AS I SEE IT 8/14: Reality, wrestling, and your thoughts

AS I SEE IT
Bob Magee
Pro Wrestling: Between the Sheets
PWBTS.com

Funny how the real world seems to get in the way of wrestling.

Ring of Honor's staff and crew were preparing to go over to the United Kingdom for a week long tour, with two Ring of Honor shows and appearance on several other UK indpendent shows through this coming weekend.

Then, there was this small matter of a Al-Qaida terrorist plot to blow up as many as 10 airliners traveling from the UK to the United States.

Fortunately, despite massive travel delays, all arrived in the UK saefly and ontime, worked a show for Frontier Wrestling Alliance's Academy shows (think student show) on Friday night, then worked an all but sold out show in Liverpool, England and a show that was sold out without one match being announced in Broxbourne.

as follows:

Before the Liverpool show return dates of March 2 and 3, 2007 were announced with a return to the Olympia confirmed. Liverpool's Olympia was within a handful of seats of sellout (1,700 capacity).

Matt Sydal defeated Colt Cabana, Jonny Storm and Spud in a “Four Corner Survival Match” to open the show, after pinning Spud. Post-match, Chris Hero made an unannounced appearance to cut heel promo,which continued until Colt Cabana chased him backstage.

Jimmy Rave and Prince Nana also cut a promo resulting in the usual toilet paper salute leading to Jimmy Rave-Davey Richards, which Richards won via pinfall after a brainbuster.

BJ Whitmer then defeated Claudio Castagnoli. Post-match, they brawled toward the back with Chris Hero returning helping Castagnoli to beat on Whitmer which set up the next match

Colt Cabana defeated Chris Hero after Cabana hit his Colt 45 finisher.

The UK's Doug Williams and Jody Fleisch beat SUWA and Go Shiozaki after Williams pinned Shiozaki.

Robbie Brookside pinned Chad Collyer to retain the Frontier Wrestling Alliance Heavyweight Title.

Austin Aries and Roderick Strong beat The Briscoe Brothers to retain the ROH Tag Team Titles after Aries pinned Jay Briscoe. The match resulted in an injury to Aries that knocked him out of the next evening's show.

"American Dragon" Bryan Danielson beat Nigel McGuiness to retain his ROH World Title and unify the World and Pure Championship belts. McGuiness was busted open with Danielson hitting him with a succession of elbows to the head.

Then, on Sunday, Ring of Honor went to Broxbourne, which had been sold out for weeks, before a lineup was even announced.

Austin Aries announcing he'd broken two ribs in Liverpool taking him out of the scheduled tag Title defense. Bryan Danielson questioned the injury, leading to a singles match with Bryan Danielson vs Roderick Strong. Then post-promo, Danielson was attacked by SUWA.

Go Shiozaki beat BJ Whitmer after a top rope moonsault

Jonny Storm beat Jody Fleisch and Spud in a three-way match after Storm hit his Wonderwhirl finisher on Spud

Post-match, Claudio Castagnoli, Chris Hero and Chad Collyer hit the ring and attacked Storm and Spud with Nigel McGuiness and Robbie Brookside making the save, then were joined by Colt Cabana who that set up the next match.

Colt Cabana, Nigel McGuiness and Robbie Brookside beat Chad Collyer, Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli ,after McGuiness pinned Collyer.

Bryan Danielson then challenged SUWA as a result of the early show attack, and challenged him to a match defending his ROH title. Danielson picked up the win after a small package.

Doug Williams then defeated Jimmy Rave with the Chaos Theory suplex. Rave again got the full toilet paper salute at his entrance.

A number of the wrestlers will stay until this coming Friday for a show with the Frontier Wrestling Alliance before returning to the United States.

From "Brian from Texas":

"I read your column and kinda had a flashback when you said Paul Boesch. He was the promoter that I grew up watching as a kind. Hell, everyone in southeast Texas all the way to Victoria watched Houston Wresting. So thanks for bringing back some good wrestling memories. I have some tapes of the old Houston Wrestling, and it was fairly tame by today's standard.

But it had almost every big name that was ever anyone there. I was actually at the show when Khan (supposedly) broke Andre's ankle...Me and all my cousins were like, yeah right...no way did he break it. Until the following week,when Andre was supporting a cast....

Man, we were a marks-mark back in those days. So thanks again for brining up something in your column that really brought back the memories from way back. I wish more people actually knew how much Paul Bosech actually did for pro wrestling. Not to mention he was wearing LARGE BLING 30 years before it was a catch phrase."


Somehow the words "Paul Boesch"...and "bling"...never struck me as being anything that would ever appear in the same sentence. :0)

From "BruzerJeff":

"The days of a wrestler being their gimmick 24 /7 are gone. Now in the VKM world it's Paul Levesque as HHH whether he likes it or not. That's how it is. So in reference to those who think it's ok that RVD got caught with his hand in the reefer jar. Wrongo!! Whatever his mama named him and what's on the ticket is who was smoking the stogie, not the gimmick. The gimmick should be a paid professional....not a foolish mark for himself. I almost fell over when I heard on the tape him give his work name and say he's World Champion. Wake up kid. The whole world does not watch wrestling nor like it. Especially these days."

In the real world, you're right; but the problem is...WWE has done things like having Nick Dinsmore in his "Eugene" gimmick 24/7... including actually forbidding Ohio Valley Wrestling from billing him as Nick Dinsmore at an fundraising event held AT DINSMORE'S OWN HIGH SCHOOL. They've also had Vito in public in his cross-dressing gimmick. So don't be so sure that in the world of Vince McMahon...that wrestler aren't supposed to live their gimmicks.

From Brandon Peyton:

"Ok, I've read the comments on RVD's arrest and I know I am SUPER late on this topic but I cannot hold my tongue anymore. The people who say WWE is partly to blame for the incident because they pushed RVD's character as a pot head have their reality wires crossed with fiction. Just because your 'character' is pushed to do something doesn't mean you get to do the same in REAL LIFE! Entertainment is just that, entertainment.

A while back Triple H's gimmick was to act racist towards Booker T, but if he went out in real life using the N word, it's not okay. Rikishi ran over Stone Cold with a car, but if he went out mowing down old ladies, he'd go to jail. Hell, Charlie Haas and many others have used gimmicks of sexually harassing and molesting women, but it cannot be accepted in the real world. It's a gimmick, not reality. The WWE has a creative right to create personality types and their counter parts for the good/evil battle. You can't have heroes without the bad guys (although those lines have been blurred). Rob Van Dam deserved his suspension because as many have said before, he got caught."


Apparently the way he conducted himself in that situation wasn't terrible important to Vince McMahon. As most people suspected, Van Dam is back just after his 30 day suspension ended...and did a run-in during the main event of The Big Show vs. Sabu on lst week's WWECW show. He'll be in the main event tomorrow night taking on Sabu and Kurt Angle.

So much for getting punished.

Until next time...

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If you have comments/questions, or if you'd like to add the AS I SEE IT column to your website, I can be reached by e-mail at bobmagee1@hotmail.com)