Taboo Tuesday

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the video Here.

Ah the 2000's, back when we watched television on television and nobody knew or cared what wrestling personalities thought about anything behind the scenes. Knowing what WWE's social media presence is like these days it feels strange to think about a time where the same company was fairly apprehensive about entering the world of tomorrow. In '97 they launched Byte This, an online only show that was so under the radar with WWE management that it would usually go unnoticed unless a wrestler went too far when shooting, assuming nobody was watching. Then in 2005 their B-shows Heat and Velocity were moved to WWE.com after failing to renew their tv deals, becoming the first weekly in ring shows that WWE would host on their site. They even got in social media wrong by trying to get fans to use the platform they had put money into, but Tout wasn't a match for Twitter. Before that though, they also tested out a new online hit, their take on the classic internet poll, sort of.

On October 19th 2004 WWE Presented Taboo Tuesday from Milwaukee Wisconsin. Nowadays you can find some kind of wrestling on most nights of the week but back then it felt strange for a pay per view to take place on a Tuesday. Every match on the card had some sort of variable which could be voted on by fans at wwe.com. In some cases this would change the stipulations of a match, and in others the challenger for a title. To a fan, that concept might sound pretty cool, but to the wrestlers planning their matches it in some cases it was chaos.

In the opening match of the night, Chris Jericho was set to defend his Intercontinental title against any one of fifth-teen potential challengers. On screen is a list of all of the wrestlers fans could vote for. Looking at this list would you be shocked if I told you that Shelton Benjamin won the vote? It's also worth noting that at the time Batista was still a bad guy under Triple H in Evolution, and just a few months later he would win the Royal Rumble heading towards Wrestlemania main event success. Normally, a Chris Jericho versus Shelton Benjamin match would have high expectations attached to it, and maybe thats why it won the vote, but while the match delivered many at the time suggested it might have been better if the two could have had the time to plan more.

When asked about the match recently by Chris Van Vleit, Shelton Benjamin actually said "I had every belief that Batista would be facing Chris Jericho." When Van Vleit challenges this Shelton elaborates "Me and Chris have spoken of this, Our match was the only match where it was one hundred percent we don't know what we're gonna do. Every other match has some sort of gimmick involved... they had some idea of what they were going to do, and who with." The end part of that statement is sort of true, but we'll get back to that later.

Shelton also claimed that WWE officials wouldn't give Chris any inside info leading on to the match, such as who the votes were leaning towards. He also noted that Jericho seemed to be very perturbed by the situation, going as far as to quiz his prospective opponents on his trademark spots, to see who he could rely on if they were chosen. Here's my issue with this though, remember that list I showed you of all the 15 wrestlers, here are the voting results as published by WWE at the time. While yes if the votes were legit, and we'll get to that too, Jericho could have potentially faced one of 15 guys, Shelton clearly won by a landslide. He got almost forty percent of the vote, double the votes as the runner up Batista. Also besides Shelton and Batista, nobody else got more than seven percent. I'm not sure Jericho should have been planning all that much in case Val Venis won. Whats really surprising though, is that Shelton actually won the title from Jericho that night, so WWE must have had some idea of what they wanted going forward as again, a lot of those guys weren't beating Jericho should they have gotten the chance.

As Shelton noted in that interview, many of the other matches were more reliant on voting for what the gimmick of a match would be. The second match would be a fulfil your fantasy women's battle royal, where the vote would be for what costumes the wrestlers would wear, either school girl, french maid or nurse. Whatever won the vote, and if you care it was school girl, the match itself would be the same, rubbish. There would be a similar vote later in the night to decide if Christy Hemme and Carmella (not that one), would compete in an evening gown match, an aerobics challenge whatever that means, or a lingerie pillow fight. Other matches were along a similar vein to this only a bit more serious. Would Kane and Gene Snitsky fight with a lead pipe, a chain or a chair? Would the loser of Eric Bischoff versus Eugene wear a dress, have their head shaved or be the winners servant? In the main event, would Ric Flair battle Randy Orton in a steel cage, falls count anywhere or submission match. In that last one the cage won by a whopping sixty eight percent. This was barely surprising as WWE did all they could to tell you to vote for the cage without actually telling you to vote for the cage.

Remember how I said Jericho wasn't the only person entirely clear on who he would be facing? Well later in the night Triple H would defend the World title against one of three opponents, either Chris Benoit, the man who dethroned him at that years Wrestlemania. Edge, who was still a while away from being the main eventer he would become, or Shawn Michaels, a man with years of friendship and bitter rivalry with the Game. I wonder who won that one? Well Shawn did with in a close vote, narrowly beating Edge. To me, an admittedly biased Shawn Michaels fan at the time it felt obvious that HBK should win and battle his at the time heated rival Triple H, but Edge was also clear a contender. Earlier that year he had returned from extensive neck surgery that took him away from the ring for over a year, and so he felt like a new and fresh face in the main event scene. Speaking to Inside the Ropes in 2018, Edge claimed that had he won the vote he was told that he would have beaten Triple H for the World title, but he doesn't explain this much further. It's also worth noting according to Edge, Shawn won with 51% and he was 2% behind, leaving 0% of votes for Benoit. Thats some pure Steiner math right there and not even close to the real numbers. He does however, as does every other wrestler I've seen comment on the concept, claim that the votes were legitimate. One such example being Mick Foley, who wrestled at the second Taboo Tuesday in 2005 against Carlito. The fan vote in that one would be which of Mick's famous characters would Carlito face, Mankind, Cactus Jack or Dude Love. All this meant depending on the result was essentially a costume change for Foley, as I'd imagine the match he and Carlito planned would likely be very similar whichever won. Much like how Jericho was concerned earlier, Mick has in the past admitted that he dreaded Dude Love winning, as he had no outfit prepared for that. Nowadays Mick will play the character in cameos, but have you ever noticed he doesn't dress like he used to? Thats because he for many years he hated what WWE did to the character in 1998 by turning him into a sleazy heel, and he hadn't yet decided to revive the gimmick. Luckily for him three time WWE champion Mankind won the vote, lucky for all of us really, as had the match played to each character's style, Cactus Jack would likely have gotten DQ'ed in minutes when he pulled his barbed wire bat out or set something on fire.

So all of this begs the question, how real were the votes? The wrestlers have claimed it was real, and for what it's worth Dave Meltzer and Bruce Prichard have also claimed they were real too. Speaking last year, Freddy Prinze Jr, who was at the time working behind the scenes for WWE, also claimed that the votes were real. He said "They literally worked out three different matches with whoever the main guy in the ring was going to be. Granted, you know that these were all super pros so they didn’t have to choreograph the entire match. They can feel it while they’re out there. But they would have to be prepared, regardless of who they thought would win just in case someone didn’t win the vote and they would have to go with the person who did. So they were always very careful with the three options they gave you." That last part is very important, as while it's generally accepted that the votes are real, it's also clear that WWE would often guide fans towards the result they wanted, but if the result didn't go their way they would make it work regardless. That begs the question, if I gave you a couple of options to choose from, but one is clearly better than the other, is that really a fair vote? It's one of those grey areas where it's wrestling, so it's kind of hard to believe in it completely.

One thing in my research for this video that I saw is a lot of fans asking why this isn't done today? Honestly, I wouldn't revive it at all. Taboo Tuesday slash Cyber Sunday existed in a time largely before fans revolting in the arenas. The most rebellion you got was adult male fans booing John Cena while women and children cheered for him. Nowadays if you put out a poll for a match, if the fans aren't into your product they will vote actively against what a company might want. We kind of saw that in TNA years ago when the implemented a fan voting system to determine who the World title challenger would be, and fans would overwhelmingly pick Nigel McGuinness regardless of who TNA wanted.

I've seen many comments claiming that the fan voting idea was ahead of it's time, but actually it might have actually been the exact right time. It existed in a time before fans who had grown unhappy wanted to throw a spanner in the works. Could it work if done again today, yeah maybe? But I feel like it could only be done with a company that has the good will of the fans behind it, and maybe that is now? We won't know for sure unless they someday revive the idea. I mean they once ran a PPV called Fatal Four Way, so I wouldn't put any idea past them...

Sources:

Shelton: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INEXpuzgtKI

Edge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EleUkYL4hPI

Freddy Prinze Jr. https://wrestlingheadlines.com/freddie-prinze-jr-details-wwe-using-real-fan-voting-for-cyber-sunday-events/

What happened to NWA TNA's Flying Elvis'?

