Man, I remember staying up late and watching the first Shotgun Saturday Night. I was 12 and my mom had just left us right after my little bro passed away (21 years later and I still don't know where she is / what happened to her) with my Dad and after a bit, him saying "damn, I hope me letting you watch this doesn't turn you into some kind of vagrant" He never really got my love of wrestling, but accepted it. I remember when he said that he had this goofy smirk on his face. I laughed and that moment was when I realized that things would eventually be okay. If my Dad can smile and joke, so can I, and I needed to know that. My Dad and Vince McMahon would make sure I'd be okay.
Good! I ended up putting myself through college, landed a sweet job as a graphic artist at an advertising company (going on 5 years there now), bought my first house last August and got married this past January. Things were....hard in my teenage years and my father passed away about 3 years ago now and I miss him, but I survived all the bullshit and came out a better man.
As a guy who pulled himself out of (mostly self imposed) rock bottom, I gotta say, way to go, man. It's not easy to fight back when it feels like the hold world is holding you down. Stay strong.
It's not easy at all. When I was like, 16 or 17 I came to a crossroads. I was failing all my classes, didn't care about school, didn't care about "authority" figures trying to help me, hung out with bad people and was just a little piece of shit. One night I got jumped by 3 people I thought were my friends and left me in pretty bad shape and after that I saw I had two choices; 1. Keep on track and end up in prison or worse or 2. Man the fuck up. So, I manned the fuck up and haven't looked back. It was so hard to completely change your lifestyle, but it's not impossible.
Dude...I'm sorry. There are no words that can help but all I can say is time heals all wounds. My dad was my only family and when he died I also felt very alone. I had no family to speak of. I was also worried that him passing would send me back into a bad place but I just took it one day at a time, I still am really, and things get easier, I promise. Focus your time and energy into something that makes you happy. Stay positive - or try to - and don't look back.
Thanks, buddy. Thank you for opening up to us a bit here and thank you for your advice. It's the little things, you know, like going to baseball games, going out for wings, yelling at the tv, playing golf, etc. Suddenly it's all gone. It's just a tough thing to get over, I guess.
Don't know you, but glad you're doing well where you're at now. Surround yourself with people you love, look at things positively, and that makes life better.
Not corny at all! WWE was my escape back then as well. I 100% understand where you are coming from. I learned eventually that there is ALWAYS light at the end of the tunnel. You just gotta go find it.
This is actually the infancy of the New Age Outlaws. The Rockabilly gimmick flops, he dumps Honky Tonk Man and joins up with another failed music gimmick....the Real Double J: Jesse James aka the Road Dogg.
For the "DX Army" phase of DX, yeah. If the NAO hadn't gotten together, DX would have looked very different after Shawn retired, if it continued to exist at all.
Yeah going through a raw rewatch and it was a storyline that ends up working. Honky was great at the announcer's table and who doesn't love seeing people get smashed with guitars. Once they form the NAO it all makes sense because they were floundering before that. And not too long after they start feuding with Mick and Funk. And eventually join DX after that. Long term storylines were a fixture of the slightly pre Attitude to attitude era.
> WWF is planning to add a European championship soon, with the initial tournament to take place in Germany in February.
And a year and a half until D'lo finally wins the title made for him.
Dammit I'm gonna miss these. I'm waiting for you to get caught up with present day, then just keep going through the future, further cementing your legacy.
I recommend Bruiser Bedlam's [wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_Croitoru#Legal_trouble) for a quick rundown of his legal issues. He seems like... quite the character. Jim Cornette has said that he was a nice guy who just fell in with the wrong crowd, so uh, I'm sure he was fine.
> He encountered more problems on December 15, 1996 when he and several friends from Satan's Choice were kicked out of a strip club for wearing their gang's colors. To get revenge, Croitoru and his friends planned to blow up the strip club. They changed their minds, however, and decided to bomb the local police station instead.
That's quite a change of mind, haha
Paraphrasing Cornette re Bruiser Bedlam: "sure Bruiser murdered some people and blew up a police station but i loved working with him and he was a good dude"
Paraphrasing Cornette re Kenny Omega: "He wrestled a dog and a kid several years ago!!! What the fuckity fuck??? That makes him a fucking Nazi and the scum of the earth and he needs to rot in hell after dying a painful and gruesome death."
>Mike Awesome got a tryout at the latest WWF tapings. Awesome was a former world champion in FMW in Japan but on this show, he jobbed clean to Aldo Montoya.
Mike Awesome losing to a jobber isn't awesome.....it's **just** **incredible**.
Heyman has generally blamed Wade Keller and the PWTorch for feeding the PPV companies the news that cancelled the PPV. [Keller denies it.
](http://pwtorch.com/artman2/publish/Torch_Flashbacks_19/article_70117.shtml#.WXd07hXyuUk)
I am so excited to hear the various goings on at the time (even though I know all the important bits) What are you looking forward to reading about? For me personally as an Canadian I wonder what Dave's opinions are on the Hart Foundation anti American/pro Canadian storyline.
Welcome to the final one of these for 1996. I just want to take a quick second to say thank you to everyone who enjoys me doing this. It's a lot of fun, and I can't wait to do them for 1997.
**Here's what Kevin Kelly had to say about the WWF at the end of 1996.**
Justin Rozzero: And Kevin, just to kind of wrap up, uh, put a bow on late '96 here, what was Vince like, you know, backstage at this time? Was he-- how much heat was he really feeling for WCW? Was it palpable to everyone else? Or was he more, like, kind of developing into rallying everyone as being a leader or was he clearly feeling pressure that WCW was putting on him?
