OO Column: Online Onslaught by Rick Scaia (Pro Wrestling News, Analysis, and Commentary... WWE, WWF, WCW, ECW, The Rock, Brock Lesnar, Triple H, Rob Van Dam, Hulk Hogan, Undertaker, Trish Stratus, Lita, Stacy Keibler, Divas, RAW, SmackDown, WrestleMania

ONLINE ONSLAUGHT
RAW, Injury Updates, TNA TV Confusion,
Nash Steals the Show?, and MORE
June 1, 2005

by Rick Scaia
Exclusive to OnlineOnslaught.com

I can't seem to go more than a week without patting myself on the back for what a terribly clever and intelligent man I am, but I've spent the last 24 hours or so feeling very dumb. To wit: while out conducting my daily business yesterday, my travels took me past one of Dayton's Generic Protestant Gathering Places. I hesitate to call them "Churches," on the grounds that they tend to look more like school buildings than places of worship, and also tend to have names like "APEX Faith Systems, Incorporated" instead of like "St. Peter's Bad-ass Cathedral." But I digress....
My point is that another of the distinguishing characteristics of these Gathering Places are the signs in front with a daily message for motorists driving past. Sometimes a bible verse, sometimes a shout-out to a parishioner, and sometimes a silly little pun or joke with evangelical overtones. You know the basic idea: it's
just like the Church Sign Gag on "The Simpsons," except never quite that funny. Still: funny or not, I always "get it." I may think it's a billion kinds of stupid, and that it's not even remotely humorous, but I always understand the INTENDED joke. Until yesterday. The gathering place in question is actually located on the corner of a major intersection a bit south of town, and I got stuck at a red light for about 3 cycles of the light changing. And the fact that I was staring at this stupid church sign the whole time, knowing that it was clearly a pun of some kind, but not being able to comprehend its underpinnings? I felt like I was being mocked. Is the pun so retarded that it's a GOOD thing that I don't get it? Am I really getting dumber? Is generic protestantism suddenly hiring writers so witty that their jokes go right over my head? Or am I just such a heathen that I'm out of touch with religion, and don't know some of their secret lingo? For close to a good five minutes, I sat there feeling miserable that I could not decipher the intended humor or wisdom behind this phrase: "The best vitamin for a Christian is B1." [That is verbatim, and I should know considering how long I was staring at the thing.] "Be one"? That interpretation would not only be a grammatical and logical nightmare, but it's also neither funny nor particularly apropos ("being one," presumably with the Cosmos, is more an Eastern philosophy dealy than something that makes sense for bible-thumping hillbillies). "Bwun?" That's not a word, near as I can tell (and I also can't see organized religion ever resorting to Idiot Internet Chatspeak -- like "God is gr8, and Jesus was 2 hot! 4 reel! a/s/l? lol!" -- anyway). Or was it not a joke at all, but just an honest suggestion to passers-by to eat more carrots (unless you're Jewish or Muslim or something else, for then, I guess you have no need for good nutrition) for some reason? I'm honestly baffled, folks. If you have any insights, I wanna hear them. Am I over-reacting, and is there really NOT a joke here? Please, if that is your belief, let me know so that I can stop worrying that I've been outsmarted by organized religion.... or if you're on the other side of the fence and can't believe I'm so braindead that I don't get the obvious humor, then please fill me in! Only then can the learning (and the healing) begin. That request duly made, I think now it's time that I quit rambling and get to bidness: The standard place to start on Wednesdays is with RAW Talk, so let's not buck tradition... and since I got the day off yesterday (to drive around town being taunted by Christianity, apparently) thanks to Erin handling recap duty, I figure I might have an excuse to talk a little bit more about RAW than usual. I think there's probably only one area in which I'd deviate from the Broad's published analysis. And although that might seem a minor thing, the end result does have me being a bit more positive about the overall show than she was. Namely, I thought the show ended on a reasonably tolerable note. Not a really creative note, certainly not the note that I would have plucked out on my Fantasy Booking Guitar... but a note that is largely inoffensive. Actually, not to do my silly thing of running with a theme, but it's a deal where -- just like most church sign humor -- even if I don't really LIKE it, I definitely "get it.' In this case, that means HHH establishing the "if you beat a dog, he either becomes submissive or becomes more violent" thing earlier, and then Batista going out in the main event and positively brutalizing Hassan and Daivari in convincing fashion. No submissive puppydog is Dave. Now, in a perfect world, HHH would never have cut that promo, because he wouldn't be back on TV yet, and Batista's drama would still be swirling around his relationship with