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can view the video Here.

You've seen the gimmick, maybe even two decades ago, but how much do you know about the winners of NWA TNA's first official match. Introducing the Flying Elvis'.

On June 19th 2002, NWA TNA's first ever event on pay per view, the show opened with a card reshuffle, as a parade of NWA Legends were highlighted. This is because in what would become a trend for TNA a crisis had to be averted. In a pre show match, a wrestler known as Cheex actually broke the ring. As the event opened, you can actually see the Harris twins among others just about completing the repairs. Had this not occurred, it's likely that the first segment of NWA total Non-stop action would have been the match featuring three wrestlers I'm about to tell you about, as former ECW world champion Jerry Lynn teamed with Low Ki, and a rookie AJ Styles, would face the Flying Elvis'.

In the early days of TNA, there were many characters what were clearly written to cater to the most stereotypical of 'Southern' audiences. It's almost like a New Yorker had his pen to the paper, and much of it would not be okay today, bro... You had the heel portrayal of the Rainbow Express, a clearly gay tag team drawing the cheapest of cheap heat, and on the other side of the coin you had Cowboy James Storm firing off cap guns, and even an appearance by Toby Keith who was plugging his song "Courtesy of the red white and blue", which admittedly I kind of liked back then, but the older I get just sounds silly enough to be in Team America: World Police. Getting back to the Flying Elvis gimmick, Jeff Jarrett on My World openly admitted that it was created to resonate with the Alabama crowd. Despite the silliness of the gimmick, lets look at the three men in the role, who they were, and what happend to them. This video isn't going to be about their Elvis runs, more their entire in ring careers.

Jimmy Yang

Let's start with maybe the most successful of the three, Jimmy Yang. Real name James Carlson Jun, Jimmy was born in California to a German Mother and a Korean Father, but was raised in Georgia. In a 2006 interview with Gerweck.net Jimmy confirmed this, and I defy you to find a more mixed heritage wrestler than that. Yang trained to wrestle at the WCW Power Plant, the most famous graduates of which include the Natural Born Thrillers, and a while before that Bill Goldberg. In an interview when asked to comment on his time in the WCW Powerplant Yang described it as Hell, and the hardest thing he has ever been through.

Jimmy would graduate to the WCW roster in early 2000, and would quickly be placed in the gimmick he would keep until the companies end. He would be part of a martial arts inspired trio known as the Jung Dragons, going by the name Yang. His team mates in the group would be Japanese born cruiserweight Kaz Hayashi, and strangely, West Virginia born masked wrestler Jamie-San. Jamie would later be known to some under his real name as former Ring of Honor World Champion James Gibson, but most like likely know him as former WWE Cruiserweight Champion Jamie Noble. It was a WCW gimmick in 2000, of course it had to turn weird somehow. The Jung Dragons were often a highlight of the opening matches of latter day WCW, especially when feuding with fellow cruiserweight trio 3 Count. Their most famous match was possible their trios ladder match against 3 Count, which some consider to be the lone highlight of Starrcade 2000. When WWE acquired WCW, Yang's was one of the many contracts the fed picked up, but Yang would be sent to train at Les Thatchers Heartland Wrestling Association, one of their developmental territories at the time. Unfortunately Jimmy would be released before actually wrestling for WWE.

According to Jimmy Yang himself in a 2022 shoot interview, the original idea for the Elvis gimmick came from Vince Russo, Triple H and Shawn Michaels. Which implies that this was first pitched in WWF, as Yang was in WCW while Shawn, Hunter and Russo were working in New York. Yang claims Vince McMahon shot the idea down, but when Russo went to TNA the idea was allowed to thrive. When Jimmy was first presented with the flying Elvis costume, in his own words he left the room refusing to wear it on national television. Eventually though he conceded, and grew to have fun with the gimmick.

Post WCW, Yang would be signed to WWE in 2003, and would appear as Akio, a yakuza style henchman for Tajiri on Smackdown, teaming with Ryan Sakoda. Yang claims that the name Akio was pitched by a WWE writer who looked in a Japanese phone book for a name and thought Akio was quote, 'the coolest one he found'. Yang would be released in July 2005, but less than a year later after a run in Ring of Honor he would be rehired by WWE, playing a vastly different character. After working a try out match as Akio and impressing WWE management, he would soon be repackaged as Jimmy Wang Yang. The character was based on Yang's Georgia upbringing despite his Asian heritage, and the conflicting perception people had of him. Yang was a popular, but fairly low card act until his second release in 2010. Despite Jimmy being a fixture in two major promotions, I couldn't find evidence of him winning any championships anywhere. He did however win two tournaments in All Japan Pro Wrestling

Nowadays Jimmy seems to has left the wrestling business full time, but still wrestles occasionally. At the time of me making this video for his last match he bizarrely popped up on a recent Pro Wrestling Noah event, losing a six man tag alongside fellow WWE Cruiserweight Super Crazy. Jimmy currently has a side job as well as wrestling where he owns and operates a camouflage clad 'redneck party bus', and a Pink 'Princess party bus' based in Ohio. Meanwhile, Jimmy's daughter has begun her wrestling career. Jazzy Yang has around 30 matches under her belt, the most high profile being at NWA Empowerrr, teaming Miranda Gordy, the daughter of another wrestling veteran, Terry Gordy. Maybe Jazzy will be able to avenge her Father by winning some championship Gold.

Sonni Siaki

Next we have the flying Elvis who was thought to have the most promise, Sonny Siaki. He was apparently a school friend of WCW wrestler Lodi, who advised him to try out for the WCW Power Plant, to which he was accepted. His training is credited to WWE Hall of Famer Mr. Wonderful Paul Orndorff. Sonny would wrestle on WCW Worldwide and Saturday night, even earning some wins, but would never wrestle on Nitro or Thunder. He would last wrestle for WCW in March of 2000, and would quit the company not liking how he was being treated.

From here Sonny would work independents, and would be booked by Dusty Rhodes' Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling, receiving further training from Dusty. When NWA TNA started Sonny was a day 1 hire, and following his time as a flying Elvis, would stick around as he was considered a future prospect. Back then fans used to compare him to the Rock based on his look and charisma, does that sound familiar? Sonny's career highlight may have been the December 11th 2002 TNA pay per view, where he would defeat Jerry Lynn for the X-Division championship. Sonny would hold the title for about 60 days before losing it to Kid Kash. One of Siaki's last notable matches came at the first TNA Lockdown event on April 24th 2005, when he and Apolo would face Lance Hoyt, now Lance Archer, and Chris Candido. This would be the match where Candido would suffer from a blood clot that would cost him his life.

In early 2006 Sonny would be signed to a WWE developmental contract. He would work for Deep South Wrestling, one of WWE's developmental territories before being moved to FCW when the Deep South relationship ended. in 2007 he would wrestle on two main roster house show tours, on for the Raw brand in February and a second in June for Smackdown, but would never wrestle a televised match for WWE. In September 2007 he would be released from WWE, and a few days later he would publicly comment that he had some personal family issued to deal with, and he was putting those first. In a 2013 interview with the Wrestling Epicenter podcast, Sonny elaborated that those issues pertained to an ill family member. It's not my place to go into details about that but I'll include the link of him talking about it in the description. Sonny would continue to wrestle on the independent scene, presumably having more control of his schedule than a WWE career would allow, but would have his last match in 2009 for Georgia based NWA Prime Time. Whats sad in a way about Sonny's career is that many had high hopes for him, but ultimately he stepped away from the ring for selfless reasons and that ought to be admired.

Jorge Estrada

Unfortunately, the third Elvis had the least of a wrestling career, Jorge Estrada. Born Jorge Moraza in Miami Florida, he would be trained in 99 by Dusty Rhodes, and like Sonny Siaki would wrestle for Dusty's Turnbuckle Championship Wrestling, which would have been his path to NWA TNA. In his time in TNA Jorge wrestled 26 matches, even challenging for the X-Division title once in a losing effort to Low-Ki. Jorge would leave TNA in march 2003 with his final match there being a victory over a villainous Elvis character called Disgraceland. Yep, TNA had a fourth Elvis, and technically three more in a weird period for Jeff Jarrett, Scott Hall and Kevin Nash later on.