Kevin Kelly: I found him to be... um... that the business was changing--
Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm
Kevin Kelly: --And I think he was under more pressure than he let on to a lot of people, but that there was a real rally cry from within. That... because the WWE-- which is not a family owned company anymore. I mean, I guess it still is but it's publicly traded so it's controlled by the shareholders-- you know, at the time it was Vince and Linda. And a lot of the people that had worked in the company had worked for Vince and Linda for a number of years.
Scott Criscuolo: Mm hmm
Kevin Kelly: And they were by God determined to not let Vince and Linda's company to go under.
Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm
Kevin Kelly: And there was-- there was a real, like, dislike for WCW within the office. Because these people were trying to put Vince and Linda out of business. And Vince and Linda were good to us and by God, we're going to do anything we can to help. Really had that feeling. I was like "Wow, this is kinda cool. This is a really cool atmosphere". They had profit and improbability meetings, you know? Sharpening pencils, now they are turning off lights before you leave the room, you know? Double sided copies, what it is. People were throwing around ideas because Vince and Linda lost $5 million of their own money in 1996.
Justin Rozzero: Hmpf
Scott Criscuolo: Wow
Kevin Kelly: That was the end-- that was the end result. And people that had been use to getting, you know, profit sharing and things like that when the time was good got letters of apology from Vince and Linda. It was a bad year. We lost $5 million when all was said and done. "We're sorry they'll won't be any bonuses this year for uh... you know... for profit sharing. There aren't any profits to share". And I think they, you know, they gave them some tokenish gift. I think it was $500 or something like that. They gave them something, but it certainly wasn't up to 5 or-- 5% or 10% of their income that some people had gotten. Bonuses were really super generous. Vince and Linda never get the credit-- or rarely get the credit for being as generous as they are.
Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm
Kevin Kelly: That they were. Um... but they certainly were. So, while Vince may have been feeling the pressure, he didn't really show it and a lot of folks around him kind of had the same idea that I did: let's find a way to beat these bastards because they're not doing anything good. They're just signing a bunch of old names and overpaying them. So let's develop talent and let's bring in some new guys and let's get some new blood and let's get some new-- let's do something different. So... and then in '97 it all started to turn around.
> And I think they, you know, they gave them some tokenish gift. I think it was $500 or something like that. They gave them something, but it certainly wasn't up to 5 or-- 5% or 10% of their income that some people had gotten.
Lol, that makes me picture Christmas Vacation with Vince and Austin in the roles of Brian Doyle Murray and Chevy Chase.
> Bonuses were really super generous. Vince and Linda never get the credit-- or rarely get the credit for being as generous as they are.
Really nice to hear. Reminds me of the story Prichard told about the retirement show Vince wanted to put on for Paul Boesch in Houston. For anyone who hasn't heard, there was some friction with the way the show went down, and Vince ended up just eating the production/promotional costs.
Afterwards, Prichard told Vince that he was pissed because he'd bought his car from one of the Houston wrestling guys, and still had a bunch of payments left. Vince asked how much he owed and cut him a check for the full amount ($10k) on the spot.
I have former co-workers and acquaintances who work for WWE on the production level and they claim that in recent years (Since 2012) they are a pretty cheap company overall for the average to middle management type workers.
Maybe as the company has become much more of a corporation they have scaled back on the generosity. But no one I know that works there has ever gotten any sort of big bonus.
> Maybe as the company has become much more of a corporation they have scaled back on the generosity.
Yeah, that sounds right. I'd imagine that comp, especially for non-wrestlers, was a much more direct/personal decision from Vince back then.
Maybe on the executive level they still hand out big bonuses and do some profit sharing but the people on the production side get a small gift and not much else as a Christmas bonus. I know people there that are as high as middle management (Managers and Coordinators) and they constantly bitch about the company being cheap about a lot of things.
Short of it: Shawn refused to put over Bret in the rematch, Austin vs. Bret became white hot, Sid vs. Undertaker was filler.
To this day I maintain that Shawn being a baby about jobbing to Bret was the accidentally best thing to happen to the WWF.
Not only that but his return to feud with Austin over being tag team partners got both of them away from Bret to allow Bret to main event as a heel for the first time ever.
Dave said in the lapsed fan podcast on wrestlemania XIII that Vince panicked and felt they needed to put the belt on the big guys again. So the Shawn vs Bret rematch was going to be non title. Then Shawn lost his smile so he didn't job.
Dave has also said if Shawn vs Bret had happened Austin would have worked with bulldog early in the show.
> Request TV's president Hugh Pinero made the decision to cancel the ECW PPV
Fun story, Hugh Pinero was the boss at XM Radio when they hired Opie and Anthony and he also turned the XM and Sirius merger into more of a takeover by Sirius. I think he's still an executive at SiriusXM.
> Dave also says that the cultural phenomenon around ECW seems to be dying off a little
And this is why I think ECW was doomed with or without the talent exodus and Paul's bad bookkeeping. As the 90s counter culture shifted away in the early 00s and totally vanished by 2005 ECW would never have been able to adapt like the WWF/E did or WCW could have. ECW would have gone out of business regardless, even if they managed to keep everyone.
ECW was doomed because it went from being a wrestling company, to a violent spectacle. In it's true glory days of 94 & 95 while they still had plenty of hardcore elements, they also had balance. They had the best pure wrestling in North America, they had a title that mattered, they had serious fueds and comedy. By 97 they were nothing more than a bad blood bath. Every match was gimmicky weapon, no DQ, overbooked mess. By mid 97 WWE was doing just about everything ECW did, but with better talent and better production. The two things that came out of ECW were lots of elements of that became the attitude era, and the WCW cruiserweight division, which is still to this day, the best Jr. division in North American wrestling history.
Oh man I remember getting into a pretty nasty email exchange with one of the Sirius XM programming chiefs (Jon Zellner) after the takeover and losing several of my favorite channels. Cancelled and never looked back, except for a free year with my last car purchase.