Ric Flair (leading up to Flair manipulating Batista into taking a match against HHH, and THEN turning on him after the turn would actually have meant something). But given that WWE seems to have a biological need to do things as lamely as possible, they came up with this alternate vision for the storyline... and what the hell? I'll go ahead and give them credit for executing a lame plan reasonably competently on Monday night. It's not as cool as if they'd gone down a different path and executed a Cool Plan, but Batista beating the bloody hell out of the Ay-rabs (while still managing to protect Hassan's unbeaten streak) is a decent pay-off to a HHH interview that, even if unnecessary, pretty clearly spelled out the best way for Batista to end the night looking like a bad-ass. Obvious ending or not, at least we GOT that ending for Big Dave on Monday... Contrast that with the last time HHH cut some dumb promo introducing some flaccidly one-dimensional concept... because when HHH spent a few weeks talking about the Extremely Awesome and Unbeatable Pedigree of Awesomely Extreme Unbeatability, that (much like HHH's promo on Monday) wasn't the direction the storyline should have gone in, but at least it seemed like it was leading us to a desirable conclusion: namely, that Batista would kick out of the Pedigree and HHH would have to shut the fuck up. So of course, what happens? The kick-out from the Pedigree never happens at Backlash, which robs Batista of "A Moment,' and makes all HHH's windbaggery even lamer, retroactively. You'll have to pardon me still having that memory fresh, and thus, being able to appreciate that WWE actually did deliver the necessary and expected Big Finish for Batista on Monday. And you kids know how I am: as long as I like the finish of a show, I'll be a bit more forgiving about other missteps, so I'm guessing this is why I can't muster quite as much venom as Erin did in the recap. [OK, so I'm not TOTALLY sanguine about the finish, but I'm also intent on not just across-the-board agreeing-with-Erin for once. The long-not-awaited return of "I'm onto you, The Rick: The Broad is your pseudonym that you created as a marketing ploy to appeal to wrestling's Young Male Demographic, and this time, you didn't do a very good job hiding it" e-mail after her recap yesterday has me convinced this is necessary. Since surely, I'm not so insane as to argue with myself, am I? But truth be told, I do think the creative team could have MASSIVELY improved the final segment with one simple tweak: instead of having Lawler and JR anviliciously explaining the "scalded dog" element from HHH's promo, you have them just spend the beatdown in Total Awe of Batista's vicious streak... and then, to end the show, you give Batista the mic. He doesn't have to say much, but DAVE should have been the one to explain that he was sending a message to HHH, and as a bonus, he could have closed with a bad-ass veiled threat with regards to not wanting to wait till Hell in the Cell to do horrible things to HHH.... "See you next week, Hunter" (in a calm, collected, almost good-humored voice, maybe even with a friendly smile, in stark contrast to the brutality on display moments prior) would have been such a sweet-ass way to close out with Batista looking strong, like this was all just part of a premeditated plan, while also creating a "cliffhangy" ending to make people curious about what OTHER plans Batista might have in store for HHH. The ending they did, for the sake of contrariness, was plenty adequate... but just because I can't find the Off Position on the Genius Switch, I must cop to thinking this little idea for an ending would have been significantly awesomer.] Other parts of the show: The opening segment was a fun one. Not without it's elements of soul-crushing stupidity, but fun by the end. And again, here's me with my "all's well that ends well" fetish. Granted, the appearance by Viscera was somewhere between eyeball-roll-inducing and stomach-churning (this continues to be a Not Very Funny gimmick, and for added excitement this week, we've added Kidnapping to the list of things Big Vis has done wrong in recent weeks; so Viscera not only offended the part of me that has no patience for shitty alleged comedy, he also managed to rub my Chivalry Gene the wrong way; it's a lose/lose situation pretty much any time Viscera shows up on TV). But other than that, the bikini contest element was just a very quick little canvas upon which to paint Victoria's "heel turn." I think they only part of said canvas that I'd turn my nose up at was when Boobies McTitsalot busted out her GoDaddy.com dance; her 15 minutes were up by the Pro Bowl, and America has collectively decided to forget she even exists, and yet, the unsexy dance lives on! It's not quite funny, and more slightly sad: it's as pitiably anachronistic as if X-Pac was still busting out Crotchchops here in the Year of Our Lord 2005...... d'oh, whoops... Anyway, about Victoria's "heel turn"... I'm guessing about the only people surprised by fan reaction to Victoria's savaging of the Useless Divas was probably the creative team. Because