Late into the making of this video I also discovered something I'd long forgotten, and thats that while still playing Elvis, Jorge briefly had a valet named Pricilla, clearly named after Elvis' ex-wife, but also as I know her better, star of the Naked Gun movies. According to her IMDB page Priscilla, real name Jodi Horn got into wrestling after meeting Jerry Lawler backstage at a show, and asking to be his Valet. She was part of TNA from their first event, where she was introduced as Miss Joni, one of many women who competed in a lingerie battle royal. After briefly managing Jorge and leaving him for Brian Christopher in November 2002, she seems to have left the wrestling business as best I can tell.

Around this time Jorge seemed to stop wrestling altogether, and there's not a lot of information out there as to what he is doing today. In the Jimmy Yang interview I mentioned earlier from 2006, Yang noted that he hadn't heard from Estrada, and also implied that Jorge was in trouble with the law, but didn't elaborate any further.

It seems though that Estrada achieved some high regard in his time in the ring, as in 2003 he achieved number 182 in the PWI 500. To put this in a modern context, had he placed there this year he would have been ranked between Dax Harwood and Tyler Bate, who are each fairly well respected. I know this isn't exactly a fair comparison given how much wrestling has changed over the past twenty years, but thats still an impressive number, and more when Jimmy Yang didn't even make the list that year.

So why after all these years are the Flying Elvis' still remembered. It feels like an act that should have fallen by the wayside years ago, and yet people still talk about the trio of Elvis impersonators in the early days of TNA. Part of it has to be the sheer gall of TNA to put them over two wrestlers who would become the first X-Division and tag team champions for the promotion, part of it has to be the sheer weirdness of an Asian from Georgia, a Samoan and a Floridian playing the King of Rock and Roll. That'll stick in the memory like a Japanese woman playing Freddy Mercury, or an American suddenly and for no real reason playing Elton John. Oh wait, those are real too. I guess my point is, given how I've been fairly critical of Vince Russo on this channel, fair play to him for creating a gimmick that is for once not remembered for reasons that would get him cancelled if he tried it today. Yes, I'm looking at you The Johnsons.

Sources:

Jimmy Yang Shoot Interview (2022): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpKLlY9Qo4s

Jimmy Yang 2006 Interview:  https://web.archive.org/web/20080623204251/http://www.gerweck.net/jimmyyanginterview.htm

Yang's bus and daughter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ1iyp8MITU

Sony Siaki 2013 interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHpml4InVbw

Estrada Indie footage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTb69O5YeDo

Joni Horn IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1750442/?ref_=ttfc_fc_cl_t14

Disgraceland: https://www.cagematch.net/?id=1&nr=1408

Schrödinger's Belt - The XPW European Championship

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the video here.

When we talk about championships in pro wrestling usually we're usually referring to championship belts, but occasionally thats not the case. When Progress wrestling formed in 2011 their singles championship was first symbolised by a staff, and their tag team championships were two halves of a shield that fitted together like yin and yang. Thankfully these didn't last long though... A more modern example would be the New Japan KOPW Championship, which began as a trophy before being replaced by a belt in December 2022. This video however, is about a championship around for a little over a year, that was represented by a presumably empty briefcase. Whats more, the company it belonged to no longer existed. The title I'm referring to is the XPW European championship.

XPW is a broader topic than is relevant here, but as a brief introduction, it was founded in July 1999 by Rob Black, who was also well known in the porn industry. Black fancied himself a promoter, and hoped to assist in bringing ECW to the West Coast, but was turned down by Paul Heyman, leading him to create his own company to be a sort of ECW competitor. Towards the end of XPW's original run they formed a working relationship with UK based Frontier Wrestling Alliance, which was formed in 99 but began as the much more locally minded Fratton Wrestling Association in 93. FWA would become known for it's US influenced presentation of storylines that many UK promotions weren't doing yet. Following XPW's closure FWA would go on to work with Ring of Honor, with the likes of Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles and Bryan Danielson, still under a mask as the American Dragon working for FWA. This even resulted in a co-promotion, with FWA and ROH presenting Frontiers of Honor in May 2003, and a sequel in 2006. As best I can tell, the seemingly odd pairing of FWA and XPW came about through FWA wanting a US working relationship.

Now let's talk about the one and only ever XPW European champion, the Wonderkid Jonny Storm. Jonny started training to wrestle in the early 90's, having his first matches for NWA Hammerlock. The same school that produced Doug Williams and Zack Sabre Jr. He would wrestle mainly for Hammerlock before arriving in FWA and other promotions in 99. In 2002 at age 25 Jonny would make his first trip to America, competing for CZW, Ring of Honor, Heartland Wrestling and crucially, XPW. His cruiserweight style made him a perfect fit against wrestlers like Jerry Lynn, Brian Kendrick and his long time friend Jody Fleisch, who was also touring US indies around this time. Jonny and Jody would often be opponents, having put together a match they could tour the indies with long before shows were as accessible as they are today through streaming. The match they planned was designed to allow them both to shine, leaving a lasting impression on whatever local crowd they were in front of.

Jonny Storm would defeat Jerry Lynn in the finals of the tournament at the Broxbourne Civic Hall on March 16th 2003. Unfortunately though XPW would run it's final event (that time), on March 8th. Whether XPW's closure around this time was the reason, or whether the belt had been completed in time, either way it didn't make it's way to Hertforshire in time for the tournament final, and so Jonny actually won and would continue to carry a black briefcase. Ya see, to the best of my remembrance from watching FWA at the time, Jonny never actually opened the briefcase. According to the thought experiment of Erwin Schrodinger, the contents of the briefcase are equally both there and not there until the case is opened. Welcome to yet another philosophy channel. And yes, I know the full theory is more complicated than this, I'm just messing around.

As the title was made in conjunction with FWA, Jonny would continue to defend the black briefcase apparently containing the XPW European title for a little over a year, long after XPW closed, until it was quietly retired in mid 2004. I guess you could say Storm was before his time, as Money in the Bank wouldn't become a thing until Wrestlemania 21 in 2005, thus continuing the tradition of briefcases being carried to the ring. In a 2005 shoot interview Jonny Storm would note that XPW had ambitions of expending internationally, explaining the link with FWA from their side. He also stated that he was long out planned to be the European champion. Jonny would defend the case mostly in FWA, but also in Germany based WXW. He would defend mostly against imported talent such as Juventud Guerrera, Super Crazy and Justin Credible among others, which did a lot to raise Storms profile, working with and beating former ECW names. As of September 2023, Jonny Storm continues to be active in the ring, some twenty eight years since his first match. Now that XPW is back maybe we might see him reactivate the briefcase, whether there's a belt in it or not some day?

Sources:

Final XPW show https://www.cagematch.net/?id=1&nr=2781

Belt history https://www.cagematch.net/?id=5&nr=78&page=5&reign=1

Storm 2005 shoot https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BUd5Wuu2mg XPW 1:19

Four pitches for the next AEW World Champion

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the video Here.

Over the four years of All Elite Wrestling's existence, it's World championship has been kept pretty sacred. Granted there was a rough period with interim titles and injury's, but as of right now only six men have held the elite prize. When Jericho had it he made the most sense as the man with the most main stream appeal when the company started. Moxley has shown himself to be a dependable hand through his record three reigns. Omega was the man people clamoured for to be champion at some point, who battled through injuries to reach his finish line. Hangman was from day one preparing to finish the story. Sorry Cody, you know I love you. Whatever anyone thinks about CM Punk, it is a fact that we never got to see what an AEW World title reign would actually look like. Then we get to MJF, who is carving out his legacy with the title today.

All of this makes me look to the future, and wonder who the next AEW World champion might be. Four of the previous six were guys established either in WWE of New Japan, whereas Maxwell can be considered an AEW guy, but at this point the future beyond MJF isn't quite clear. At the time of making this video his Full Gear match with Jay White was just announced. By the time that match takes place MJF will have surpassed Kenny Omega as longest reigning champion, and if he gets by Jay White, he will pass the one year mark, as he won the title on the same weekend last year.

Before I get into my list, I want to hear your ideas. Please let me know in the comments who you think will be the next AEW World Champion and why.