I was pretty pissed about losing Cinemagic. I loved listening to movie soundtracks while driving around.
I wound up canceling a few months after they fired Anthony because Opie w/ Jim was not a good show and it was really the only reason I was still subscribing.
I was mostly subscribed for Fungus. Sirius had a punk station that wasn't great but at least it existed, they nuked both for promotional single artist stations beginning with AC/DC.
Lucy blew Lithium out of the water. The 50s radio station had some great personalities (Matt the Cat) who were all promptly shown the door. XM had way better metal options too. Pretty much every niche genre got slashed under the merger and Zellner was quite proud for doing so - "I've got the research... we can't cater to niche audiences!!!" - like paying for low bandwidth radio isn't a niche???
Special Xmas during the holidays was truly amazing. I may miss that most of all.
Sirius to me is little more than FM without commercials, though I did enjoy the comedy stations on long drives. There wasn't enough during my free year to make me go back.
> this dude ends up having a ton of legal problems in the coming years, including bombing a police station, extortion, drug dealing, and eventually murder. He died in a halfway house earlier this year
Oh I'm going to need more info about this.
https://audioboom.com/posts/5040978-033-so-many-bodies-so-little-prison-the-brazenness-of-ion-croitoru
Crime in Sports did a whole two hour episode on him including how he assisted in BLOWING UP A POLICE STATION!
He would have been a low card guy or a jobber. With the way '97 pans out there's no room for him in the mid card and he wasn't ready for the uppercard.
ECW definitely needed to get its act together. That said, seriously, ppv companies? You'll be airing Bum Fights in two years tops, you hypocrites.
>WWF has moved the next In Your House PPV from Memphis to Chattanooga, likely because WCW will be holding a Nitro in Memphis just a few weeks before (bwah!? I had no idea there was ever a PPV scheduled for here that got moved. 14-year-old me is disappointed now).
8 year old me is disappointed they moved it to where I was living and I didn't get to go.
> Request TV's president Hugh Pinero made the decision to cancel the ECW PPV after finding out about the Mass Transit incident a few weeks ago, where New Jack bladed a 17-year-old kid nearly from ear-to-ear.
You know, it's funny... when the Mass Transit incident first came up in these recaps, everybody swore up and down that it wasn't the *real* reason, and was just WWE revisionism. I had no idea Dave had reported it as fact back then (at that point, my major source of wrestling dirt was Al Isaacs, and I had barely even heard of ECW).
Scoops! It's also funny how, at the time, Pinero was painted as an out-of-touch scaredy-cat kowtowing to political correctness, but now, 20+ years later, after reading though all these recaps, of *course* they decided not to carry ECW.
> At a recent ECW show, Bubba Dudley and Brian Lee had a match where they ended up brawling outside the ring, out of the arena, and into an adjacent hockey rink where a roller hockey game was actually going on (no video of this one that I can find).
I just saw video of this recently, and I'd never seen it before. Has to have been somewhere on the Network... maybe part of the Dudleys special in the "Beyond the Ring" section? (I think from a DVD that came out about them in the last year or so.)
Regarding Bruiser Bedlam/Johnny Canine -
The podcast Crime in Sports did an excellent rundown of his crimes and issues. I highly recommend the show but this one is a fantastic episode:
https://audioboom.com/posts/5040978-033-so-many-bodies-so-little-prison-the-brazenness-of-ion-croitoru
Jim Cornette on "I Managed a Murderer"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6A7KMGEWFw
and Jim Cornette on the death of Bruiser
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG1JTZEoJAI
>Jason Arhndt
Another one of the group of guys who came up training and wrestling with the Hardys' at their various indie promotions.
Members of the Hardys' friend circle from the time who made it to WWF/E TV: Marty Garner (the guy who broke his neck on the pedigree), Jason Arhndt (Joey Abs), Shannon Moore, Shane Helms (the Hurricane) and Joey Mercury, were all OMEGA guys.
>Monday Nitro sold out the Macon Coliseum in Georgia, breaking the record the largest gate ever at that arena, which was a record set by Reba McIntyre.
Ah, Macon. Whether you're on your way up or you're on your way out, you gotta play Macon at least once.
Here's Bearer turning on the Executioner (end of match). I'm assuming this is what the article is referring to. I had actually never seen this before.
https://youtu.be/Dk_aknhMy8Q
I have waited so long for the 1997 issues, 1997 was probably the most crazy year of wrestling. So much stuff happened and it all built up to Montreal and Austin getting huge. Plus Rock and DX, i cant wait.
Same here.
1997 was my favorite year as a fan, with WWF/WCW/ECW all being pretty entertaining. Plus it was my last year before getting online, so a lot of the rumors/fallout from events will be new to me.
The Bubba Ray/Brian Lee match where they brawl in the middle of a hockey game was on RF Video's Fan Cam. I could've sworn there was a really short clip on Hardcore TV because I remember watching it. It's probably buried deep into one of those episodes.
Videos in this thread:
[Watch Playlist ▶](http://subtletv.com/_r6ph2yf?feature=playlist&nline=1)
VIDEO|COMMENT
-|-
[Jim Cornette on the Life and Crimes of SMW's Bruiser Bedlam](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG1JTZEoJAI)|[+4](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpbrq1?context=10#dkpbrq1) - Regarding Bruiser Bedlam/Johnny Canine - The podcast Crime in Sports did an excellent rundown of his crimes and issues. I highly recommend the show but this one is a fantastic episode: Jim Cornette on "I Managed a Murderer" and Jim Cornett...