unlike certain exceptionally-insightful websites, WWE has still not arrived at the conclusion that between "hot chicks" and "hot chicks who are good at something," most fans with a pulse will cheer for "hot chicks who are good at something." Not a single girl beaten by Victoria has ever shown fans the ability to be good at anything. And don't even get me started on Lawler: I actually saw the sac-kick coming a mile away, but that still didn't make it any less satisfying! I'm sure that, somewhere out there in the braindead interweb, some jack-off is blaming Canada for the bizarro response to Victoria, but I honestly think that they'll face much the same fan reaction in the States. I think that reaction may only become more pronounced when they let Spaz win the inevitable feud... I may not be one to say anything but spiteful things about "American Idol," but I really did love Erin's Victoria/Spaz vs. Bo/Carrie comparison in the recap (that most people will be cheering for the right person to win, but in the end, somehow the less deserving person will come out on top against all odds and all good sense). But in an attempt to show I'm not COMPLETELY retarded when it comes to pop culture, I'll even go the Broad one better and draw the analogy out further: because just like Bo finishing second is actually better for him (by my understanding, this means he's not obligated to put out nearly as many shitty AI-sanctioned albums, and might actually proceed to rocking before this decade is out, and he wins just by making it that far while being so visibly and audibly different from the crap that surrounded him), Victoria losing a feud to Spaz will actually be better for her in the long run, too (because turning heel and recreating her old and more marketable psycho persona is what really matters here, and even if she "loses" to Spaz, she'll win by just out of all those awful Useless Diva skits and by once again being demonstrably different and multi-faceted as compared to the crap that surrounds her). Once Trish is back and done with Lita, it's good to know there'll be somebody else waiting for her to feud with... and Trish/Victoria churned out a rather excellent feud back about 2 years ago. Consider losing to Spaz to be Victoria's obligatory album produced by American Idol that people will absorb and then forget because of it's shittiness; consider the prospects for a run at Trish down the line to be Victoria's first substantial and enjoyable act once out from under The Suck. Note to Erin about Diva Theme Music: you must have me confused with Hocking... he's the one who wrote the overly-charitable CD review of "WWE Originals" last year, but picked all the wrong songs to be charitable towards. I liked Lillian Garcia's song, dammit! It was one of MAYBE three songs I decided to bother singling out for modest praise when I felt compelled to do a mini-rebuttal CD review, and stood as my favorite and most-listenable-with-a-straight-face one on what basically amounted to a novelty record. Better than the Hives? I won't go that crazy, but Lillian's entrance theme is quite good, especially by WWE in-house standards. [On another entrance theme note: I heartily endorse Batista's re-mix. Not only did they finally ungenericize it with instruments that sound like they might be real instead of presets on a keyboard, but they also realized "hey, if this guy is our champion," maybe he better have an entrance at least HALF as well-thought-out as Mega-Tool Chris Masters'." So yay on drum breaks and choreographed pyro and all that. Plus, as an added bonus, there was a new little pre-chorus mini-riff in Batista's remix that reminds me vividly of Alice in Chains' "Junkhead." This is not a bad thing. It's not a track that reinvents the wheel, it's really just a marginal change from the old version; and once I hear the lyrics, I reserve the right to bitch up a storm; but I also don't think there's any denying that this represents an obvious Upgrade for Batista. He actually has an entrance, now, instead of some track off a Public Domain Background Music CD! And he only had to be champion for 2 months to get it! Way to be, WWE!] The tag title match was bleh. I like HurriRosey, and I get a perverse kick out of the Heartthobs, especially since they really seemed to tweak things a bit and are presenting them as obnoxiously metrosexual toolboxes who, as a result, are doomed to forever strike out with the chicks (more a "Roxbury" vibe, as was my very first request for the gimmick, rather than the more predictable and less-enjoyable options of Ambiguous Gayness or Actual Worldclass Poonhounditude). Yet, when you have tag champs defending titles against a team with no reason to have a title shot (and don't tell me "it was on Heat"; that doesn't count for 80% of RAW's viewers, and you know it; if you're not over enough to get it done on the Big Stage, then you're not over enough to get it done on the little stage and use that as a lazy excuse to pretend like you have business on the Big Stage), it results in a rather underwhelming sensation. The win does zero for HurriRosey, since the competition may as well