vince.

- Shawn also tweeted the following: “I’m staying retired. Understand skepticism though.”

- WWE held a tryout last weekend in FCW in Tampa that Jim Ross evaluated. Roughly 63 potential new talents tried out. Ross believes that roughly maybe 5 total will make it and get signed.

- New WWE Diva AKSANA .

- NXT Announcer/host ASHLEY VALANCE . WOW .

- WWE is working on a new company logo that will be debuting for the 900^th episode or RAW in late August. THIS has been floating around the internet but I feel that it is probably just a fan-made Photoshop job.

- WWE continues to mend fences with former talent as this week on WWE.COM, they had a “Where are they now” article on Debrah Miceli aka former Women’s Champion Alundra Blaze. She is specifically asked about the night she debuted on Monday Nitro and threw the WWE women’s title in the garbage. She basically replied that Eric Bischoff was her boss and it was her first night back so she had no choice but to do what she was told.

- Watching some old Rick Rude stuff recently due to a question that went to PWInsider.com about him getting a DVD one day. Just wanted to say that Rude was WAY before his time as a performer and had he been around/active during the “Attitude Era” he would have done incredible business as an antagonist for Steve Austin and the Rock. It’s a shame he passed away before he could have made his comeback (which he was training for an in ring comeback at the time of his death)

- Melina and FRIENDS .

- Congrats to former WWE World Champion John Bradshaw Layfield (JBL) who announced on Twitter that after a “scare” and 3 months of medical tests, he does NOT in fact have cancer (apparently doctors thought he did). Great news.

- Also congrats to Nick Cvjetkovich (Kizarny) and Stacy Carter (The Kat) who were married last weekend. Edge was in attendance for the wedding.

WWE Summerslam PPV is on August 15, 2010 from Los Angeles CA and the line-up is as follows:

• WWE TITLE: Sheamus © vs. Randy Orton
• WORLD TITLE: Kane © vs. Rey Mysterio
• 7-on7 ELIMINATION MATCH: John Cena//Edge/Chris Jericho/Bret Hart/John Morrison/R-Truth/Great Khali vs. Nexus (Wade Barrett/Justin Gabriel/Skip Sheffield/David Otunga/Heath Slater/Darren Young/Michael Tarver)
• Big Show vs. CM Punk/Luke Gallows/Joey Mercury in a 3-on-1 Handicap match.

TNA News and Notes

- TNA was trying to get Ric Flair vs. Shane Douglas booked for a match at the “Hardcore Justice” PPV. Flair turned them down as he was not interested. Douglas has also turned down TNA’s latest offer and apparently will not be appearing on the PPV. Douglas via his website has stated that he will only work the PPV if his opponent is “Dic Flair”. Can someone explain to Douglas that A) he has no leverage to dictate to anyone who he should and shouldn’t wrestle. He isn’t as important to an ECW reunion as he thinks he is since WWE did a very successful one without him. And B) “Dic Flair”? Really? That line wasn’t cool in 1995 when he first used it and it isn’t making him more hip to use it today. Come on now Shane.

- In an apparent clerical error, Balls Mahoney’s name was removed from the “Hardcore Justice” line-up. D’Angelo Dinero confirmed via Twitter that Balls Mahoney will in fact be appearing.

- Dixie Carter did confirm that Too Cold Scorpio, Brother Runt, CW Anderson and the FBI are appearing on the PPV.

- Tammy “Sunny’ Sytch however stated on her Facebook page that she has not been contacted and will not be appearing.

- The Heyman latest is….not looking good. Most think he isn’t coming in. His game of chicken with Dixie Carter has neither him nor Carter caving and most close to Heyman know he isn’t going to bend on his demands. If he was willing to stand up to Vince and Stephanie McMahon on more than one occasion in WWE, including shouting matches with both, he is definitely not going to bend to Dixie.

- Spike TV did hold a conference call with Heyman and after talking/interviewing him for an hour or so, they are very interested in him coming to TNA and since they do have A LOT of pull in TNA, they may be able to convince Dixie Carter to concede to his requests.

- Heyman was also personally invited to attend the PPV on Sunday by Tommy Dreamer but is more than likely he will not be attending.

- TNA returns to the infamous “ECW Arena” on September 24^th

- AJ Styles got his first TATTOO . Not very inconspicuous either.

- Styles also didn’t do himself any favors when he completely badmouthed TNA in an interview. He completely buried his title loss to RVD saying it shouldn’t have happened, especially to a guy who hasn’t wrestled in over a year and just came into the company. He also said that TNA makes a lot of mistakes booking wise and that he doesn’t think he is the “face” of TNA since most fans recognize him as that but no one from TNA ever does.

