Best match of the year/WWE or TNA
Your votes MUST be marked with "AS I SEE IT anniversary awards" in the subject header and your category; and submitted by the morning of January 5th. All others will be discarded. Votes can be sent by e-mail to bobmagee1@hotmail.com.
Please note: I do reserve the right to throw out votes if I start to get e-mails that are clearly ridiculous and just designed to spoil the fun (such as 500 votes for MVP as Best Wrestler of the Year).
In a major addition, thanks go out to Canada's The Fight Network, a new advertiser with PWBTS.com, the flagship site of AS I SEE IT.
The Fight Network Inc. is a Canadian-based media company with TV, radio, online, mobile and PPV components All five of these outlets are be seamlessly integrated to offer fans of combatant sports and theme related entertainment a true convergence experience each and every time.
The Fight Network offers wrestling, MMA, and boxing programming:
MMA programming includes: UK's Cage Rage, Jeff Osbourne's Hook and Shoot, IFC, International Vale Tudo Championships, K-1 Hero's, Hawaii's Rumble on the Rock, World Fighting Alliance, King of the Kage.
Wrestling programming includes: FMW, Ring of Honor, Memphis Championship Wrstling. Pro Wrestling NOAH, TNA, WEW, classic episodes of Wrestling at the Chase.
Boxing programming includes: Broadway Boxing, Showtime Boxing.
The Fight Network also runs Live Audio Wrestling, which available weekly to radio stations coast to coast in Canada through Fight Network Radio's national syndication agreement with Broadcast News (“BN”). Live Audio Wrestling. LAW is heard live every Sunday night (11pm EST) in Toronto, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, Vancouver and on the world wide web. The LAW is hosted by Jason Agnew and Dan “The Mouth” Lovranski.
Live Audio Wrestling has conducted thousands of interviews over the years with the who's who of pro wrestling such as; Ric Flair, Steve Austin, Lou Thesz, Mick Foley, Kurt Angle, and Bret “The Hitman” Hart along with MMA superstars such as Ken Shamrock, Randy Couture, Chuck Liddell, and Tito Ortiz.
Fight Network also runs the well-known Wrestling Observer.com and MMA Weekly.com websites.
Fight Network Mobile Service delivers Canadians the most up to date news, inside stories, interviews, event listings, round by round results and more…from boxing, wrestling, and MMA.
The Fight Network offers both live and live to tape PPV events commercial free to fans in Canada each month through its working relationship with Viewers Choice/Canada a division of Astral Media. This agreement allows The Fight Network to present one of a kind events from around the world drawn from the sports of boxing, pro wrestling and mixed martial arts.
CHIKARA Pro Wrestling also signed on as an advertiser this week. For those readers who don't know, Chikara Pro Wrestling is a family style promotion based in Philadelphia, PA and the southeastern Pennsylvania area. The promotion combines elements of lucha libre, and Japanese lucha, with a healthy dose of Kaiju Big Battle style comedy elements.
The promotion started from the Chikara Wrestle Factory school founded in January 2002 in Allentown, PA. The promotion started running shows in Allentown in May 2002. The promotion and school moved to the ECW Arena, where training occurs together in the building with Combat Zone Wrestling.
CHIKARA has gained notice to a wider audience through the work of Smart Mark Video. The promotion also houses a weekly podcast hosted by "Lightning" Mike Quackenbush and a rotating cast, showing clips of matches and storyline recaps.
Your letters:
From JinseiandShi@aol.com:
"I, for one, am boycotting any WWE television. This means no WWE PPVs, no RAW, no SD!, and no ECW. Which sucks, because I've been watching WWE for ten years and usually enjoyed the product. I stopped buying PPVs long ago due to there being too many duds and few reasons to spend my money for only one or two intriguing matches.
To be fair, the original ECW never announced more than one or two of their matches.. but this is WWE. The ECW-of-dead could never fully promise wrestlers to show up where in WWE, they have contracts that make pretty everyone show up. I expected a lot better build up than what they gave.
Also, the original ECW always pushed the younger guys ahead of veterans. Sandman and Dreamer are veterans. Sabu can't have a good match without tables-which is too dangerous for WWE, as a business, to invest in. And RVD screwed up by being a druggie. However, the original ECW did it in such a way that the veterans could walk out with pride and reputation while WWECW seems to only care about pushing the younger guys.
As for ECW being without Heyman, that's what people probably said about WWWF without Vince Sr. Fact is, promoters and storyline writers move on and are succeeded by someone else. However, Heyman never fully had the chance to take WWECW in any direction in which a new booker could take it.