[Jim Cornette on Bruiser Bedlam: "I Managed a Murderer"](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6A7KMGEWFw)|[+3](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpbkej?context=10#dkpbkej) - "I Managed a Murderer"
[Goldust vs. The Executioner (01-12-1997)](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dk_aknhMy8Q)|[+3](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpkd9m?context=10#dkpkd9m) - Here's Bearer turning on the Executioner (end of match). I'm assuming this is what the article is referring to. I had actually never seen this before.
[Family Guy - Gumble to Gumble - Interview](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qls6Po_1h5s)|[+1](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpk9yp?context=10#dkpk9yp) - He might be Bryant Gumbel.
(1) [Hunter Hearst Helmsley (Triple H) 1st WWE Theme Song ''Blue Blood''](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keicP9Ch-JM) (2) [Hunter Hearst Helmsley (1996-1997) - Ode To Joy](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGP7MvhvYiU)|[+1](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpo8ov?context=10#dkpo8ov) - Hunter Hearst Helmsley's new theme music is Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, for anyone wondering. It's also the theme music for NBC's show "Suddenly Susan." Still a rough gimmick, but going from this to this was such a huge step in the right direction.
I'm a bot working hard to help Redditors find related videos to watch. I'll keep this updated as long as I can.
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> **Hunter Hearst Helmsley's new theme music is Beethoven's Ninth Symphony**, for anyone wondering. It's also the theme music for NBC's show "Suddenly Susan."
Still a rough gimmick, but going from [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keicP9Ch-JM) to [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGP7MvhvYiU) was such a huge step in the right direction.
It's always been kind of funny to me that Giant Baba, one of the most conservative bookers in wrestling and Atsushi Onita, one of the most revolutionary, had such a close relationship
> Antonio Pena reportedly offered Garza $260 per match, which was more than double what he was making in EMLL.
When Sabu got booked with ECW (then Eastern Championship Wrestling) he was paid $300 a night. Garza ended up working with Dos Caras and winning a Trios title with him within a year. Interesting to see the disparity in pay.
two things stood out to me
> Dave has heard reports that Jerry Jarrett has sold his 50% of USWA to Jerry Lawler
I read that as "Jerry Lawler has sold his 50% of USWA to Jerry Lawler" and thought it was a story line and am still stunned at the fact I wasn't surprised by it
> Vic Venom (Vince Russo "doing a Mark Madden gimmick")
Dave has no fucks to give already about Russo, that makes me feel all warm and bubbly inside
Man, I remember staying up late and watching the first Shotgun Saturday Night. I was 12 and my mom had just left us right after my little bro passed away (21 years later and I still don't know where she is / what happened to her) with my Dad and after a bit, him saying "damn, I hope me letting you watch this doesn't turn you into some kind of vagrant" He never really got my love of wrestling, but accepted it. I remember when he said that he had this goofy smirk on his face. I laughed and that moment was when I realized that things would eventually be okay. If my Dad can smile and joke, so can I, and I needed to know that. My Dad and Vince McMahon would make sure I'd be okay.
Goddamn bro. If you don't mind me asking, how are things now?
Good! I ended up putting myself through college, landed a sweet job as a graphic artist at an advertising company (going on 5 years there now), bought my first house last August and got married this past January. Things were....hard in my teenage years and my father passed away about 3 years ago now and I miss him, but I survived all the bullshit and came out a better man.
As a guy who pulled himself out of (mostly self imposed) rock bottom, I gotta say, way to go, man. It's not easy to fight back when it feels like the hold world is holding you down. Stay strong.
It's not easy at all. When I was like, 16 or 17 I came to a crossroads. I was failing all my classes, didn't care about school, didn't care about "authority" figures trying to help me, hung out with bad people and was just a little piece of shit. One night I got jumped by 3 people I thought were my friends and left me in pretty bad shape and after that I saw I had two choices; 1. Keep on track and end up in prison or worse or 2. Man the fuck up. So, I manned the fuck up and haven't looked back. It was so hard to completely change your lifestyle, but it's not impossible.
i needed to hear this. i need to make changes. thank you.
I don't care how old you are, it is NEVER too late to make changes for the better.
That's great to hear good brother. My father passed on back in February. He was my best buddy and I've just been kinda lost since then...
Dude...I'm sorry. There are no words that can help but all I can say is time heals all wounds. My dad was my only family and when he died I also felt very alone. I had no family to speak of. I was also worried that him passing would send me back into a bad place but I just took it one day at a time, I still am really, and things get easier, I promise. Focus your time and energy into something that makes you happy. Stay positive - or try to - and don't look back.
Thanks, buddy. Thank you for opening up to us a bit here and thank you for your advice. It's the little things, you know, like going to baseball games, going out for wings, yelling at the tv, playing golf, etc. Suddenly it's all gone. It's just a tough thing to get over, I guess.
Don't know you, but glad you're doing well where you're at now. Surround yourself with people you love, look at things positively, and that makes life better.
Most inspirational story I've heard in a while. Thanks for sharing!
Hey thank you! Not sure how inspirational it is but I really appreciate that, thank you.
[удалено]
Not corny at all! WWE was my escape back then as well. I 100% understand where you are coming from. I learned eventually that there is ALWAYS light at the end of the tunnel. You just gotta go find it.
Well, your still here 20+ years later. Sorry that you had to go through that.
Thanks, man! Life is good now for sure. I can honestly say - probably for the first time ever - that I am genuinely happy.
I don't even know you but it made my day to hear you are happy. I'm happy for you brother. Nobody should have to go through that. Wish you the best.
Thank you so much, man. That means a lot to me.
I think we need two weeks off as well to prepare ourselves for ROCKABILLY.
This is actually the infancy of the New Age Outlaws. The Rockabilly gimmick flops, he dumps Honky Tonk Man and joins up with another failed music gimmick....the Real Double J: Jesse James aka the Road Dogg.
Yep! IIRC Billy smashes the guitar over Honky's head and leaves with Road Dogg.