1) Swerve Strickland

I'm not just saying this because of his line in a promo with Hangman saying that if he had the same opportunities as Page had he'd be the first black AEW World champion, but I honestly feel like Swerve would kill it as the World champion. When allowed to which he hasn't always, Swerve often delivers one of the better matches of any show he's on. At All In, Swerve felt like a big star, and completely at home across the ring from an icon like Sting, which by the way is a match he manifested on his podcast and made it happen. Then at WrestleDream he beat Hangman in what felt like validation of him as a top star for the promotion. Swerve needed a big win against a credible talent, and he got one that night in Seattle. This coming Tueday he's set to wrestle Bryan Danielson, and honestly if feels like he might get another huge win. It also seems like Tony Khan is a fan of Swerve, despite his early dubious booking of the guy.

Swerve has also made it sound like his personal goal, not exactly in these words, is to make WWE regret releasing him, and there's no better way for him to do that than to conquering All Elite Wrestling and proving his worth in the main events. The quiet part of that goal might be to eventually go back with a bigger profile than he left with ala Drew Mcintyre and Cody Rhodes, which I can totally see him doing. He showed a lot of promise in NXT, and was let go right after being called up to Smackdown, along with the rest of Hit Row. He had a bit of a slow start in AEW, being in a long team and feud with Keith Lee, then being handed a parade of henchmen that he frankly didn't need. As an early ROH fan I  love his nods back to the Embassy, even going as far as to wear the no longer with us Jimmy Rave's entrance robe, and it suits him well. His relationship with Prince Nana had been allowed to build organically too, with Swerve dictating Nana's pace depending on his mood. If Swerve doesn't feel like it, Nana can't dance. Swerve comes across to me at least, as a badass who controls his own empire stoically, and thats a surprisingly rare thing when you look at a lot of other top heels these days. Maybe you could put Roman in that category when he leaves his grievances to Paul Heyman to deal with.

If they spent the next few months having Swerve knock off a few more big names, I could see him being ready to challenge MJF by Revolution, because the one thing he was lacking but is not slowly gaining is big wins. A few wins over the likes of Danielson would set him up right, and tell me they wouldn't be great matches too.

2) Eddie Kingston

I know this isn't likely, but this is a fantasy booking video so I can say it, how freaking great would a MJF vs Eddie Kingston main event feud be? The promos alone would be a sight to behold, and both men like to draw from their personal histories to provide context to promos at every chance they get. Talk about pro wrestling storytelling, this might well be epic. When I started writing this video Eddie hadn't yet won the Ring of Honor World title, but my point still stands that the story could be epic given time.

Eddie has for so long been the nearly man who succeeds every once in a while. He's the man who at the start of the pandemic sold his wrestling boots prior to his AEW debut, where he wasn't guaranteed to leave with a job but he did. All of this is to avoid calling him an underdog, because you could apply that term but Eddie is deeper than that as a character. If he wasn't, a better comparison would be Mikey Whipwreck, and he beat Steve Austin for the ECW World title. Yes he recently won the ROH World title, but imagine if that was just the start of him ascending, putting a new spin on the classic underdog story.

Right before the pandemic, Eddie was telling an interesting story in Progress Wrestling that never really got going. Eddie did one promo in particular about being the last of his generation not to make it to a major promotion, and now the generation younger were passing him by, and he was sick of watching it happen. He at the time had targeted then NXT UK roster member and new NXT Champion Ilja Dragunov, and as we've come to expect from the Mad King, his promo made you feel his angst and rage.

Eddie is the perennial nearly man just like Tommy Dreamer was in ECW, but every once in a while the nearly man in wrestling has to win to keep himself in the game. He did this recently by winning the NJPW Strong title, but how much more meaningful would it be for Eddie Kingston to even for a day be AEW World Champion. Maybe before he gets a shot at MJF, he might have to get that big win over Jon Moxley, calling back to their 2020 feud over the World title, and once he has that behind him he could maybe earn a shot some time next year.

3) Jungle B-

3) Jay White

When Jay White first won the IWGP heavyweight title from Hiroshi Tanahashi back in 2019 he was a fairly contentious figure amongst fans. Some saw him as the future, and others thought he was undeserving. Personally even though I loved Tanahashi and his win over Kenny Omega, I was sad that his likely last major title reign was over as soon as it was, but I was also a fan of Jay White and the potential in him back then. Now four years and another World title reign later the Switchblade is in AEW, and leading his own brand of Bullet Club. I could totally see Jay blind siding all of us and having a Bullet Club Gold a hostile takeover to end Full Gear.

The main thing Jay lacks right now, much like Swerve is big singles victories. He's proven himself elsewhere but not in AEW yet. Once thing I would have loved out of CM Punk's second AEW run was a singles match between the two, and imagine what it would have done for Jay to win that match, but it wasn't to be. I don't see MJF losing at Full Gear myself, but maybe Jay in retaliation might earn a later shot having beaten some other top card talent and come back in win down the line?

4) Adam Cole

Let's get the obvious one out of the way. Now I'll be honest in saying that I'm a bit of a recent convert to this idea. While I enjoyed the current storyline as it happened, I wasn't thrilled about it main eventing Wembley Stadium, however live and in person I absolutely loved the match they gave us and the story that was told. It felt like a big important main event. There were people sitting around me that fully believed when the two double pinned each other that the show was about to end, and they were very, very angry.

The way All In ended left many open branches as to where the story could go. Cole and MJF won the ROH tag titles, which by the way was a very clever move as nobody seems to care much about ROH these days, and having them on it might help for a while. I still haven't given up on the idea that Cole will turn on us all and align with Roderick Strong and the Kingdom. He does after all have history with Taven and Bennett that admittedly I don't know much about. Unfortunately for AEW they weren't able to reunite the Undisputed era for various reasons, Bobby, but maybe the Kingdom plus Roddy group could take that role with Adam Cole at the helm? They could even involve Kyle O'Reilly should he be fit enough to come back. The end of last weeks Dynamite has been much discussed, and my view right now is that it is leading to a Cole, Roddy, and Kingdom faction.

Throughout the Cole and MJF story one thing I wasn't having was the umpteenth attempt at MJF teasing turning babyface and usually doesn't in the end, but All In felt like they were making the biggest effort ever to try and convince us that the guy who refers to himself as the Devil could actually turn the corner. Him chasing a heel group led by Adam Cole is an interesting prospect in itself, and one that could maybe even take us back to Wembley Stadium for the payoff if they play it right.

So those are my four ideas, if you have a different one please let me know in the comments. Despite everything I just said, I walked out of Wembley Stadium with the thought in my head that in the era of longer title reigns we seem to be in, MJF could well still be AEW World Champion come All In next year, and right now I'd be fine with that.

WCW's EVP going into the 1990's, Jim Herd

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the full video by clicking Here.

On the September 9th 1991 edition of Prime Time Wrestling, Bobby Heenan would introduce a new major signing to WWE. He wasn't just a World champion, according to Heenan he was the 'real Worlds champion'. Out walked The Nature Boy, Ric Flair, carrying a familiar piece of hardware, the WCW International Heavyweight title as it was known at the time, also known colloquially as the Big Gold Belt. But how did a major WCW title end up on WWE programming? The short answer is a man who was serving as EVP of WCW at the time, Jim Herd. I'll get to more about Jim and Ric's history a bit later.

What most know about Jim's career pre-WCW is that he at one time was a manager at Pizza Hut, but he also had experience in the television industry, being a former production executive for KPLR-TV in St. Louis. This was the same channel that aired 'Wrestling at the Chase', which ran on the channel for twenty four years, though it's not clear if Herd had anything to do with that product. Likely due to this experience and also a connection to a Turner executive, Herd was hired by Turner Broadcasting and placed in charge of WCW in January of 1989.

Creative or crazy?

Chances are if've heard of Jim, you've mostly heard bad stories about him. He's not exactly the most popular executive amongst wrestlers who worked for him, and for a few very good reasons. His lasting reputation is that he seemed to have not a lot of product knowlege, and didn't seem willing to learn any, but still wanted to contribute ideas. He was credited with such ideas as a tag team of wrestling hunchbacks, who could never be pinned as both of their shoulders were never on the mat together. Herd apparently thought that this would make the team unbeatable, until it had to be explained to him that there are in fact, other ways to win a wrestling match. This is perhaps indicative of the level of wrestling knowlege we're dealing with. That idea was quickly rejected by the booking committee who knew much better, but occasionally one of Herd's daft ideas would make it to the ring. Introducing the Ding Dongs, played by Greg Evans and Richard Sartain who had previously worked as the Rock n Roll Rebels.The team would come running out wearing awful orange costumes, thankfully with masks so they couldn't be identified, billed from Belleville USA, of which there actually is one in Illinois. To make things worse they would be wearing bells on their wrists and ankles, and would have a bell in the corner that they would ring to fire themselves up. To be fair to them, neither Evans or Satrain look to be bad wrestlers in the slightest, but the gimmick wouldn't ring in much success. As best I can tell Jim Herds reason for this ridiculous gimmick was he was trying to come up with wacky characters that kids would love, because thats what he saw the WWE doing with acts like the Bushwackers. Unfortunately though Herd seemed to be taking the wrong lessons from how WWE gained its national audience, as the sillier gimmicks didn't last long there either.

