TNA to go head to head w/WWE in the New Year

Hulk Hogan made an appearance tonight on the season finale of The Ultimate Fighter, to announce TNA's Monday, January 4 special, airing from 9-10pm which for those in the know realize is head-to-head with the WWE's flagship Monday Night Raw program. He also announced he would be making his live Impact debut that night, although he was non-committal in regards to whether or not he would wrestle on the show. Also not mentioned, was whether this indicated a long-term 'all-in' full court press for TNA moving to Monday nights going forward.

Either way though, I'm excited by this. TNA has been getting some ducks in a row for awhile now, and is easily far-and-away the #2 company in the US right now. With the name value associated with Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff, it's time to test, for both sides of the equation, how TNA can stand up to the WWE product. If it fails, it will establish once and for all just where TNA's place in the current pecking order is, which isn't a bad thing, as I feel TNA's biggest failing at this point is over-reach; it can do quite well for itself as a profitable company should it ackowledge and remain on a smaller scale.. On the other hand, however, should they succeed, or even come close, it will truly be a shot across the bow launching MNW II, which can only mean good things for wrestling fans.

At long last the return of ITVR ... (click here for podcast) ...

But know that in my own opinion, admittedly, our return is not a particularly triumphant one. I address all this on the air too so don't want to overkill it, but it's at the end of the show when we may have lost you anyway so it bears mentioning here too:

Amidst a week with a terrible Raw, and very sad news in regards to Eddie 'Umaga' Fatu passing today, it was not going to be the happy-go-luckiest show in the first place, and after a few stressful weeks on the busy-ness and exhaustion front (Ari falls asleep on air! lol), I do want to warn right now that our discussion of the latter topic in particular sort of edges into a bit of dark humour, and some criticism of Fatu's choices in the months and years leading up to his death, which we realize tonight on the very day of his loss to family, friends and colleagues might not have been the time or place. For that we hope to not cause too much offense, and to own that we have admittedly over time come to a place of lacking much-needed patience with those making choices we see as sad, and hurtful to those making them, and their loved ones. That doesn't, however, diminish our sorrow at the outcomes, and the loss involved here tonight; we all of us love imperfect people, and perhaps the avoidability of situations like this one make them all the more tragic.

To that end, though, we don't want to redo the show at this point, nor do we want to leave it off the air for another week - especially as there's some fun stuff towards the end per reader participation going forward. So please, listen in, enjoy the parts of the show you find entertaining, FF the parts you don't, give us feedback on both, and have a great weekend. :D

ITVR

Hi all - ITVR will be making its return from a two-week hiatus tomorrow night after Smackdown - we began to record tonight but realized we could either rehash the stuff from the last 2 weeks we've missed and make the show border on 1.5-2 hours, or just talk about this week, which would last about 15 minutes, as it's effectively been a quiet week (a trash Raw, with WWE superstars now overseas in Iraq filming their Tribute to the Troops show, and Hulk Hogan teasing an engagement the biggest wrestling news stories). I think adding SD analysis will flesh things out to just the right length of show.

In the meantime though I'd like to ask you guys all a favour. As we're heading into the end of the year, I'd like my readers and listeners to please submit their votes for the best and worst of 2009, the year in wrestling. I'm not going to give guidelines here, to categories or format. Send me lists, send me a few paragraphs ... anything that for you sums up the year in wrestling. I will share what's sent our way, and we will be doing our year-end podcast with our own thoughts on the Year that Was the last Thursday of 2009. But I'd love to hear from other wrestling fans. And no ... 'Best use of a foreign object' cannot be awarded to Elin Nordregen Woods and her nine-iron, I'm sorry. ;)

Hope to see you tomorrow, right here, In This Very Ring.

RAW

So Raw last night was kind of a mess as I thought. Particularly it was a whole bunch of false advertising. Particularly, as much as I had been dreading "Little People's Court" this week, with DX facing off 'in court' against Hornswoggle before guest host Verne Troyer (aka Mini-Me), to advertise it and then decide not to go ahead with it, passing it off as a DX 'dream', is still wrong. Especially since I suppose on some level it could have been done well as Verne Troyer was a pleasant surprise, seeming to know more about wrestling than many guest hosts did and seemingly more natural and comfortable in the position.

I was also not pleased with the 'let's give Mark Henry a gimmick' thing; first, it's insulting to him who I feel does better (damning with faint praise) when he just goes out and lets his fists and feet do the talking; and then to choose rap was not a stretch considering he's, let's say it, black, and that's what WWE sees their black performers as, ballers or rappers. But then he goes out and he's not even that good at it. I suppose seeing Jillian Hall get accidentally crushed in all the goings-on was kind of funny, but ... enh? Really?

And, since this has already just turned into a rant with no particular order, let's go back to the top of the show; DX and Jeri-Show have very little chemistry, which is surprising as they are all veterans who can be entertaining if given the chance; and my concerns that DX winning the tag belts would only put them on a team who doesn't need them, and knows they don't need them, were confirmed as they essentially said 'You may have those stupid little belts but we don't need the belts to be important'. Any work that Show and Jericho have done to try to elevate tag team competition in the WWE is about to be undone. And as there's no mystery over who is going to win this match - a Jericho-Undertaker feud is being built up on Smackdown, which is the only bright side to all this, and DX's lack of tag title glory in the last ten years of their existence is being talked up - it's just not intriguing at all.