- Samoa Joe received a one month suspension (not an angle) for chewing out Vince Russo in the TNA production truck following his match with Jeff Hardy on Impact. The situation was made worse by the fact that Dixie Carter was standing right there while Joe was doing it. Joe had specifically told the production people and ring announcer to not say how much time was remaining in their match (since it was booked to be a draw) so that the fans wouldn’t know the outcome. Instead, during the match, they had the ring announcer say how much time was remaining at specific intervals thus causing everyone to know it would be a draw. Joe was irate after the match feeling it took away from the ending. Due to TNA’s taping schedule, it is going to appear as if he isn’t gone at all since he is suspended for one month but it happened immediately following the taping which was approximately 3 weeks ago from today. LAME.

- Gotta love TNA. They are advertising that the “No Surrender” PPV will feature the first ever PPV match between Kurt Angle and Jeff Hardy. Angle and Hardy actually wrestled on a WWE PPV in a King of the Ring tournament match which Angle won via ankle lock submission. Hey, I will give them credit though; at least they aren’t giving it away on free TV.

- TNA may have also painted themselves into a corner with their “FREE PPV” show next Thursday because they have scheduled Kurt Angle vs. AJ Styles on it. The reason they have painted themselves into a corner is because AJ Styles has vowed to defend the TV Title each week and Angle has vowed to retire if he loses during his running of the Top 10 rankings. So either AJ is losing the TV title already or Angle is retiring which means he and Hardy won’t be fighting for the “first time ever”.

- At the same show, they are advertising Jeff Hardy having an “open challenge” for someone. 99.9% positive that it will be Gregory “Hurricane” Helms who is now available to sign with TNA since his no-compete clause from being released is over.

- Shelton Benjamin is also expected in but I do believe that TNA is waiting for Charlie Haas to join him before that happens.

- Mick Foley announced on his Twitter that his “Countdown to Lockdown” book is being released in 60 days. It covers his career from becoming a WWE announcer to leaving to join TNA and main event the Lockdown PPV in his debut.

- TNA Reaction will finally debut on 8/12 at 11 p.m. immediately after Impact.

- Wasn’t Orlando Jordan getting the big push by being a bi-sexual wrestler who sprayed semen all over his chest? What happened to that? Did someone realize that it wasn’t innovative but rather just STUPID? He was on TV last week and while he was still half-gay, his act is definitely toned down and definitely not featured anymore. Does anyone know if Bischoff commented on his lack of push on his Facebook page? Because Bischoff originally thought it was ground breaking.

- D-Lo Brown was promoted to head agent backstage. Good for D-Lo, he’s a good guy.

- 52 year old Scott Norton is lobbying for a job in TNA as Dixie Carter’s bodyguard. He is still accepting independent bookings as well as doing professional bodyguard work for reality TV star and Playboy Playmate Kendra Wilkinson.

- Congrats to Northeast Independent wrestler Rob Eckos on his recently signed TNA contract. I’ve only met Eckos once but he is a good dude. Congrats to him.

- Mickie James conducted an interview where she stated that she would be interested in appearing in TNA at some point since they dates would allow her to continue pursuing her country music career.

TNA Hardcore Justice PPV is on August 8, 2010 from Orlando FL and the line-up is as follows:

• Rob Van Dam © w. Bill Alfonzo vs. Jerry Lynn
• Raven vs. Tommy Dreamer with Mick Foley are referee
• Also scheduled to appear: Sabu, Sandman, Al Snow, Rhino, Stevie Richards, Team 3-D, Brother Runt, Simon Diamond, Johnny Swinger, Balls Mahoney, Axl Rotten, Too Cold Scorpio, The FBI, CW Anderson, Nova, Joel Gertner and MORE….

Independent / International News and Notes:

- Ring of Honor has confirmed that “the Worlds Greatest Tag Team” of Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas will face off with the ROH Tag Team Champions “The Kings of Wrestling” (Claudio Castagnoli and Chris Hero) at the 9/11 “Glory By Honor” event in New York City.

- ROH has also announced that on August 28^th in Charlotte, Davey Richards will receive a rematch against Tyler Black for the ROH title. Richards and Black had a MOTY candidate earlier this year.

- Female wrestling legend Manama Toyota will be wrestling in a mixed tag team match for the September 19^th Chikara show teaming with Mike Quackenbush facing off against Sara Del Rey and Claudio Castagnoli. That match should be awesome.