One unfortunate wrestler who personified not one but two of Herds bad ideas was Brad Armstrong, brother of Brian Armstrong better known as the Road Dogg. In September 1990 Brad would be repackaged as the Candyman, wearing candy can coloured tights and throwing sweets out to the crowd on his way to the ring. Years later Herd claimed that the reasoning behind this gimmick was not just to appeal to children, but also to try and get a brand deal with Hershey which fell through. Later on near the end of Herd's time in WCW, Brad would be given a new costume to wear. A new, suspiciously familiar costume, recoloured to match the WCW logo of the time. Yes, Brad would be bitten by a radioactive shitty idea, and would become Arachnaman, complete with silly string shooting from his hands. Maybe a young Serpentico might have seen this, who would have been seven years old at the time. As you might well imagine, Marvel comic's super legal team got involved fairly quickly and the Arachnaman gimmick was squashed. If you're going to infringe on Marvel's trademarks, you might as present it well, like when the AWA's Terry Boulder became 'The Incredible Hulk Hogan". They billed Arachnaman from Web City, not even New York!

Speaking of brand deals, Jim was also responsible for another infamous brand deal with a sneaker brand Roos, now known as KangaROOS. I'd genuinely never heard of these before making this video, and I don't know how I feel about shoes with pockets but thats neither here nor there... According to Jim Cornette in one of his dozens of shoot interviews where he talks about Herd, Jim arranged for the WCW wrestlers to work their matches wearing Roos', but the wrestlers hated this so the edict was quickly removed. There are also numerous adverts that are still with us through the magic of YouTube that feature various WCW stars promoting the sneakers with the tagline "shoes for your feet, pockets for your stuff" that very much sounds like it came from an SNL sketch, I can even hear it being said in Phil Hartmans voice.

I can't talk about Jim Herds creative input without talking about one of the craziest idea that has been attributed to him. It seems like he and one Ric Flair never really got a long, and it also seemed like Herd didn't care much for sticking with established gimmicks that had worked for years, like Flair had at the time. It has been claimed for many years by Ric himself that Jim once pitched an idea for Ric Flair to trade his suave suits and long blonde locks, and to become a Roman gladiator, now going by the name Spartacus. Clearly this was never going to actually happen, and in a 2020 interview with Conrad Thompson, Herd would deny that this was ever actually pitched, and that many silly ideas would be thrown into meetings, but many were tongue in cheek and not meant to be serious suggestions, or thats what he implied at least. Jim also noted that the idea came from Turner buying a backlog of black and white movies and colourising them. It was felt that there was a need to cross promote these movies, and this may have been where the Spartacus idea came from. There is some weight to this given Tony Schiovone's explanation of Robocop being in WCW later on was that there was pressure from Turner to co-promote with the release of Robocop 2.

Herding Jim's enemies

As I mentioned earlier, Jim wasn't much popular with many wrestlers, and if the stories are true, he didn't do much to change that. One such wrestler that hated Herd is a man who is known to hold a grudge or two, The Franchise Shane Douglas. In a 2018 shoot interview Shane told a story about once meeting Herd in his Atlanta office. Shane claimed that Jim talked down to him the entire time, and at one point handed him a document while saying "you probably won't understand this just being a wrestler." Shane, with his two Masters degrees in education, wasn't thrilled by this comment, and claims not only to have understood the document which included rating information for various other wrestling shows, but he understood it better than Herd.

Another of Herds more famous enemies was Jim Cornette, who as you can probably imagine has talked endlessly about Herd over the years. In fact, he has done entire shoot interviews about the period of his career where he worked for Herd, I recommend in particular his Timeline: 1989 interview by Kayfabe Commentaries. If I went through Cornette's grievances with Jim Herd we'd be here all day, and Jim tells it all way better himself but I'll share this one story. Having left WCW in October 1990, one year before Herd would leave, Jim upon hearing about how bad WCW's business had gotten would be inspired to send Jim a funeral wreath of black roses, with a card that read "my deepest sympathies for the death of your  wrestling promotion". According to Cornette Herd was fuming when he received the wreath, and placed it on the desk of Jim Ross, who worked in the WCW offices at the time.

Sorry for teasing you at the start, but now we get to Herd biggest blunder of all, managing to get the WCW World championship into the hands of his competition. Flair and Herds feud resulted mainly from Ric Flair being the WCW booker at the time, and Herd constantly wanting to get involved and change things. In 1991 Ric would finally have enough to the point of quitting the company, while he was the International champion as it was then called. In Jim Cornette's Timeline 1990 interview with Kayfabe Commentaries, Jim actually shows a copy of the actual resignation letter that Flair sent. Back in those days, in order to be the NWA world champion, which is what the International title upheld the lineage of, the new champion was required to pay a deposit of $25,000, which would be repaid back to the champion upon losing the belt. This was essentially to keep said champion responsible and to make sure they made all required bookings, as any money lost by a promoter would be repaid to them from the deposit. When Ric left WCW, he claimed that for whatever reason the deposit wasn't returned to him, so he kept possession of the belt. When Ric arrived in WWE in September 91 he considered the belt his, and as a way of sticking it to Jim Herd, he made the Prime Time appearance with the belt, claiming to be the 'real Worlds champion".

Much like with Marvel and Arachnaman earlier, WCW and Turners legal team got involved pretty quickly. Going forward WWE would not be allowed to use the belt, so they would have Flair come out with a modified tag team title belt, and they would blur it out in the edit to make it look like Flair was still using the WCW belt. Flair claimed that when he agreed to send the belt back once WCW paid him the deposit, but Herd refused. However not long after this incident in January 1992 Jim Herd would resign from Turner Broadcasting, and Ric Flair would return a month later. Upon his return, Ric claimed in a 2004 WWE Interview that he was paid the deposit plus interest.

In all my years of listening to and reading interviews with wrestlers, I don't remember ever hearing a good thing said about Jim Herd. He was clearly a capable business man to have reached such a high corporate level, but clearly didn't understand enough about the wrestling business, and yet tried to influence it anyway. As I mentioned earlier at the age of 88 years old, Jim Herd gave his first interview in decades to Conrad Thompson on his Ad Free Shows platform. I won't share too much from that interview given that it's behind a paywall, but Herd claims that his biggest achievements that he brought to WCW were improvements to the visual presentation of the shows such as better entrance sets, pyro and ramps.

In the end Jim Herd is one of those people that history doesn't remember kindly, but it's worth noting that he was the first in a line of WCW EVP's who failed to turn the company's fortunes. On Herd's watch came the classic Flair/Steamboat trilogy, the ascension of Sting and many more legendary talents, and yet WCW was still struggling. One thing you can't deny though is that Jim was an influential figure in pro wrestling going into the 90's, one who now in his 90's is still talked about today.

Sources used for this script:

Prime Time debut: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWUx-iuvpOQ

ding dongs debut (Clash 7): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHcMK3a4Vj8

Shane Douglas on Jim Herd: https://m.facebook.com/TheHannibalTV/videos/shane-douglas-on-jim-herds-wcw-regime/441552703743887/

Herd denies Spartacus: https://www.fightful.com/wrestling/jim-herd-we-never-considered-changing-ric-flair-s-name-spartacus

Cornette funeral wreath: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_6yjSD8lLk

Ric Flair interview re Herd: http://www.mediaman.com.au/interviews/flair_silvervision.html

Why Shane Douglas threw down the NWA World Championship

This is a script for my YouTube channel. You can find the video by clicking Here

August 27th 1994 should have been a proud moment for the National Wrestling Alliance. It was the day that they were set to crown a new World Champion, their own World champion following the separation of the Alliance from WCW.  Crowning a new champion was an exciting prospect for the NWA with it's top title no longer under WCW's control as it had been. It also signified the return of the most famous design of the NWA World title as WCW had replaced it with what is today known as the 'big gold belt'.  A one night tournament was held in Philadelphia Pennsylvania in one of the alliances' biggest territories, Eastern Championship Wrestling, including some impressive names of the day like the Tazmaniac, Dean Malenko, and Doink the Clown for some reason. The final of the tournament saw two more up and coming stars vie for the gold, with Shane Douglas, the former dynamic dude, defeating Too Cold Scorpio to win the championship, but what happened next the NWA hadn't bargained for, as Shane took the microphone, presumably to give his victory speech.