have been Johnny the Jobber and Colin O'Enhancementtalent (surely on loan from ROH)... and the rare exposure on RAW does nothing for the Heartthrobs, who could benefit from some character development and whatnot which could turn them into compelling challengers, if only they hadn't already had their shot and lost. Shelton vs. La Resistance was not unenjoyable, but that's mostly because I'm assuming this HAS to be building towards the draft lottery breaking up La Resistance (or rather, restructuring them so that Grenier/Dupree are reunited, with Conway breaking off as a babyface and getting a personality of his own, which I think could be cool; if all three end up on the same brand, somehow, Conway could even add a new partner, and it could be a boon to one brand's tag division). The Highlight Reel, with Kane and the TitanTron appearance by Edge/Lita? Ugh. The only saving grace of that segment was Jericho plucking that "kleenex/ice cream/Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" riff straight out of my brain. That was the more-funny/less-bitter way of saying all the things I tried to say in Monday's column about how absolutely nobody in the world relates to a whiny little drama queen. Other than that? I remain unintrigued by the overall story-arc here, which again seems more predicated on somebody's short-term idea for turning a real life story into an angle, rather than on it being particularly interesting or compelling. The mere fact that this angle seems to exist only to make Kane look awful is enough for me to loathe it (because at this point, even if he does eventually morph back into bad-ass revengening Kane, it'll be after an interminable delay, and I'm sure WWE's mindset will be, instead of having Kane react to Edge/Lita in a realistic way, they're having him wait 2-3 weeks so he can OVER-REACT in a way that's sure to not appeal to me, either). Again, suckiness of the material aside: kudos to all involved for jumping in with both feet and acting the shit out of it. Unlike Erin, I won't bother praising Kane (because seeing him pour himself into crap no longer makes me enjoy/appreciate/like his character, it just makes me feel sorry for the man behind it; a personal-favorite column that I wrote 2 full years ago (if you click the link, you'll want to scroll down half-way to get to the good part about Kane!) seems more and more prescient with each passing day, and I keep waiting for the day when Glen Jacobs says "Enough! If I am Kane, then I am going to have some say in what Kane says and does"; there's a time when Civil Disobedience is called for, dammit!)... instead, I'll mention that I thought it was Edge and Lita who again did the sufficiently over-the-top job with playing their roles that it covered up for some other gaping weaknesses (such as, "How come Lita can divorce Kane NOW, but not last fall when it would, you know, have been something that would have been more logical and in-character for her?"). Especially perfect for those two hornballs this week was that they ended the segment making out in a public men's room stall, where wanton acts of skankosity are not exactly uncommon, especially if you pick the wrong (or possibly right, if you're one of the ones who rolls with the Having No Standards Club) bar/club/skank. Double kudos for making sure it was the Men's Room, too, since for some reason completely inexplicable by Pure Logic, everybody knows that carnal acts committed in women's room are not nearly as skanky. Perhaps not entirely pure manifestations of true love, but maybe I'm saying too much?. So, ummmm: LITA IS A CRACK WHORE! Yeah. The subsequent Edge/Benoit match was very good, and the best of the night. Sadly, they bracketed it with such crap that it was overshadowed, and it was hard to really get into it the same way you would if it had been couched correctly. Bischoff's pre-ramble was brain-ache-inducing, as I'm not entirely clear on how "out-ECW'ing ECW" makes a lick of sense, nor on how Edge fits in as EB's "general" for his anti-ECW troops. That was the START of WWE doing exactly what I said they shouldn't (by stretching for unrealistic elements to the Bischoff vs. ECW story)... and at the end of the match, WWE finished up be going of the deep end. Because not only is Edge being randomly tapped for Bischoff's army, but then they did the dumbest thing possible: they plumbed the depths of Heat for more guys who are not only out of their element here, but who also represent an apparent ejaculation of the Random Booking Machine. To me, they were kinda the Bermuda Triangle of Continuity Nightmares... Maven, Tomko, and Snitsky? Really? Maven is anti-ECW, but his regular tag partner, Simon, will actually be appearing on the show as Hollywood Nova... why Tomko but not Christian?... Edge is anti-ECW, but his "girlfriend" is another ECW alum... and Lita and Snitsky in the same ring together, getting along great? Nobody could have thought that was a good idea... unless they didn't notice it until I just mentioned it. Just a whole bunch of stuff that makes it really hard to enjoy the quality Edge/Benoit tables match that was hidden