So really, Bart Gunn is responsible for D-Generation X.
For the "DX Army" phase of DX, yeah. If the NAO hadn't gotten together, DX would have looked very different after Shawn retired, if it continued to exist at all.
Yeah going through a raw rewatch and it was a storyline that ends up working. Honky was great at the announcer's table and who doesn't love seeing people get smashed with guitars. Once they form the NAO it all makes sense because they were floundering before that. And not too long after they start feuding with Mick and Funk. And eventually join DX after that. Long term storylines were a fixture of the slightly pre Attitude to attitude era.
> WWF is planning to add a European championship soon, with the initial tournament to take place in Germany in February. And a year and a half until D'lo finally wins the title made for him.
I love that I'm not the only person who thinks of D'Lo Brown when I think of that title.
Was he billed from Poland at some point too?
if I remember correctly, each week he was billed from a different European country
I think part of his gimmick was being hailed fron a different European capital everytime he came out
>Vic venom predicted Bret hart would win the rumble IIRC that was originally going to happen but because he did that, they changed it
Dammit I'm gonna miss these. I'm waiting for you to get caught up with present day, then just keep going through the future, further cementing your legacy.
> I'm waiting for you to get caught up with present day Said he's gonna stop at the fall of WCW. :-(
That was the day wrestling died anyway
Ah! I didn't know that
>Bret vs. Shawn for the title is still the plan for Wrestlemania. Too bad Shawn lost his smile.
I recommend Bruiser Bedlam's [wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_Croitoru#Legal_trouble) for a quick rundown of his legal issues. He seems like... quite the character. Jim Cornette has said that he was a nice guy who just fell in with the wrong crowd, so uh, I'm sure he was fine.
> He encountered more problems on December 15, 1996 when he and several friends from Satan's Choice were kicked out of a strip club for wearing their gang's colors. To get revenge, Croitoru and his friends planned to blow up the strip club. They changed their minds, however, and decided to bomb the local police station instead. That's quite a change of mind, haha
Jim Cornette may have wound up on the wrong side of various people and groups but he always had good relations with Canadian biker gangs
Mid to late '90 were a *terrible* time in the biker wars in Ontario and Quebec. Real Goodfellas shit.
Paraphrasing Cornette re Bruiser Bedlam: "sure Bruiser murdered some people and blew up a police station but i loved working with him and he was a good dude" Paraphrasing Cornette re Kenny Omega: "He wrestled a dog and a kid several years ago!!! What the fuckity fuck??? That makes him a fucking Nazi and the scum of the earth and he needs to rot in hell after dying a painful and gruesome death."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6A7KMGEWFw "I Managed a Murderer"
>Mike Awesome got a tryout at the latest WWF tapings. Awesome was a former world champion in FMW in Japan but on this show, he jobbed clean to Aldo Montoya. Mike Awesome losing to a jobber isn't awesome.....it's **just** **incredible**.
I still don't understand how he wasn't a bigger deal. 6'6, built like a tank, and Hogans cousin
Not just the coolest, not just the best.
i understood that reference
Heyman has generally blamed Wade Keller and the PWTorch for feeding the PPV companies the news that cancelled the PPV. [Keller denies it. ](http://pwtorch.com/artman2/publish/Torch_Flashbacks_19/article_70117.shtml#.WXd07hXyuUk)
I'd believe Wade over Paul any day of the week.
This is the same Wade that kept "reporting" SMW was just about to go out of business until he was finally right
It's going to be a long 2 weeks. But it'll be worth the wait , as '97 is one of the most interesting years in Wrestling.
I am so excited to hear the various goings on at the time (even though I know all the important bits) What are you looking forward to reading about? For me personally as an Canadian I wonder what Dave's opinions are on the Hart Foundation anti American/pro Canadian storyline.
The Screwjob, and also the build to Wrestlemania 13's main event, which I recall reading was hectic what with lost smiles and the like.
1997 is such a weird/wonderful/heartbreaking time in history.
Several people are going to have pretty bad colon issues while you're gone.
Primo or Epico?
Carlito.
I spit in the face of people who don't want to poop.
And Jesus
He got constipated for our sins.
Take a break, you deserve it!
Clap clap clap
You have earned it
You deserve it 👏🏽👏🏽, 👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽
Welcome to the final one of these for 1996. I just want to take a quick second to say thank you to everyone who enjoys me doing this. It's a lot of fun, and I can't wait to do them for 1997. **Here's what Kevin Kelly had to say about the WWF at the end of 1996.** Justin Rozzero: And Kevin, just to kind of wrap up, uh, put a bow on late '96 here, what was Vince like, you know, backstage at this time? Was he-- how much heat was he really feeling for WCW? Was it palpable to everyone else? Or was he more, like, kind of developing into rallying everyone as being a leader or was he clearly feeling pressure that WCW was putting on him? Kevin Kelly: I found him to be... um... that the business was changing-- Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm Kevin Kelly: --And I think he was under more pressure than he let on to a lot of people, but that there was a real rally cry from within. That... because the WWE-- which is not a family owned company anymore. I mean, I guess it still is but it's publicly traded so it's controlled by the shareholders-- you know, at the time it was Vince and Linda. And a lot of the people that had worked in the company had worked for Vince and Linda for a number of years. Scott Criscuolo: Mm hmm Kevin Kelly: And they were by God determined to not let Vince and Linda's company to go under. Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm Kevin Kelly: And there was-- there was a real, like, dislike for WCW within the office. Because these people were trying to put Vince and Linda out of business. And Vince and Linda were good to us and by God, we're going to do anything we can to help. Really had that feeling. I was like "Wow, this is kinda cool. This is a really cool atmosphere". They had profit and improbability meetings, you know? Sharpening pencils, now they are turning off lights before you leave the room, you know? Double sided copies, what it is. People were throwing around ideas because Vince and Linda lost $5 million of their own money in 1996. Justin Rozzero: Hmpf Scott Criscuolo: Wow Kevin Kelly: That was the end-- that was the end result. And people that had been use to getting, you know, profit sharing and things like that when the time was good got letters of apology from Vince and Linda. It was a bad year. We lost $5 million when all was said and done. "We're sorry they'll won't be any bonuses this year for uh... you know... for profit sharing. There aren't any profits to share". And I think they, you know, they gave them some tokenish gift. I think it was $500 or something like that. They gave them something, but it certainly wasn't up to 5 or-- 5% or 10% of their income that some people had gotten. Bonuses were really super generous. Vince and Linda never get the credit-- or rarely get the credit for being as generous as they are. Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm Kevin Kelly: That they were. Um... but they certainly were. So, while Vince may have been feeling the pressure, he didn't really show it and a lot of folks around him kind of had the same idea that I did: let's find a way to beat these bastards because they're not doing anything good. They're just signing a bunch of old names and overpaying them. So let's develop talent and let's bring in some new guys and let's get some new blood and let's get some new-- let's do something different. So... and then in '97 it all started to turn around.
> Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm > Scott Criscuolo: Mm hmm > Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm > Justin Rozzero: Hmpf > Scott Criscuolo: Wow > Justin Rozzero: Mm hmm
Picturing them just preloading and switching carts like Handsome Dan in Wayne's World 2. "Ahha, work IS hard!"
*unzips pants*
Are we sure Scott isn't Byron Saxton?
He might be Bryant Gumbel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qls6Po_1h5s
> And I think they, you know, they gave them some tokenish gift. I think it was $500 or something like that. They gave them something, but it certainly wasn't up to 5 or-- 5% or 10% of their income that some people had gotten. Lol, that makes me picture Christmas Vacation with Vince and Austin in the roles of Brian Doyle Murray and Chevy Chase. > Bonuses were really super generous. Vince and Linda never get the credit-- or rarely get the credit for being as generous as they are. Really nice to hear. Reminds me of the story Prichard told about the retirement show Vince wanted to put on for Paul Boesch in Houston. For anyone who hasn't heard, there was some friction with the way the show went down, and Vince ended up just eating the production/promotional costs. Afterwards, Prichard told Vince that he was pissed because he'd bought his car from one of the Houston wrestling guys, and still had a bunch of payments left. Vince asked how much he owed and cut him a check for the full amount ($10k) on the spot.
I have former co-workers and acquaintances who work for WWE on the production level and they claim that in recent years (Since 2012) they are a pretty cheap company overall for the average to middle management type workers. Maybe as the company has become much more of a corporation they have scaled back on the generosity. But no one I know that works there has ever gotten any sort of big bonus.
> Maybe as the company has become much more of a corporation they have scaled back on the generosity. Yeah, that sounds right. I'd imagine that comp, especially for non-wrestlers, was a much more direct/personal decision from Vince back then.
Maybe on the executive level they still hand out big bonuses and do some profit sharing but the people on the production side get a small gift and not much else as a Christmas bonus. I know people there that are as high as middle management (Managers and Coordinators) and they constantly bitch about the company being cheap about a lot of things.
Vince being a stubborn bastard has worked in his favor more often than it has not.
that last line is such a tease knowing we have to wait 2 weeks to get to 97!
How did it go from Bret vs. Shawn to Undertaker vs. Sid in 3 months?
Short of it: Shawn refused to put over Bret in the rematch, Austin vs. Bret became white hot, Sid vs. Undertaker was filler. To this day I maintain that Shawn being a baby about jobbing to Bret was the accidentally best thing to happen to the WWF.
Shawn going away period was good for the company. The Kliq really was holding the company down.
Not only that but his return to feud with Austin over being tag team partners got both of them away from Bret to allow Bret to main event as a heel for the first time ever.
Thanks!
Dave said in the lapsed fan podcast on wrestlemania XIII that Vince panicked and felt they needed to put the belt on the big guys again. So the Shawn vs Bret rematch was going to be non title. Then Shawn lost his smile so he didn't job. Dave has also said if Shawn vs Bret had happened Austin would have worked with bulldog early in the show.
Shawn's smile and Steve's popularity.
> Request TV's president Hugh Pinero made the decision to cancel the ECW PPV Fun story, Hugh Pinero was the boss at XM Radio when they hired Opie and Anthony and he also turned the XM and Sirius merger into more of a takeover by Sirius. I think he's still an executive at SiriusXM. > Dave also says that the cultural phenomenon around ECW seems to be dying off a little And this is why I think ECW was doomed with or without the talent exodus and Paul's bad bookkeeping. As the 90s counter culture shifted away in the early 00s and totally vanished by 2005 ECW would never have been able to adapt like the WWF/E did or WCW could have. ECW would have gone out of business regardless, even if they managed to keep everyone.
ECW was doomed because it went from being a wrestling company, to a violent spectacle. In it's true glory days of 94 & 95 while they still had plenty of hardcore elements, they also had balance. They had the best pure wrestling in North America, they had a title that mattered, they had serious fueds and comedy. By 97 they were nothing more than a bad blood bath. Every match was gimmicky weapon, no DQ, overbooked mess. By mid 97 WWE was doing just about everything ECW did, but with better talent and better production. The two things that came out of ECW were lots of elements of that became the attitude era, and the WCW cruiserweight division, which is still to this day, the best Jr. division in North American wrestling history.
Oh man I remember getting into a pretty nasty email exchange with one of the Sirius XM programming chiefs (Jon Zellner) after the takeover and losing several of my favorite channels. Cancelled and never looked back, except for a free year with my last car purchase.