- The Wilpon wrestling venture is now talking to Paul Heyman and looking to bring him in. While I am sure they would be able to give Heyman the total control he wants, the fact is that even though they are backed with a ton of money, they still do not have television and without it, any viable wrestling brand is useless.

- Jose Maximo once considered half of the tag team with probably the most potential in years, the SAT, has apparently retired from professional wrestling. Jose, partnered with his real life brother Joel, wrestled in the northeast independents for years and had a stint in TNA along with real life cousin Amazing Red. I originally trained with the Maximo’s when I broke into wrestling at a small gym in Brooklyn NY called Arena Puerto Rico. After training there, I moved to the infamous Doghouse while the Maximos went to Long Island to train with Mikey Whipwreck. For those who confuse the two, Jose is the older and “bigger” Maximo brother. Joel will now be teaming regularly with Ricky Reyes (formerly of the Havana Pitbulls) and the team will be known as Blood Ties.

- While on the subject of Mikey Whipwreck, best of luck to him as he has been experiencing severe pain in his neck and has lost some feelings in his limbs from it. He is undergoing medical testing in Long Island and will more than likely need some sort of neck surgery. Possibly fusion. Since he is not a contracted WWE talent, he will not get the WWE doctor on his salary/benefits which is definitely not a good thing since when it comes to your neck and getting surgery, you definitely want the best.

ICW returns TOMORROW NIGHT to Queens NY with "FULL SPEED AHEAD" and the line-up is as follows:

• Dan Maff vs. Christopher Daniels with Prince Nana
• WSU TITLE: Mercedes Martinez © vs. Mickie James
• Homicide vs. Jerry Lynn (although I have no idea why Homicide is being advertised since he is injured)
• Danny Demanto vs. The Amazing Red
• Heaven & Hell (Grim Reefer & Azrieal) vs. The Weapons of Mass Destruction (Sonjay Dutt & Daivari)
• Balls Mahoney vs. The Candy Man
• The Heavy Hitters (Monsta Mack & Havoc) vs. The Dirty Rotten Scoundrelz
• Bandido Jr. vs. Devon Moore
• Julio Dinero vs. Maximus Sex Power
• Also appearing The SAT, Xavier, Pinkie Sanchez, Justin Toxic, VSK, EJ Risk, Damien Dragon and more....

MMA News and Notes

- Jon Jones is the REAL DEAL. Plain and simple.

- Takanori Gomi shocked EVERYONE who watches MMA last weekend when he KNOCKED OUT Tyson Griffin on the “UFC on VS.” show. Griffin has NEVER been knocked out before. When I say knock out, I don’t mean ref stoppage or TKO. I mean Griffin was unconscious after a devastating shot by Gomi.

- Chael Sonnen has basically been a one man verbal highlight reel in the last week leading up to his UFC Middleweight Championship fight tomorrow night. He has verbally blasted Anderson Silva and basically made himself into the real winner regardless of the outcome of the fight. He became marketable and will get a big money fight (possibly against Rich Franklin) if he loses. Dana White, who admittedly has said he doesn’t like Chael personally, readily said that Sonnen is doing a great job and is focused on winning. It also explains why Jim Ross and Gerald Brisco of the WWE have been heavily recruiting him. For those who do not know, Sonnen is a HUGE wrestling fan going far enough to actually try out for the WCW Power Plant in the 90’s.

- Unofficial for sometime now, Dana White officially announced that the winner of the Roy Nelson vs. Junior Dos Santos match will be next in line for the Heavyweight Title fighting the winner of Brock Lesnar © vs. Cain Velasquez fight.

- Zuffa filed a lawsuit against MMA promotion Bellator and MMA agent Ken Pavia for Pavia leaking documents concerning UFC’s operating procedures to Bellator. They provided emails as proof with Bellator founder basically saying they received the documents and will re-write them to make it look like it is their ideas and not intellectual UFC property. WOW.

- Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, who six months ago wanted to be a big time movie star, has dropped those dreams by saying that movies don’t pay the bills and he gets paid A LOT more for MMA so basically it isn’t worth it to him to make more movies. He is probably one and done.

- Paul Daley, best known for basically sucker punching Josh Koscheck after the bell at UFC 113 has signed a 6 fight deal with Strikeforce.

- In what is not so good news for those of you out there who illegally download UFC PPV’s online, the content provider US Stream has handed over the IP addresses for everyone who illegally uploaded a UFC PPV to their systems per a subpoena. They didn’t provide those who watched the streams, just the people who loaded them. Justin.tv is next.