amidst the garbage. And then from there, I think the rest of the show was just HHH's promo and the main event (which I've already discussed at plenty of length; neither was perfect, but at least together they told a cogent story that actually remembered to have the pay-off ending for once) and then a Chris Masters bit. And if you think there's anything to be said about a Chris Masters bit, you haven't been paying attention. There was nothing interesting about the guy before, and there's still nothing interesting about him after Monday. To everybody who mails in to say I'm being too harsh on the guy, and that he might be boring, but he doesn't suck, so I should give him a chance to improve, I simply say: Bite Me. You improve in OVW. You do not befoul Monday nights until you can bring something to the table that was even boring back in 1985. If you disagree, please place a plugged-in toaster in the tub and then hop in until you are either electro-shocked back to sanity or are dead, since I'm sure you the type who also enjoys "Joey" and "The OC," and frankly you're just dragging the rest of society down. Oh, and there was Christian's quick-but-tasty promo. "I wouldn't say I Quit even if Cena made me listen to his lame-ass album." Oh sweet jesus did that one ever hit me where I laugh. My manlove for Christian grows by leaps and bounds every week they remember to put him on TV. And I think that is finally it. Again, Erin did a dandy job recapping the show, and all I'm really doing is piling on with editorial thoughts. So for details about what actually happened (along with a non-zero amount of the Broad's own analysis, too), what you need to do is check out the RAW Recap. At present time, ratings for RAW are not available. Or at least, not available to me. You know me: I'm already usually a day late and a dollar short when it comes to OMG scOOps~! as it is, and this week, ratings were delayed by the Memorial Day holiday. I'm sure I'll have them Friday, though... After the last two weeks bi-polar-ness, I actually am kind of intrigued to see what kind of number RAW delivers. The Monday holiday is only a partial (at best) excuse if numbers come in low, since everybody has usually wrapped up holiday festivizing by 9pm on a Monday, so WWE's audience size on Monday was dictated more (in my opinion) by whether people have been liking what they're seeing than by holiday inconveniences. Another thing from Monday... a small handful of readers mailed in with live, on-site reports, and it turns out that Erin's premonition about what was going on in the arena during HHH's promo was dead-on accurate: the audience almost immediately stopped paying attention to the TitanTron promo, and started paying more attention to a fight in the stands. I guess they cut the background crowd noise pretty early on, since people were cheering for the fight at a time when HHH was saying nothing cheer-able; and then when they turned the ambient sound back on at the end? The two jack-offs were being escorted out of the building, and the crowd was too busy singing "Na na na na, hey hey hey, goodbye" to respond to HHH's punchline. Still wanna tell me WWE wouldn't have benefitted from keeping HHH away a bit longer and doing more with the Flair/Batista dynamic instead? I didn't think so. Also from live Calgarian Reports: the crowd was just raucous all night long, even if not always for the action in the ring. In addition to one fight, you had impersonators in the crowd who were spawning big crowd reactions... You had La Resistance getting a politically-motivated chant out of the Quebec-hating Alberta crowd (score one for Canada; I can't see WWE ever venturing into a Blue State and being bombarded with a "Stem Cell Research, Stem Cell Research" chant!)... And I guess Monday night also marked the return of hot chicks in the crowd showing their boobs. But if that report was true, it must have happened during a commercial or something, because I didn't really notice any serious Crowd Response Anomalies during the broadcast.... TNA's TV situation has certainly gotten no clearer the last two days... as the hours bleed away towards June 20 (the proposed first night of programming on WGN), it seems to me less and less plausible that TNA really has things in order with WGN. If you want to believe the guy who runs NWA-Ohio, the deal with WGN might even be totally dead, but I'd tend not to take that too seriously. He's the same guy who boasted that he had the money to buy-out Panda Energy's interest in TNA, and that wasn't worth taking seriously (by any accounts I hear, anyway). And now that he's trying to justify "pulling his offer off the table," I'm not sure I'd seriously believe his word that the reason he's out of the running to buy TNA is because they lost their TV deal with WGN. The pieces really don't seem to fit together very tightly. In the meantime, other more reputable TV industry sources are now suggesting that a deal with SpikeTV is not wholly dead, although what I read almost sounds like they were kind of just re-hashing old news and speculation that we've had in front of us for over a month, now. A move