Random Wrestling Thoughts (Part 2)

Well typically speaking, more 18 to 34 year olds today have more money to waste and prone to impulse buying, where as those older have more expenses and are wiser to blow their money frivolously.

The Wrestling Channel was really hidden gem of a channel back in the day on Sky.

You had soo much access to wrestling outside WWE.

Loved the wrestling channel back in the day for and a company that probably only about a budget of €100 a week and running at a loss from the very start they did a great job getting shows from around the world and lasting as long as they did.

I used to watch the The Wrestling Channel back in the day myself. Only my opinion... but TWC launched at the right and wrong time if that makes sense.

What I mean is that Sky started to offer free satellites and installation for TV in 2000/2001 if you signed up to a years contract. Suddenly you had thousands of people watching Sky digital. So more and more budget channels popped up (Gaming network, Heck even babestation started in 2001)

So you can imagine by 2004 alot of people in the UK and Ireland would have access to watch the newly established TWC. This is also before the advent of streaming and YouTube in 2006 so they started before all that. Problem is wrestling was no longer hot 2005ish.

A lot of people stopped watching WWE late 2001/2002 onwards. Wwe is not the be all end all, but if their business was going down subsequent other smaller promotions in the western world were drawing smaller too. Less fans watching overall.

You could argue that if TWC launched in the height of the wrestling boom it may have faired better (sky digital launched 1998) but am sure the cost of launching a channel would have been soooo much more then than that of 2004.

Even if the channel launched 2000 say, sure Bravo had a deal to show ECW. Then they dropped them for WCW. But both would be gone by March 2001 even if the wrestling channel got both.

The iron man match at judgement day 2000 is the best iron match wwe have ever done.

It was a good match but I was referring a specific type of match. I mean bar wrestle mania that year which was a bit off, the wwe in 2000 were sucking diesel.

You thought correctly brother there was one.

Is the freebird rule only for the tag titles?

Obviously Woods would not be able to defend the World Title for Big E

God wwe needs a few new factions

Morrison dressed as Meltzer for Halloween...

The Wrestling Channel was brilliant, imo, but I didn't watch it for indy wrestling - I watched it for the RF shoots. I don't really watch current wrestling anymore, but I do love me some shoot interviews - old RF stuff, Kayfabe Commentaries, Hannibal TV etc. It's miles more interesting than what actually gets put in front of the camera, based on what little I do see of the current product.

What makes you think the 'average casual wrestling fan' has changed in that belief?

I think the NBA fans reaction to Chris Jericho when they NBA led into dynamite shows that the average casual wrestling fan still thinks WWE is pro wrestling. AEW hasn't gotten the mainstream reach yet and tbh as long as they only produce content for their key demo they won't get there.

Which for the non-casual wrestling fan is probably a good thing because the stuff that appeals to the casual is the much that WWE churns out by the boatload.

Eurosports NJPW was eye opening to me as a kid. I think CMLL was on one of the other obscure satellite channels but fcuks sake the NJPW junior heavyweights obliterated everything WWF and WCW were doing. I mean what compete with the in ring action of the Pegasus kid, Jushin Thunder Liger, the Guerreros etc.....

Remember WCW bouncing from Saturday afternoon to some weeknight at 10 and then finally ending up in a 2 am slot.

Was it Batista that refused to sell the leg drop and Flair knew it so was able to distract Hogan away the pin before Dave kicked out?

Roman has surpassed Punk's 434 day title reign. Someone on Reddit punched the numbers and found that they've both defended the title 12 times over 14 PPVs as Champion...

Cena and Bryan being the only crossover opponents.

I'll always remember being there when Vader won the title from Sting on St Patrick's night in Dublin.

They had switched the title earlier in London while on a European tour.

He’s something alright but I’m sure the rules of boards.ie prevent me from expressing them fully. I’d forgotten he’d worked with Vader because I can remember something about hogan getting Vader to sign something to stop him from working stiff. I hated how hogan would kick out almost at the same time as the three count so he’d lose but it was never clean, and it was always as if the opponent get lucky. You can see why piper never agreed to put him over clean in WWE, because didn’t trust him to do the favour in return.

A big name for the women as opposed to the ham and eggers who’ve won it since it’s been done. Bayley isn’t meant to be back until after mania.

Have a feeling they may be building Liv towards a Rumble win. Men's one is harder to call. My money's on Lesnar or Lashley

That's funny as feck. Who says wrestling can be homoerotic?!

Wasn't he a big covid denier , warning fans not to show up to autograph signings in masks and such , can't imagine that got him many bookings

I remember this vividly. 12-13 year old me considered Jericho to be a nobody compared to Rock and Austin and I was completely undecided on who was going to win the Undisputed title between Rock and Austin because it was never gonna be Jericho.

The next day in school someone told me Jericho won and I was "Shut up, no way." It was only the following Saturday watching Smackdown on Sky One did I believe it.

I remember being disappointed about Chris Jericho winning the Undisputed Championship, but for a good reason because I was a kid at the time and I always sided with the babyfaces over the heel. So when I found out Jericho defeated both The Rock and Austin I was totally surprised by it. However looking back on it now, I'm happy he won the Undisputed Championship. It was completely unexpected and would have been too obvious having Rock and Austin win it since they were already multiple-time world champions. I just hated how they handled his championship reign and made him into a joke during his feud with Triple H.

I still wonder to this day if HHH tried to sabotage Jericho's title reign because it seems like HHH disliked Jericho back then. At least according to Jericho's book anyway. If HHH was against Kurt Angle holding the world championship then imagine how he felt about Jericho.