"I stand here before God and my Father in Heaven tonight, as I said I would be, Worlds heavyweight champion. In the tradition of Lou Thez. In the tradition of Jack Brisco, of the Brisco brothers (not those ones). Of Dory Funk Jr. Of Terry Funk, of the real nature boy Buddy Rogers upstairs tonight. From the Harley Race's to the Barry Windhams, to the... Ric Flair's. I accept this heavyweight title. Of Kevin Von Erich, of the fat man himself Dusty Rhodes, this is it tonight Dad. And Rick Steamboat, and they can all kiss my ass." With that line, Shane would take his newly won World championship, whose lineage could be traced back to 1948, and he would throw it to the ground. Shane goes on to declare the NWA to be a dead promotion, proclaiming himself the new ECW world champion. Why did Shane do this? Who's idea was it? What would be the consequences for Eastern Championship Wrestling?

According to Shane Douglas in a 2018 interview, the whole idea came from ECW's founder Todd Gordon and booker Paul Heyman, who had been part of creative in ECW for almost a year by that point. Shane was already ECW's champion at the time, having beaten Terry Funk for the title in March of 94, so the plan was made since ECW was one of the largest and best drawing NWA territories at the time, to crown the ECW champion as NWA World champion also. In the 2005 WWE produced documentary 'The Rise and Fall of ECW, Paul Heyman claims that he pitched the idea as a way of breaking Eastern Championship Wrestling away from the traditional perception of wrestling upheld by the NWA. In Paul's words, the old school NWA was "everything we wanted to get away from". In that documentary Paul doesn't mention a man who is important to this story, who Paul and Todd Gordon had heat with at the time. A fellow promoter and competitor who he claimed in a 2006 interview would call the fire department on ECW shows claiming overcrowding just to be a nuisance, Dennis Corraluzzo.

The match and Shane's actions would air on the August 30th episode of Eastern Championship Wrestling, and would be followed by an interview with at the time joint NWA president who was in the building that night, Corraluzzo. Dennis was a fellow promoter in the Philadelphia and New Jersey area, and had made clear his distaste for Todd Gordon and ECW because of it's mature product. Even before ECW became extreme by name, they had already begun the shift towards its new direction. Dennis also was against ECW hosting the title tournament, but was over-ruled by the NWA board as ECW was one of the few Alliance members with a stable television presence, therefore it would give the new champion more exposure. At the time, Dennis was understandably shocked by what he saw in the ring, but was assured by Todd and Paul that it was just a storyline to start an NWA vs ECW feud. Neither side, Dennis on one and Paul and Todd on the other trusted the other's intentions for the NWA World title, so Paul and Todd planned the swerve to distance themselves from the NWA, to create buzz for their new brand, and to firmly define Shane Douglas as their guy. Having won the NWA world title tournament, their regional champion was now able to rebrand himself as a World champion in the eyes of ECW's fans.

On the Hardcore TV episode moments after Douglas' actions were aired, Corraluzzo, who at this point still wasn't aware he had been swerved, claimed on camera that Shane was still the NWA champion and the NWA board would get involved since ECW was one of their members. Little did he know at the time that his comments would play directly into Todd and Paul's hands, as this interview would be directly followed by a message from Todd Gordon himself, announcing that NWA Eastern Championship Wrestling as a company was being folded, and in it's place would be Extreme Championship Wrestling, not an NWA member and so not subject to it's rules. The show would close with the Public Enemy, one of ECW's hottest tag teams of the day, spray painting over the word 'Eastern' on the logo banner, and painting the word extreme under it. While the name 'Hardcore TV' had existed since April '93, the following weeks show aired on September 6th 1994, would be the first episode of Extreme Championship Wrestling.

In the interview with Shane Douglas I referenced earlier, he noted that he initially felt that the idea when pitched to him by Paul Heyman was the wrong thing to do. In the promo when he won the title he listed many esteemed names that had held that honour, who he did have respect for , well most of them. For those not in the know Shane held a long time grudge against Ric Flair for his treatment in WCW while Flair was booking the shows, a grudge he has referenced for decades now. He claimed to spend the whole week leading up to the event wrestling with the idea of it, and notes that Paul never forced him to do it. He claims his mind was made up after receiving a phone call from of all people, Mike Tenay, future voice of TNA Wrestling, who at the time hosted a radio show called 'wrestling insiders'. Tenay told Douglas that on his show the previous night Dennis Corraluzzo made some negative comments about him. When Shane heard the comments from a man Shane didn't even really know, he was incensed, and this was enough to convince him to follow Heymans plan. Dennis, again not knowing what he had started, unwittingly caused a great deal of damage to the NWA, damage that it would take a long time for the Alliance to come back from.

In November he would oversee another tournament to crown a new NWA World champion, this time held in association with Jim Cornette's Smokey Mountain Wrestling. Jim has stated that given his former ties to the NWA and respect for it, he was appalled when he learned what had happened. Jim has a fairly rocky history with Paul Heyman, and this no doubt made things worse between them. Cornette has claimed that while not an official NWA member, he offered to host a new tournament to crown a champion, one Cornette trusted in future ECW star Chris Candido. Unfortunately for the NWA the bloom was already off the rose, and the NWA would struggle through the rest of the 1990's. There would be a few notable names to hold the title over the next eight years, such as Sabu, Steve Corino, more ECW names, and former UFC champion Dan Severn, who in his first reign held it for four years and a month. After some dark years for the title where it usually changed hands at non-televised events, it wouldn't be until NWA TNA launched in June 2002, that the title would be seen by a national, and eventually global audience as TNA grew.

While the NWA entered it's wilderness years through the rest of the 90's ECW would continue to thrive. At this point I'll confess that this video has an ulterior motive. While continuing the videos I make on this channel, I also want to chronicle ECW month by month, starting with Shane Douglas throwing down the NWA title and ECW becoming extreme. If you're interested in this idea please let me know in the comments, and I'll hopefully cover September 1994 very soon.

Sources (directly referenced)

ECW August 30th 1994: https://network.wwe.com/video/73525/ecw-hardcore-tv-aug-30-1994?playlistId=15447

Heyman 2006 interview: https://www.pwinsider.com/ViewArticle.php?id=20037&p=1

Shane Douglas Interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBBB9hakIPA&t

Cornette on Shane throwing the belt down: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlU18p0LlRM

What happened when Ric Flair went to Ring of Honor?

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the full video by clicking Here.

For this video I want to take you back to a different time in wrestling. Back when there was one major company, a distant second and an even more distant everyone else. Amongst that everyone else, Ring of Honor was a growing company that showed promise, but it had been built on the efforts of it's largely home grown talent, many of whom would become superstars, but weren't there yet. They needed something more if they were going to grow past being a small company reliant on DVD sales. They were going to need a star to give them legitimacy with the wider wrestling audience, and of all people they managed to recruit the dirtiest player in the game. But what would happen when Ric Flair would enter Ring of Honor? First we'll look at the changing landscape of ROH at the time, then where Ric Flair's career was, and the timeline of his relationship with the indie. Finally, we'll try to figure out what went wrong and how it happened.

ROH in 2009

The late 2000's were a very pivotal time in Ring of Honor history in terms of changes that impacted the entire company. Since the start of the promotion all wrestlers and storylines had book booked largely by one man, Gabe Sapolsky. Gabe had spent the previous years before ROH working for ECW but more importantly, he spent those years sitting under the learning tree of Paul Heyman himself. Gabe's booking from ROH's early years is still fondly remembered by fans two decades later, from the beloved 'Summer of Punk, to the nearly two year reign of Samoa Joe as World Champion. Many, Many wrestlers that Gabe brought into Ring of Honor went on to become big stars, proving that he had an extraordinary eye for talent. On the screen right now is not even a complete list of the sheer talent Gabe had an influence on in their early careers.

