AS I SEE IT
Bob Magee
Pro Wrestling: Between the Sheets
PWBTS.com
This has been quite a week for wrestling news...very little of it good.
First, 20 WWE main roster and developmental wrestlers were released last week: Sylvester Terkay, CW (Christopher W.) Anderson, Jazz, Rodney Mack, Tony Mamaluke, The Bashams (Danny and Doug), Al Snow (as a wrestler) , The Gymini (Shane Brothers), and Gangrel were all released on January 18th. Chris (Tatanka) Chavis, along with OVW wrestlers Seth Skyfire, Jack Bull, and Ryan Reeves were released on January 19. Deep South Wrestling Head trainer Bill DeMott, Mike Taylor, Tracy Taylor, Tony Salantri and Thomas Farra from Deep South Wrestling were fired on January 20.
Skyfire, Bull, and Reeves had all been in regular programs on Ohio Valley Wrestling's TV program, with two of the three in title matches in the TV program airing January 13 on OVW TV. Even worse, Gymini were the current Deep South Wrestling Tag Team champions. It ought to be really fun explaining that all away to TV viewers and fans of OVW and Deep South.
In addition to that, there was the pre-Christmas release of Claudio Castagnoli, before he'd ever had a chance to wrestle for WWE. With all of these releases, it puts the lie to any rumors that Castagnoli's release was for anything than the officially stated reasons...WWE layoffs.
Then....there was the passing of Scott Charles "Bam Bam" Bigelow on Friday.
Those of us in South Jersey saw him first by "Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers, then at Larry Sharpe's Monster Factory. Bigelow started out first in Memphis in 1986 winning a battle royal to capture the Southern Heavyweight title in Memphis, then played Crusher Yurkov in World Class Wrestling; before taking on the Bam Bam Bigelow gimmick.
He had early WWF and NWA tours of duty; before making his real fame in New Japan Pro Wrestling, where he wrestled for where he formed a tag team with Big Van Vader, and won the IWGP Tag Team title. He continued in Japan until late 1992, when he returned to the WWF.
This WWF stay saw Bigelow's biggest mainstream wrestling program, as he started a program with NY Giants football legend Lawrence Taylor, taking it all the way to WrestleMania XI in what was easily the best celebrity-tied match in wrestling history.
Bigelow left the WWF in 1996 and went to ECW, where he was part of The Triple Threat with Shane Douglas and Chris Candido, holding the ECW Television Championship and the ECW World Heavyweight Championship during his stay there.He was a dominant force in ECW. Many fans will remember his strength spots including throwing Spike Dudley out of the ring into the crowd and the PPV that saw him slam Tazz through the ring.
Bigelow finished his national touring career with WCW from 1998-2001, before largely retiring from wrestling except for occasional shows with New York area independents.
In October 2005, Bigelow made news after he and his girlfriend were in a serious motorcycle accident, with both rushed to the hospital; and threats that Bigelow would face criminal charges if his girlfriend died. Both did recover, however, and continued on living quietly until Bigelow's sudden passing last Friday.
For those of us who are old school ECW fans, Bigelow's a sad passing...the second of a member of the Triple Threat. I have to wonder what Shane Douglas is thinking, especially with his recent battles against painkiller addiction. Bigelow had his own very public and admitted issues with Oxycontin in recent years.
I'd appreciate your thoughts on Bam Bam Bigelow. PWBTS and AS I SEE IT send their condolences to his family and loved ones.
With all this news, I'm going to go ahead and include the letters from over the week on your favorite "Wrestlecrap" moments. Again, for those of you who weren't familiar with Wrestlecrap, it's a website that features the some of the most renowned and classic moments in wrestling suckdom.
Here's some of your favorites:
From gran1999@comcast.net:
Mae Young giving birth to Mark Henry's "baby" which turned out to be a hand. That sent motherhood back at least one thousand years...
From David Alter:
"Jake the Snake's acting is good in this classic clip, however the best thing about this clip is the Warrior's grunting. You can see it at this link
From Jesse Lee:
"All I have to say at least Katie Vick was meant to push an angle. At least Shockmaster was supposed to be the next big thing. At least Papa Shango was meant to be the big challenger for Ultimate Warrior-who had no one to feud with. (And to be fair, it was Warrior who said that only someone with magic could beat him.) The Rosie/Trump thing did pretty much nothing. Even David Arquette was brought in to try and help the company. The Rosie/Trump deal was nothing more than a waste of time, waste of money, and a waste of an opportunity to showcase a better feud or an actual match."
From Chris Murray:
"Bischoff gives us his great creation...... Loch Ness...You've got Memphis Legend Steve Kiern packaged by Vince as Skinner. Worse then TL Hopper. Just awful.... Big Dick Johnson, has to be the most embarassing thing to watch. A big, fat oily guy dancing in a thong. Maybe WWE is trying to reach the gay demograhpic they lost when they fired Rico.
Chris Wolvie shared this one:
"Any of the Diva matches I deemed "The Bowl Matches". Y'know, those matches played in a wading pool of something? Like gravy or snow or the Evening Gown In a Pool Match? It dragged women's wrestling down to depths it has yet to recover from."
From Joseph Shay:
"The 1989 Halloween Havoc main event, a craptastic main event called the 'Thunderdome' cage match featuring Ric Flair and Sting versus the Great Mutah and Terry Funk, a take of of Mad Max I believe but no lethal weapons. There was however electricity flowing through the cage Mutah being the only one to get 'zapped' even though all the guys in the match were climbing the supposed electrified cage almost the entire match. Second WCW moment was the portrayal of Paul White AKA the Big Show as Andre the Giant's son and pitting him against Hulk Hogan running this portrayal for about a year. WCW had Bobby the Brain play on this gimmick in announcing matches between the two which I thought was a disgrace to Andre's legacy."
From John Kovel:
"Who could forget: The Red Rooster, Oz, and Giant Gonzalez and his muscle suit?"
Until next time...
If you'd like to add advertising on PWBTS.com (the flagship website of this column), banner ads are available for $400 for one year. These ads would appear on each newspage appearing on the newsboard. Cube ads are available for $200 for one year, which would be placed on the main newsboard page.
If you have comments or questions, if you'd like to add the AS I SEE IT column to your website or for advertising requests, I can be reached by e-mail at bobmagee1@hotmail.com.
_________________________________________________________
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)