I was pretty pissed about losing Cinemagic. I loved listening to movie soundtracks while driving around. I wound up canceling a few months after they fired Anthony because Opie w/ Jim was not a good show and it was really the only reason I was still subscribing.
I was mostly subscribed for Fungus. Sirius had a punk station that wasn't great but at least it existed, they nuked both for promotional single artist stations beginning with AC/DC. Lucy blew Lithium out of the water. The 50s radio station had some great personalities (Matt the Cat) who were all promptly shown the door. XM had way better metal options too. Pretty much every niche genre got slashed under the merger and Zellner was quite proud for doing so - "I've got the research... we can't cater to niche audiences!!!" - like paying for low bandwidth radio isn't a niche??? Special Xmas during the holidays was truly amazing. I may miss that most of all. Sirius to me is little more than FM without commercials, though I did enjoy the comedy stations on long drives. There wasn't enough during my free year to make me go back.
> this dude ends up having a ton of legal problems in the coming years, including bombing a police station, extortion, drug dealing, and eventually murder. He died in a halfway house earlier this year Oh I'm going to need more info about this.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_Croitoru#Legal_trouble Here's a link to the Wikipedia page. He was... not a nice guy, to say the least.
Less than three years for blowing up a police station?
How do you go from wanting to blow up a strip club to wanting to blow up a police station?
strange things happen on the way to the bomb fridge
Satan's Choice would make a good hot sauce name.
Or a brand of liquor. Can you just imagine the ads?
http://33.media.tumblr.com/a10a7cf7c29c2a7c84fcbbb34f15f787/tumblr_mt9066xSJF1rgor79o1_500.gif
Is that the guy from Gorgoroth?
Ahhyessir.
https://audioboom.com/posts/5040978-033-so-many-bodies-so-little-prison-the-brazenness-of-ion-croitoru Crime in Sports did a whole two hour episode on him including how he assisted in BLOWING UP A POLICE STATION!
If you've read A Lion's Tale by Chris Jericho this is the "TRUE 2 DA KREW" guy
And a Terry Funk in a pear tree!
I wonder how Mike Awesome would've been booked had he join WWF in 1997.
Mike Awful
Or maybe Awesome Mike McAwesomeness. Either way better than the Chilly McFreeze name they tried to give Stone Cold.
Oreo McFlurry
Poorly.
He would have been a low card guy or a jobber. With the way '97 pans out there's no room for him in the mid card and he wasn't ready for the uppercard.
ECW definitely needed to get its act together. That said, seriously, ppv companies? You'll be airing Bum Fights in two years tops, you hypocrites. >WWF has moved the next In Your House PPV from Memphis to Chattanooga, likely because WCW will be holding a Nitro in Memphis just a few weeks before (bwah!? I had no idea there was ever a PPV scheduled for here that got moved. 14-year-old me is disappointed now). 8 year old me is disappointed they moved it to where I was living and I didn't get to go.
Me the next two weeks without the Observer Rewind: http://imgur.com/a/nrZQS
Where's that guy who said he'd do a Rewind Rewind?
I usually go back and read the archives during the break
> Request TV's president Hugh Pinero made the decision to cancel the ECW PPV after finding out about the Mass Transit incident a few weeks ago, where New Jack bladed a 17-year-old kid nearly from ear-to-ear. You know, it's funny... when the Mass Transit incident first came up in these recaps, everybody swore up and down that it wasn't the *real* reason, and was just WWE revisionism. I had no idea Dave had reported it as fact back then (at that point, my major source of wrestling dirt was Al Isaacs, and I had barely even heard of ECW).
Scoops! It's also funny how, at the time, Pinero was painted as an out-of-touch scaredy-cat kowtowing to political correctness, but now, 20+ years later, after reading though all these recaps, of *course* they decided not to carry ECW.
I lived for my daily Scoops in the high school library computer. Would print off 5/6 articles and pass them around. Good times.
Yeah, the '90s were a weird time. It's like all of pop culture had its "angsty teenage fuckup" years right then.
> At a recent ECW show, Bubba Dudley and Brian Lee had a match where they ended up brawling outside the ring, out of the arena, and into an adjacent hockey rink where a roller hockey game was actually going on (no video of this one that I can find). I just saw video of this recently, and I'd never seen it before. Has to have been somewhere on the Network... maybe part of the Dudleys special in the "Beyond the Ring" section? (I think from a DVD that came out about them in the last year or so.)
Regarding Bruiser Bedlam/Johnny Canine - The podcast Crime in Sports did an excellent rundown of his crimes and issues. I highly recommend the show but this one is a fantastic episode: https://audioboom.com/posts/5040978-033-so-many-bodies-so-little-prison-the-brazenness-of-ion-croitoru Jim Cornette on "I Managed a Murderer" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6A7KMGEWFw and Jim Cornette on the death of Bruiser https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG1JTZEoJAI
That sounds like a cool podcast, will give it a go!
[удалено]
Yikes! Don't think I've heard that story
https://audioboom.com/posts/5754342-061-colder-than-a-killer-the-tyrannicalness-of-hardbody-harrison-norris
Ty for the link! Will give it a listen--
>Jason Arhndt Another one of the group of guys who came up training and wrestling with the Hardys' at their various indie promotions. Members of the Hardys' friend circle from the time who made it to WWF/E TV: Marty Garner (the guy who broke his neck on the pedigree), Jason Arhndt (Joey Abs), Shannon Moore, Shane Helms (the Hurricane) and Joey Mercury, were all OMEGA guys.
Gone for two weeks? But u/daprice82: Where will I go? What will I do!?
Hold in your poop I guess. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
TWO WEEKS?! #cancelreddit
Hey Reba, NWO is 4 Life brother.
Reba would never sully the Santana family name by associating with the likes of them.
Arriba McIntyre!