John Cena as 'Angry John' was entertaining, as he always breaks into this mode at some point in his more serious feuds, and Carlito showing up was nice too. A bit silly at parts (was he REALLY expecting Cena to just stand there and wait for him to spit in his face?), but it worked; I just wish it weren't so predictable. Cena funs around, gets beaten up badly, and comes back furious. I suppose it gives some credibility to Seamus that he got under the champ's skin so, but still ... and just for the record? Beating up Santino Marella doesn't add to anyone's credibility either. Anyone can do it. I half expected after all that cockiness for Santino to bust out and win, but not at this point in Seamus's build. I think here someone a bit more important should have been sacrificed - not necessarily a Kofi Kingston or whatnot, but maybe an MVP?

Speaking of Kofi Kingston that was my other gripe; they announce him vs. Randy Orton, which really should occur on a PPV, or at LEAST have gotten more hype than to be announced at the top of the show (should have had at least a week's worth of prep). I 'got it' when the Legacy came out before Orton and beat up Kingston, leaving him as easy pickings for the Legend Killer, but two wrongs don't make a right here; a not-hyped-enough potential match turned into a bait-and-switch. Still, Kofi Kingston has been too much in the ascendant in this feud for Orton not to get a leg or two up on him along the way and this was a good time for that; the booking was just poor. And when this contributed along with maybe two other matches to there being a grand total of about 8 minutes of action prior to the main event over the course of a two hour show ... sad. The main event of Triple H vs. Chris Jericho was a good one, fresh, with Show and Shawn Michaels on commentary, and took up 10 minutes - more wrestling than the whole rest of the night combined.

All in all, as much as that was picking Raw apart, where I DID enjoy some minutes (again, Verne Troyer was a pleasant surprise, the main event was good, John Cena's promo was entertaining if predictable), really it was trash this week, true trash with a few little gold nuggets thrown in. If WWE is going head to head with a major football game, while expecting PPV money in two weeks, and raising the price of monthly pay events in the new year (and this is the last PPV in this price point), they need to convince fans it's worthwhile to tune in and STAY tuned in. They did not at all get that job done. Here's hoping the creative/booking team just had some cramps getting back into form after the holidays, and will be back to at least 'competent' by next week, the go home show for TLC. I know *I* have had enough of my own distractions and busy-ness these last few weeks. I'm ready to snap out of it and get back on the ball; WWE, won't you join me?

OMG! :P (and Smackdown ...)

OK first of all - I am incredibly ticked off at present that when I DID upload our show tonight? Complete silence. The mic was plugged in etc. ... not sure what was wrong ... and at this point it's 2-3 days later, past midnight ... we'll go next week. Ari I think concurred with much of what I said about SS and Raw ... as far as Smackdown ... let me cover it in a nutshell

• Fascinated by straightedge CM Punk getting the former Festus (who was supposedly Autistic) off of whatever anti-depressants/painkillers/whatever to make him 'normal'; the match with Matt Hardy was very, very strong.
• As was the match between Chris Jericho and Undertaker; can't wait for these two to face off on PPV for the title (which very well might happen should Jeri-Show lose the tag belts to DX at TLC pay per view).
• So long Eric Escobar, as you lost your charisma ... I mean, IC title challenge AND Vicki Guerrero. :P
• For the record, last but not least: as a woman with a weight problem, Mickie James is NOT overweight. Not at all, not by a long shot. That is all.

As I said, incredibly embarrassed and aggrieved both this week by our own level of distraction/laziness, and attendant technical difficulties; we appreciate your patience and we promise to be up and running properly again next week. Trust me; we are as annoyed as you after putting in an hour to recording (not to mention the half hour or whatever of prep), to get static. We will have this solved by next week - we promise. And thank you for your dedication. We promise to continue matching it in the future. :P

*embarrassing*

So we just finished ITVR ... and stupid box.net, my downloader, is down. We'll get it up tomorrow for sure - I will do my best for first thing in the morning. Just as I get my crap together ... boo! lol Oh well, hope you enjoyed SD and check back here tomorrow; I promise after the last couple weeks where we've been busy with family stuff (birthdays, visitors, etc.) and my getting used, again, to the work schedule for the first time in 12 mos. really, next week starting tomorrow should run more smoothly. Thanks for everyone's patience. :P

Programming Note

No no no we don't have any visitors this weekend nor did we forget ITVR last night, nor did we even just look at it and think 'meh forget it'. We actually made a conscious decision, since *I've* discussed Survivor Series and Raw already in previous blogs and it's been a quiet week in wrestling so far otherwise, to wait until after SD tonight, which promises to be a good one, so that we can get Ari's opinion in on those earlier shows, and discuss SD. We'll also discuss how the TLC pay per view is shaping up, and how the Hulkamania tour seems to be going, and what that tells us about Hulk Hogan's future impact on TNA. We'll also be discussing WWE's annual Tribute to the Troops show. So be sure and check in around midnight tonight, to join us In This Very Ring.