UFC 117 is TOMORROW NIGHT from Oakland California and the line-up is as follows:

• MIDDLEWEIGHT TITLE: Anderson Silva © vs. Chael Sonnen
• Jon Fitch vs. Thiago Alves
• Junior Dos Santos vs. Roy Nelson
• Matt Hughes vs. Ricardo Almeida
• Clay Guida vs. Rafael dos Anjos

UFC 118 is on August 28, 2010 from Boston Massachusetts and the line-up is as follows:

• UFC LIGHTWEIGHT TITLE: Frankie Edgar © vs. B.J. Penn
• Randy Couture vs. James Toney
• Kenny Florian vs. Gray Maynard
• Nick Osipczak vs. Greg Soto

UFC 119 is on September 25, 2010 from Indianapolis Indiana and the line-up is as follows:

• Frank Mir vs. Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira
• Ryan Bader vs. Antonio Rogerio Nogueira
• Ryan Bader vs. Chris Lytle
• Joey Beltran vs. Matt Mitrione

Random Thoughts, Links, Pics, ETC.

- Random VIDEO of the week: I have an iPhone and am the biggest Apple supporter around but this is HILARIOUS.

- Random PIC of the week: The advertisement says it all.

- Fun on FACEBOOK : This guy is GANGSTER!!!!

- Congrats to Alex Rodriquez for becoming the 7^th player to hit 600 career home runs.

- Jennifer Lopez is going to be a fulltime JUDGE on American Idol next season.

- Ninja LOHAN .

- Due to MGM Studio’s being for sale for so long with not even a bid from anyone, it appears that the James Bond Franchise may be DEAD. Ideally, MGM could sell just the franchise to another studio and both director Christopher Nolan and director Quentin Tarantino have expressed interest in taking over the franchise. It’s sad considering the last two Bond films with Daniel Craig as the main character have grossed a billion dollars worldwide and are probably the best two Bond films ever made.

- THE AVENGERS . Teaser.

- In a recent interview, Mike Tyson stated that he accepted a role in the hit comedy “The Hangover” in order to fund his cocaine habit. He never thought it would be a commercial success and was stunned when he saw how good the film was. He also said he stopped using drugs last year following the death of his 4-year-old daughter.

- My Future Wife, Kim Kardashian-Aponte SHOPPING with her sister Kourtney.

- Actor Laurence Fishburne’s (Morpheus from the Matrix) 19-year-old daughter Montana Fishburne has become a PORN actress. No, not acting in a sex tape, she is a (NSFW) PROFESSIONAL PORNO ACTRESS .

- Also making a professional porn debut? Tila Tequila.

- Check it out at CLUBWWI.COM . There are literally HUNDREDS of interviews with your favorite wrestling stars of yesteryear and today!!!  This week, we welcomed former TNA Knockout Champion O.D.B. for one of her first and ONLY interviews since leaving TNA.  If you’re not a member then please do yourself a favor and JOIN CLUB WWI right NOW!!!! You’ll thank me for it. DO IT. DO IT NOW.

PLUGS

- NY Diaper Cakes (Best possible baby shower gift…EVER.)

- DJUCH.com (Best Dance Music DJ… EVER.)

- Geek Week (RD Lee rocks!!)

- ACE Pro Wrestling (The future of independent wrestling. A Virtual “Who’s Who” of East Coast talent has wrestled here at one point in time or another)

- Jersey All Pro Wrestling (home of the best independent wrestling not named ROH or DGUSA)

- EVOLVE (the Evolution of Wrestling)

- Woman’s Superstars Unleashed (WSU Wrestling)

Ok kiddies, classes are over for now. See you soon!!!!!!!!!

Feel free to discuss whatever you’d like in the “Anger Management” section of the message board or whichever section you see fit.

~ Matt Dawgs

World Wrestling Insanity writer Matt Dawgs is the crown jewel of World Wrestling Insanity and if he decided to leave the site, it would crumble due to the lack of awesomeness. Matt used to moonlight as a professional wrestler/manager in the NY/NJ Indy scene. The New York Yankees are the premiere sports franchise IN ANY SPORT, LeBron James will NOT be a New York Knick and MMA will be more popular and lucrative than Boxing in less than 5 years. Also, if you have any questions, corrections, feedback, comments and ideas, email me at Matt@worldwrestlinginsanity.com . If the feedback is negative, you can e-mail Matt at insanity@worldwrestlinginsanity.com .

Don’t forget to check out CLUB WWI . It can be found by clicking the banner at the top of this page. Check out all the new audio updates and features found there. Some good stuff including all of James Guttman’s past Radio Free Insanity broadcasts as well as all new, uncut interviews with some of wrestling past and present names. Good stuff people.