to Spike might be good, or it might not, and the risk is HUGE since TNA would basically be without TV until September if that was their play. I simply don't consider that to be wise or feasible. Plus, I cannot fathom a reason why Spike would even really take TNA seriously. Even if you factor in FSN's reduced cable penetration, TNA would have to instantly triple its ratings share to even be a blip on the prime time radar. Not to be competitive with WWE (that would take increasing ratings by a full order of magnitude), but just to be a blip on the radar. This does not, to me, seem like a reasonable expectation for Spike to have. To my way of thinking, it's either WGN (and WGN SOON!) or bust. Or there's a possible third option, which is that Panda might be willing to just take a 3 month bath and promote 3 PPVs without any hype, instead of just one, complete with all the diminishing profits that accompany them, in order to make the SpikeTV deal happen. It'll be interesting to see what happens here. And more importantly: how fast it happens. I keep assuming that one of these updates, I'm gonna have the Official Announcement From TNA to talk about, and this makes 3 columns in a row where I haven't had that.... the clock is ticking. More news from the Ambiguous Injury File, where Rey Mysterio joins Shawn Michaels.... Michaels missed another edition of RAW and has also been pulled from house show line-ups for the next few weeks. My guess: the "tweaked" knee is maybe a bit worse that originally let on, and they are hoping that resting him will do the trick. This didn't really work out so well last summer, when Michaels took a mini-vacation to relax and recover, came back for SummerSlam, and still needed knee surgery by October, but let's cross our fingers and hope for the best. Against all odds, Michaels is easily one of WWE's top 5 all-around performers, and over-the-hill or not, TV is better with him than without him... And then there's Rey, who went down with an ankle injury on Sunday night. All reports seemed to say it was a minor thing and Rey finished a match and left the ring under his own power.... but then last night? He did not compete on SD! tapings, so you do the math. If nothing else, I guess we wait till there's a chance to get a full prognosis, and then said prognosis trickles down to us schleps. Again: everything I said about HBK goes for Rey. Maybe doubly so, since on a depleted SD! roster, Rey's all the more important to helping keep things exciting. In the past couple days, lots of people have mailed in asking about Terry Funk.... specifically because I went out of my way to explain why Funk wouldn't be appearing on the WWE-run One Night Stand ECW PPV (it's because Funk, at his age, feels he can only compete once in a weekend, and he felt his allegiance should be to Shane Douglas' alternative reunion show). But then, folks wonder, how come Terry is all over WWE's advertising for the event? The answer? I'm not sure.... but if I had to wager a guess, it'd be along the lines of WWE just assumed Funk would take the bigger payday, especially since Terry is on good terms with officials and everything. So they pencilled him in as working the show (and logically, would have been in their rights to do so; although it also might not have hurt to ask him, directly, a bit sooner), and included him prominently in all the promotional materials. Again, even if Terry respects the fans and ECW's memory too much to embarrass himself by working a second match that weekend, I think it'd be a cool touch just to have him in the building in some capacity... but supposedly, not even that will happen. Last thing I'll mention today is that a number of folks went to go see "The Longest Yard" over the past 4-5 days, some just because they thought it'd be a good movie (most weren't that impressed; not that it was horrible, but just not quite as funny as you might think given the cast) and others even went specifically to see Steve Austin (and to a lesser extent, the other wrestlers). What's interesting is that out of these MultiPlex Reports, nobody really singled Austin out as being a highlight... but TWO guys couldn't get over how hilarious Kevin Nash was in the movie. That he's not just kinda funny, that he doesn't just keep up with everybody around him, but that he actually steals a scene or two. Huh. I might have to check this one out for myself when it hits the $2 second run house... otherwise, if I don't see it, you'll pardon me for not quite believing it. Keep an eye out for Big Sexy if you see the movie, and feel free to report back to me with your thoughts, be they confirming or denying rumors of Nash's awesomeness. That's all today, kids. One way or another, I will see you Friday. Probably with the SmackDown! Recap (isn't it Extremely Ironic how the last two times I've gotten a break from RAW, I've been pushed into duty on SD! Recappening? Coincidence, or is The Rick just that damned smOOth?!? I'll never tell!), unless an adequate replacement rears its head. And if there's important news to cover, don't fret, cuz I'll get that squeezed in, too. Later on, everybody....