In late 2008 then owner Cary Silkin made the decision to remove Gabe from his position as Booker after about six and a half years. Gabe who admitted afterwards that he had been feeling burned out after putting all of his focus into ROH, was great at drawing the fan that wanted a stronger style of wrestling, but Cary felt that the company would need to change it's product to be more accessible in order to grow the company. Cary was mostly a fairly passive owner, leaving the day to day operations to his booker and other staff, but stepped in when he saw the company's decline in live attendance and dvd sales throughout 2008, which were vital in keeping the company going. Aside from any revenue ROH made, Cary had put a lot of his own money into the company, and thus wanted to recoup his losses.

When Gabe left, Cary replaced him with an interesting choice, an active wrestler who appeared to have a good relationship with a lot of the ROH locker room, 'Scrap Iron' Adam Pearce, who at the time was also the NWA World champion wrestling all over the US and internationally. The same Adam Pearce seen on WWE television today. When Pearce was tasked with wrestling Roman Reigns on Smackdown a couple of years ago I hoped we might see shades of the old 'Scrap Iron', but sadly we didn't. When Adam took over the ROH product there became a very clear change. The excellent quality of wrestling was still there especially in their main events, but the overall tone of the shows felt lighter and more family friendly. One of Gabe's final projects, a dark emo stable known as the Age of the Fall, became very much toned down in terms of its violent nature. This is a group that debuted by hanging an already bleeding Jay Briscoe by his feet from the loop that just been used for a ladder match. The group's leader Jimmy Jacobs then proceeded to cut a promo standing underneath, as Briscoe's blood dripped down onto Jacobs' white suit, creating one of the most stunning moments in ROH history. Under Pearce there was none of that, and the groups future prospect was quickly separated from the group and pushed as a singles star. That prospect was a young Tyler Black, known today as Seth Rollins.

The changes to the product can maybe be best visualised in the transformation of one of ROH's top wrestlers of the time, Austin Aries. Around the time of Gabe's last shows Aries was presented as a very serious wrestler. The man who ended Samoa Joe's epic world title reign, who was going to time limit draws with Bryan Danielson, and who was battling Jimmy Jacobs in brutal matches. By mid 2009 Aries was almost a completely different wrestler, undergoing a vast makeover, adopting flashy new ring gear, and style. This was validated by Aries defeating Jerry Lynn to become the first ever two time ROH World champion, a title that he held until Tyler Black was ready to ascend to the throne in the following year. The newly christened 'A Double' felt like the figurehead of ROH's new direction, which was propelled forward by another major change, ROH's first foray into national television.

On March 21st 2009 Ring of Honor debuted ROH on HDNet. While HDNet was a start for the company, it wasn't the most accessible channel as to my understanding you needed an extra package on your cable to have the channel. Years later HDNets owner Mark Cuban would sell the channel, and it would become known as AXS tv, the current home of Impact Wrestling. The weekly one hour show at the time felt very different to the televised products of WWE and TNA of the time. One reason for this was ROH taping as many as six episodes over a weekend, usually from the former ECW arena. This meant that you only saw the big stars of ROH every few weeks as opposed to every single week on Raw. As a fan at the time I liked this, as I might get a thirty minute Bryan Danielson match one week, and it gave time enough to look forward to seeing Bryan wrestle again in a few weeks. The show was clearly aimed less as ROH's already die hard fanbase and more at casual or new fans. Character babyfaces like Delirious and weirdly, the Necro Butcher were featured, as well as traditional heels like the Embassy who a new fan would instantly recognise to be the bad guys. The birth of the HDNet show also brought something ROH had rarely used in the past, an on screen authority figure. Jim Cornette had previously, and would again in future take on the role, especially during the well regarded ROH vs CZW feud, but ROH wanted a bigger name for their HDNet show, which is where Ric Flair comes in.

Leave the Memories Alone

Much like for Ring of Honor, 2008 was something of a big year for Ric Flair too. Flair entered the year with a storyline in which Vince McMahon would force him to retire the next time he lost a match, which led to many near misses for Flair. This was slowly leading to one of the biggest matches of his at the time thirty six year long in ring career, which would take place at Wrestlemania 24. Throughout the whole of Wrestlemania weekend you could say that Ric Flair was the star attraction. On the Saturday night he was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as the featured inductee, along side Mae Young, Rocky Johnson, High Chief Peter Miavia the Father and Grandfather of The Rock, famed announcer Gordon Solie, Florida promoter Eddie Graham and  Gerald and Jack Brisco. Flair would again be inducted in 2012 as a member of the Four Horsemen, making him the first of currently eight wrestlers to be inducted twice, as groups such as the nWo, DX, the Hart Foundation and Harlem Heat would follow.

On March 30th at Wrestlemania 24, Ric wrestled what was to be his final match against Shawn Michaels. While not a perfect match, it had enough story and drama in it that fans were truly along for the ride, capped off by Shawn's "I'm sorry, I love you" moment. Fairly early in Shawn would suffer a cracked rib which would go on to hinder him for the rest of the match. The injury came when Shawn would perform an Asai moonsault to the outside of the ring, missing Flair and landing ribs first on the spine of the Spanish announcers table. Apart from this scary moment Ric Flair claimed while discussing the match on his podcast that the rest of the match went according to plan, and was always going to end with the Sweet Chin Music. He also claimed that the famous line from Shawn Michaels hadn't been planned, or at least Flair didn't know it was coming. Clearly production must have known that the line was coming since the camera was there to get a perfect shot of Shawn mouthing the words, but that doesn't necessarily mean that Flair knew.

On Raw the next night, the show ended with tributes to Ric Flair. He was honored in the ring by many of his peers, from Triple H, to members of the Horsemen, to his family including a pre-wrestling career Charlotte, and eventually the entire roster. After the programme went off the air Flair, who by this point had no more tears left in his body was even shown ultimate respect by the Undertaker in a somewhat in and out of character moment. The entire weekend felt like the perfect sendoff for the Nature Boy. More on that later... While Ric would make a couple of appearances on Raw it still seemed that his days in the ring were done. 

Ric Flair and Ring Of Honor

So what did Ric Flair actually do in Ring of Honor? On March 13th 2009 ROH presented a show they titled 'Stylin' and Profilin' because of Flair's presence. He was there to observe the main event ROH World title match between Nigel McGuinness, who was nearing the end of his epic sixteen month long reign and his challenger for the night Brent Albright, the man briefly known as Gunner Scott for a few months on Smackdown. The match would end in a disqualification as Claudio Castagnoli would interfere on Nigel's behalf, and Flair would actually enter the ring to make the save.

Around this time Ring of Honor would announce that Flair would become an 'ROH Ambassador' and heavy promoted him for their HDNet show. He would make his first TV appearance on the May 2nd 2009 HDNet episode. He begins the show with an in ring promo complimenting ROH in the most Ric Flair way, by claiming that the next Flair, Shawn Michaels or Triple H might be in the ROH locker room, which is not exactly what a die hard ROH fan would have wanted to hear given that many of them loved the indie for it not being like WWE. He was then interrupted by Austin Aries, planting the seeds for what would come later. On the following week's episode Flair would appear in a backstage interview talking up the roster whose names I bet he couldn't have told us without a prompter. On the May 16th episode he heads to the ring again, this time to announce a four way match for the ROH World title in which the new champion who by this point had dethroned Nigel, Jerry Lynn, would defend against Austin Aries, Bryan Danielson and Tyler Black. On the June 6th episode, Ric would be interviewed before the four way that I mentioned before, and would talk about the importance of being in a World title match. As best as I can tell all of these episodes were taped in early April at the second ever HDNet tapings. On the June 13th episode that would have been the first of a new set of tapings, commentators Dave Prazak and Mike Hogewood note that Ric Flair had stepped down as ROH's ambassador, and he wouldn't be seen in the company again.

Aside from the HDnet show, at this time ROH was still running events that were primarily released on DVD, a huge aspect of their income especially in the early years. While Ric Flair appeared on the aforementioned 'Stylin and Profilin' show, he was next advertised to appear at The Hunt Begins on April 17th in Montreal, but apparently no showed the event. Undoubtedly the biggest wrestling related catastrophe to ever hit that city. Following this event, Ring of Honor would proceed to sue Ric Flair for money that he had been paid in advance to appear. The lawsuit revealed that Ring of Honor were paying Flair ten thousand dollars per appearance, and thirty five thousand on top of that to be their Ambassador on the HDNet show, though ROH was claiming that Flair owed them a total of forty grand. According to a 2011 article by Cageside seats, part of Ric's conditions for bookings included a refundable five thousand dollar deposit, and this may contribute to the amount ROH was owed for not being their Ambassador and no showing in Montreal.