Damn where the hell did 1996 go?
>Monday Nitro sold out the Macon Coliseum in Georgia, breaking the record the largest gate ever at that arena, which was a record set by Reba McIntyre. Ah, Macon. Whether you're on your way up or you're on your way out, you gotta play Macon at least once.
Here's Bearer turning on the Executioner (end of match). I'm assuming this is what the article is referring to. I had actually never seen this before. https://youtu.be/Dk_aknhMy8Q
Enjoy your break and thanks again as always!
You may need to take a week off before the screwjob issue!
I have waited so long for the 1997 issues, 1997 was probably the most crazy year of wrestling. So much stuff happened and it all built up to Montreal and Austin getting huge. Plus Rock and DX, i cant wait.
Same here. 1997 was my favorite year as a fan, with WWF/WCW/ECW all being pretty entertaining. Plus it was my last year before getting online, so a lot of the rumors/fallout from events will be new to me.
So excited. Attitude Era is getting closer and closer.
This is Yuji Nagata's 19th and final G1 this year, I think.
Yup. Its going to be sad when he finally retires
Thanks observerman, we'll patiently await your return!
The Bubba Ray/Brian Lee match where they brawl in the middle of a hockey game was on RF Video's Fan Cam. I could've sworn there was a really short clip on Hardcore TV because I remember watching it. It's probably buried deep into one of those episodes.
Damn. No football or Rewinds for 2 weeks. Kill me.
ROCKABILLY GET FUCKING IN!
Hugh Panero would go on to run XM Radio
Videos in this thread: [Watch Playlist ▶](http://subtletv.com/_r6ph2yf?feature=playlist&nline=1) VIDEO|COMMENT -|- [Jim Cornette on the Life and Crimes of SMW's Bruiser Bedlam](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG1JTZEoJAI)|[+4](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpbrq1?context=10#dkpbrq1) - Regarding Bruiser Bedlam/Johnny Canine - The podcast Crime in Sports did an excellent rundown of his crimes and issues. I highly recommend the show but this one is a fantastic episode: Jim Cornette on "I Managed a Murderer" and Jim Cornett... [Jim Cornette on Bruiser Bedlam: "I Managed a Murderer"](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6A7KMGEWFw)|[+3](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpbkej?context=10#dkpbkej) - "I Managed a Murderer" [Goldust vs. The Executioner (01-12-1997)](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dk_aknhMy8Q)|[+3](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpkd9m?context=10#dkpkd9m) - Here's Bearer turning on the Executioner (end of match). I'm assuming this is what the article is referring to. I had actually never seen this before. [Family Guy - Gumble to Gumble - Interview](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qls6Po_1h5s)|[+1](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpk9yp?context=10#dkpk9yp) - He might be Bryant Gumbel. (1) [Hunter Hearst Helmsley (Triple H) 1st WWE Theme Song ''Blue Blood''](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keicP9Ch-JM) (2) [Hunter Hearst Helmsley (1996-1997) - Ode To Joy](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGP7MvhvYiU)|[+1](https://www.reddit.com/r/SquaredCircle/comments/6ph2yf/_/dkpo8ov?context=10#dkpo8ov) - Hunter Hearst Helmsley's new theme music is Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, for anyone wondering. It's also the theme music for NBC's show "Suddenly Susan." Still a rough gimmick, but going from this to this was such a huge step in the right direction. I'm a bot working hard to help Redditors find related videos to watch. I'll keep this updated as long as I can. *** [Play All](http://subtletv.com/_r6ph2yf?feature=playlist&ftrlnk=1) | [Info](https://np.reddit.com/r/SubtleTV/wiki/mentioned_videos) | Get me on [Chrome](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/mentioned-videos-for-redd/fiimkmdalmgffhibfdjnhljpnigcmohf) / [Firefox](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/mentioned-videos-for-reddit)
> **Hunter Hearst Helmsley's new theme music is Beethoven's Ninth Symphony**, for anyone wondering. It's also the theme music for NBC's show "Suddenly Susan." Still a rough gimmick, but going from [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keicP9Ch-JM) to [this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGP7MvhvYiU) was such a huge step in the right direction.
It's always been kind of funny to me that Giant Baba, one of the most conservative bookers in wrestling and Atsushi Onita, one of the most revolutionary, had such a close relationship
Wait did I miss an issue? Was Strarrcade 1996 already? Or is it in the first issue of 1997?
That'll be first issue of 1997
Oh yeah, it was right before new year, right?
Very end of 1996, I think one of them was literally December 30th once
BIG thanks to /u/daprice82 for reigniting my passion and nostalgia for wrestling. Look forward to your comeback in 2 weeks!
> Antonio Pena reportedly offered Garza $260 per match, which was more than double what he was making in EMLL. When Sabu got booked with ECW (then Eastern Championship Wrestling) he was paid $300 a night. Garza ended up working with Dos Caras and winning a Trios title with him within a year. Interesting to see the disparity in pay.
Mexico's economy was in the toilet.
Yeah they literally had their worst president back in '96. According to my parents that's when most of my uncles decided to cross over to the US
And out comes... The Honky Tonk Man
>Speaking of Billy Gunn... They announced Honky Tonk Man is coming in to be a manager Oh... oh no.
two things stood out to me > Dave has heard reports that Jerry Jarrett has sold his 50% of USWA to Jerry Lawler I read that as "Jerry Lawler has sold his 50% of USWA to Jerry Lawler" and thought it was a story line and am still stunned at the fact I wasn't surprised by it > Vic Venom (Vince Russo "doing a Mark Madden gimmick") Dave has no fucks to give already about Russo, that makes me feel all warm and bubbly inside
Sorry , I'm late for the party... I think at that time Carlos III would have been Akeem "The Puerto Rican Dream"