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Bonding Exercises

RAW RECAP: The New Guy Blows It

PPV RECAP: WWE Night of Champions 2012

SMACKDOWN RECAP: 18 Seconds? NO! NO! NO!

RAW RECAP: The Show Must Go On

SMACKDOWN RECAP: The Boot Gets the Boot

RAW RECAP: Heyman Lands an Expansion Franchise

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Losing is the new Winning

RAW RECAP: Say My Name

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Deja Vu All Over Again

RAW RECAP: Dignity Before Gold?

PPV RECAP: SummerSlam 2012

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Backfired!

RAW RECAP: Bigger IS Better

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Hitting with Two Strikes

RAW RECAP: Heel, or Tweener?

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Destiny Do-Over

RAW RECAP: CM Punk is Not a Fan of Dwayne

SMACKDOWN RECAP: The Returnening

RAW RECAP: Countdown to 1000

PPV RECAP: WWE Money in the Bank 2012

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Friday Night ZackDown

RAW RECAP: Closure's a Bitch

SMACKDOWN RECAP: In-BRO-pendence Day

RAW RECAP: Crazy Gets What Crazy Wants

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Five Surprising MitB Deposits

RAW RECAP: Weeeellll, It's a Big MitB

SMACKDOWN RECAP: #striketwo

RAW RECAP: Johnny B. Gone

PPV RECAP: WWE No Way Out 2012

RAW RECAP: Crazy Go Nuts

SMACKDOWN RECAP: You're Welcome

RAW RECAP: Be a Star, My Ass

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Needs More Kane?

RAW RECAP: You Can't See Him

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Lady Power

RAW RECAP: Big Johnny Still in Charge

PPV RECAP: WWE Over the Limit 2012

SMACKDOWN RECAP: One Gullible Fella

RAW RECAP: Anvil, or Red Herring?

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Everybody Hates Berto

RAW RECAP: Look Who's Back

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Care to go Best of Five?

RAW RECAP: An Ace Up His Sleeve

PPV RECAP: WWE Extreme Rules 2012

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Sh-Sh-Sheamus and the nOObs

RAW RECAP: Edge, the Motivational Speaker?

SMACKDOWN RECAP: AJ is Angry, Jilted

RAW RECAP: Maybe Cena DOES Suck?

SMACKDOWN RECAP: No! No! No!

RAW RECAP: Brock's a Jerk

SMACKDOWN RECAP: Back with a Bang

RAW RECAP: Yes! Yes! Yes!

PPV RECAP: WWE WrestleMania 28

E-MAIL RICK SCAIA
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Rick Scaia is a wrestling fan from Dayton, OH. He's been doing this since 1995, but enjoyed it best when the suckers from SportsLine were actually PAYING him to be a fan.