When Ric Flair officially left Ring of Honor, he claimed that he did so to go back to WWE, which he technically did, making a very brief comeback, and by brief I mean two weeks. He would get into an in ring dispute with Randy Orton on May 25th 2009's Raw, and a week later he would receive a dreaded Orton punt kick and would disappear again. It turns out based on what happened next that Flair may have used his WWE link to get out of his ROH deal, in order to to explore some other opportunities. In November of 2009 Flair would break his in ring retirement, wrestling on the Hulkamania: Let the Battle Begin tour in Australia. I won't go into too much detail here as the tour definitely deserves it's own deep dive, but Flair crucially would wrestle in four main events, losing to Hulk Hogan every time.

The next time Ric Flair would be seen on a major platform would be a night etched in the memories of every TNA fan of the time. January 4th 2010, the debut of the ill fated attempt by TNA compete head to head with Raw, which only lasted around three months. The first episode featured a former WWE star either debuting or returning in what felt like every single segment, including Ric Flair who would be paired with TNA champion AJ Styles. Flair would stay in TNA for two years, wrestling twelve matches before eventually making his way back to occasional WWE appearances. Michael Bochicchio, which by the way I apologise if I'm pronouncing wrong, is a former friend of Ric who I'll return to in the next section, alleged in a 2011 interview with Cageside Seats that TNA offered Ric a four hundred thousand dollars per year deal. Given how Ring of Honor weren't using him on every show, he was never going to make the kind of money TNA was offering while with the much smaller Ring Of Honor. Until his to date final match in 2022, his last would have been a loss to Sting on a 2011 episode of Impact, but more problems continued to follow Flair.

From what I can tell ROH eventually sued Flair in 2011, citing that he had been with TNA for long enough that he feasibly could have paid them back by then, but from what I can tell the ROH vs Flair lawsuit never really went anywhere. I've also seen it claimed that when Sinclair Broadcasting purchased the ROH in 2012, they showed no interest in perusing the previous owners debt, which might be accurate as Cary seems to be claiming that it was his own money and not ROH's. Over the years Ric Flair has been fairly quiet about Ring of Honor, but in March of this year he was directly asked about them on his podcast. Ric claimed talking to Conrad Thompson that the deal fell through when someone asked him to bad mouth WWE in a promo, but never really explains any further. In his exact words, Flair says "They asked me to go out and say that they were a bigger product than WWE, but I said I'll absolutely never do that. They said you're under contract, say what you're told and I said I'm under contract for that? Not for that, I won't do it. Thats all it was, simple as that." He also briefly implies that ROH's plan was for him to go to a strip club before the show, but that gets glossed over so we still don't know what that meant. Flair doesn't say who "they" are who told him to do this, and moves on to burying Bocchichio. Around this time ROH would never really bury other promotions on screen except within agreed upon promotional feuds with CZW and later Chikara, so this claim doesn't feel like the true story. With respect to Conrad, he could have grilled Ric on his statement a bit more, maybe ask for clarification. Flairs 2023 comments caused Cary Silkin to again reiterate that Flair owed him the forty one grand, not sure where that extra thousand came from, for appearances Flair didn't make. Money Cary will likely never see quite frankly.

In the podcast Flair also claims that the ROH deal was put together by the owner of HighSpots, Michael Bochicchio who I mentioned earlier, who has had his own financial disputes with Ric. In researching for this video I found a story of Flair giving Highspots an NWA championship belt as collateral for a loan. According to Highspots, Flair never repaid the loan leading to them attempting to sell the belt, but they quickly found that it wasn't theirs to sell, as Flair had previously used the same belt as collateral to a company called Conbraco Industries for a different loan. Conbraco by the way was a plumbing heating valve company making this even stranger. The article I found this information from at Cageside Seats claims that Flair also gave Conbraco more items as collateral, most notably his first WWE Hall of Fame Ring, and the Rolex watch that Shawn Michaels gifted him following Wrestlemania 24, and weirdly an autographed poster of Michael Jordan. Weeks later Dave Meltzer would clarify that the owner of Conbraco was a friend of Flair so that at least makes some sense. To be clear though these are allegations, and the money disputes between Flair and Highspots are very, very messy, so I'll include a link to the multiple articles in my blog which can be found in the video description if you would like some further reading. Frankly I wouldn't have known about any of this had Flair not mentioned the Highspots owner instead of focusing on Ring of Honor.

To be clear, as best as I can find, Ric Flair has never given a clear and concise explanation for his Ring of Honor run, other than his badmouthing WWE claim. He did reference this same claim against ROH in 2022 on an earlier version of his podcast with Mark Madden, another long time friend of Flair who he fell out with. There is however another theory about what might have happened, but I want to make it clear that this shouldn't be treated as absolute fact, and will get quite dark. It's been speculated that Flair made the deal with ROH partly to guarantee his son Reid a spot on their roster, only for this to never happen when Reid was arrested for driving while impaired right before Ric would appear for the company, but after he had been advertised. The timeline for this does add up, as Reid spent much of 2008 training to wrestle with Harley Race, and made his in ring debut in December of that year teaming with his brother David. He was arrested on March 4th, right before Flair's first ROH appearance and a again on April 26th, which was after the show that Flair didn't turn up for. Maybe ROH denied using Reid, who according to his Cagematch stats had only wrestled one match by the time of Flairs first appearance, (not including the two he had in WCW as a child), and so Flair reneged on his deal. When Reid sadly passed away at the age of twenty five, Mike Johnson of PWInsider as well as other obituaries noted that he had been slated to work for ROH but his arrest caused this not to happen, with Johnson in particular claiming that this might have led to Flair deciding to no longer appear for the company.

When I first read this I was very skeptical, as Flair probably could have got Reid straight into the WWE system with his connections, so why would he have joined an indie just to get him a spot. When Rey Mysterio returned to WWE it was fairly common knowlege that he was doing it to ensure that Dominik would get an opportunity to bypass the indies and train within WWE, so the idea that Flair couldn't do this initially felt suspect to me. At first I wondered if Flair might have felt that Reid should go through the indies because of what happened when David Flair was pushed straight onto Nitro and that didn't end well. Maybe that could have been Flairs approach? It turns out though that years later in a 30 for 30 documentary about Ric Flair, Triple H explained that Reid actually was on course to join WWE, but wasn't signed as he failed two drug tests, so maybe WWE just wasn't an option for the time being.

It's ironic in a way that the wrestler most famous for embodying the lifestyle of the rich and famous, the limousine riding, jet flying and all the rest son of a gun, famous for "living the gimmick", has been plagued by money troubles in the latter years of his life that grew more and more complicated. In researching Flair's life around this time I read some truly harrowing stories around his finances, his relationships, and even his health. They're out there if you choose to find them, but I don't want this to turn into Dark Side of the Ring. I'll instead leave you with a reminder of the amazing high's of Flair's long and successful time in the ring, because as the song chosen for Flair's retirement says, 'leave the memories alone.

Sources (that are directly referenced in the video)

Sorry line not planned https://talksport.com/sport/wrestling/692195/ric-flair-shawn-michaels-wwe-wrestlemania-2008-match/

Ric Flair on his time in Ring of Honor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agXGcnDWfmo

Flair saying he would never bad talk WWE and mentioning ROH in 2022: https://wrestlingnews.co/wwe-news/ric-flair-says-he-walked-out-on-roh-after-they-asked-him-to-bad-mouth-the-wwe

Highspots owner https://www.cagesideseats.com/2011/6/8/2213881/michael-bochicchio-of-highspots-talks-about-their-legal-dispute-with

ROH sues Flair https://bleacherreport.com/articles/335844-breaking-news-roh-sues-ric-flair

Highspots sues Flair https://www.cagesideseats.com/2010/8/3/1603875/highspots-sues-ric-flair-over-lack

Highspots sues Flair 2: https://www.cagesideseats.com/2011/5/26/2192312/tnas-ric-flair-charged-with-contempt-of-court-in-highspots-belt-case

PWInsider Reid: https://www.pwinsider.com/article/76485/reid-flair-passes-away.html?p=1

'The Wrestler in real life' profile: http://grantland.com/features/the-wrestler-real-life/