If people are willing to spend up to $200+ for PPVs that have always been disappointing in one way or another (in WWE's case) then all the power to them, but it just proves that they're not willing to show Vince that they mean business. As long as anyone keeps watching and buying their materials, Vince will never take them seriously.
As long as Paul Heyman isn't involved with WWECW, no one should take it seriously...not that therre are that many who are were before, anyway, thanks to Vince McMahon.
From Joseph Shay:
" I read your column on the atrocity that was WWECW's December to Dismember and really appreciated it. It got me thinking about an interesting thing I read the other day and how it ties in to a rating ploy Vince McMahon used several years ago when trying to trump WCW.
I was reading Forbes list of the Richest Men in America and it had Vince's worth at a sickening 555 Million Dollars. This, along with your column today, made me ponder the reasons for Vince's second decimation of ECW. I believe it is because he sits on one fat pocketbook, and has no competition to worry about that he can't buy-out. This reminds me of the Billionaire Ted skits that the WWE used in the mid 90's to get under Ted Turner's skin. Granted the Huckster and the Nacho Man are not extraordinarily clever ideas, but they worked to wake Turner up.
It seems to me though that it's no longer Billionaire Ted that the Wrestling fans have to worry about it's Millionaire Vince who now controls what the fans get. It's sad and trivial that a promoter doesn't listen to the fans and for me if I am going to spend money for a wrestling Pay Per View TNA is looking better and better all the time. They, at least, show some of the same qualities that ECW once possessed and the stars are not all ex-bodybuilders who happened to learn to wrestle.
Until there is a second promotion that gives Vince McMahon a run for his money, McMahon can do whatever he wants. TNA isn;t yet it, and doesn't appear to be heading in that direction. The only real challenger for PPV dollars and fan interest is UFC...which isn't even a wrestling promotion, but MMA.
From "melonhedz@aol.com":
Let me start by saying that your opinion on WWECW is very true and it is obvious you are from Philadelphia as I am. I was at Survivor Series,and I hope McMahon takes into consideration how true wrestling fans felt about Cena and Batista.
Where I was sitting, there were "Harlem Heat" chants going on throughout the Booker T-atista match, which was the worst PPV main event I have witnessed in quite some time. The only reason I think Lashley even got a pop from the crowd is because he is in "ECW". CM Punk received a bigger pop from the crowd than DX, which is WWE's pride and joy.
I was wondering what your view on the Cena/Umaga feud is. I mean if McMahon really wanted to push this match down our throats then why not have Umaga pin the champ at Survivor Series? Why have Umaga disqualified in the beginning and then, why, in Philly, have two of the most loved and original ECW superstars, RVD and Sabu, be the first from their team eliminated?
McMahon wants his ratings back as high as they were during the attitude era, which was full of controversy. The original ECW and Paul Heyman are nothing but controversial. When I heard ECW was being brought back, I was excited. But when I heard that not all matches were under "Extreme Rules" I wondered what the point of this WWECW was. Now this WWECW barely even has "Extreme Rules" matches, and why isn't the title at least only defended under these rules?
I feel McMahon doesn't give two shits for ECW or what it stands for, the old ECW. If he did, he would have made Benoit's comeback be on ECW, not Smackdown. He would have moved Super Crazy to ECW and not to Raw where he can have matches on HEAT that aren't even the main event. Further, why not combine the Tag titles? Or at least let the Smackdown Titles be defended on ECW since they tour and tape together now?
Why did they have RVD and Sabu eliminated? Because Vince McMahon doesn't care about WWECW in anything but name....not even apparently as a revenue source. If he did, he'd have SOME version of ECW...even if it were an ECW with some old faces and a lot of new faces that would be made into distinctive stars....not performers cut out of the WWE cloth.
With all I've said in defense of ECW, I'd like to make clear that it's not necessarily a personal defense of Paul Heyman.
Longtime readers known that I've seen up close how Heyman screwed a lot of people along the way...notably ten years ago in ECW. Well, there's an old saying that your karma goes along with you. According to this past week's Observer, the same guy who screwed people years ago is now being ridiculed behind his back with nervous breakdown jokes much the same way he went after people years ago...to satisfy personal agendas.
Karma's a bitch, isn't it, Paul?
The only problem is...the wrestling fans that were developed ten years ago are the ones being affected...by being forced to watch this sub-standard garbage called "ECW" that is now being put on the air; instead of something that even vaguely resembles the product of 1993-2001. If you buy my karma theory, Heyman's not the only one being burt for his past actions...we are.
Until next time...
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