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Archive for June, 2009

Although I think it was clear to most people that Donald Trump “buying” Raw from Vince McMahon was a storyline designed to raise viewer interest in WWE’s product, apparently Wall Street is full of rubes who needed that spelled out for them after the twist ending of the three-hour Raw broadcast of a couple weeks ago. Of course, the WWE did confuse things by issuing that phony press release regarding the sale of Raw to Mr. Trump, but hey, it’s the June curse.

June was when WWE ill-advisedly tried to sell as “real” storylines in which Vince McMahon was killed (twice) as well as other storyline twists that ended up being bad, bad ideas. Still, the Trump thing seemed a bit more obvious so maybe some Wall Street rubes were just bored. But, hey, that’s the WWE treadmill for you; while the details change, there is a season for everything, including storylines that require retraction and clarification.

Welcome to June.

After five years and endless computer memory being devoted to images of her, Candace Michelle has been released from the WWE. The SuperBowl spokesmodel for GoDaddy.com was released without ceremony or explanation this past week.

In other developments, it appears CM Punk’s character is being revitalized once more with a solid push on Smackdown. It’s a great training ground for a younger wrestler like him who’s not quite ready for Raw, but could be soon.

Mick Foley lost the TNA title at the Slammiversary PPV on Sunday, with Kurt Angle becoming the new title-holder after defeating Foley, Jeff Jarrett, A.J. Styles and Samoa Joe in a King of the Mountain match. It’s been a while since TNA switched champs without using Jarrett as a transitional title holder, so that was refreshing.

And that’s about the only thing that was refreshing, as the names Foley, Jarrett and Angle were a lot more interesting back when they were new, in the 90s. Until TNA develops and takes more seriously home-grown young talent like A.J. Styles and Samoa Joe, there’s just not much to be excited about here. The Attitude Era is over, and both ECW and WCW are dead everywhere… except on TNA, which is dwelling somewhere in the Outer Banks, where the houses are beautiful, but the wrestling is so 10 years ago.

Randy Orton may regularly be WWE champ right now, but he certainly doesn’t want to follow in the footsteps of one-time mentor Ric Flair. Despite receiving one of the classiest retirement matches ever by WWE at the 2008 WrestleMania, Flair may soon return to regular ring action in order to comply with court-mandated alimony payments to his many ex-wives.

“I don’t want to put myself in a position where financially I need to perform when I’m 60 or 50 or even in my mid-40s,” Orton told the Charlotte Observer. “There will be a time when I’m a dad of two or three and I just want to be at home with my family.”

While staying away from diet pills and other performance-enhancers would be a good first step for Orton, choosing wisely when he takes a wife might also help Orton avoid Flair’s fate.

The WWE put the belt on Batista at the Extreme Rulz PPV last weekend knowing he would have to vacate the title the next day due to scheduled surgery. While RAW covered the reason for Batista’s absence with an angle injury the next night, it make champ Randy Orton look extremely weak.

Now, going into tonight’s RAW, the WWE Title is vacant with Orton, Cena, Triple-H and Big Show all having legitimate claims to being in the title picture. While it will be entertaining to watch how they resolve this, the sloppy booking of last week is still a disappointment.

Yet it’s not like Batista’s going to be leaving for on lovely Orlando vacations or anything; his surgery is scheduled to keep him on the shelf for several months – meaning he may not be back until Royal Rumble time next year. Maybe Survivor Series.

Here’s a move that shocked me: the WWE has released Mr. Kennedy. Talk about going from the penthouse to the outhouse!

Ken Kennedy has made some bone-headed statements in the press over the past year, sure; and he’s become injury-prone to boot. But few wrestlers have made as solid a definition of their in-ring persona as did Mr. Kennedy when he debuted on SmackDown a few years ago.

I’ve long tagged Mr. Kennedy with being part of the main event rotation within the next couple years, but I guess things went south with WWE recently. I think it’s a bit of a mistake and short-sighted by WWE’s part, though there may be factors that are not known to the public that make this move make sense.

Still, TNA will undoubtedly sign him and since he’s still in his prime, Mr. Kennedy will add some real firepower to TNA if they use him right.

What, huh? Jeff Jarrett’s still in charge over there?

Never mind; even if they sign him, Kennedy’s doomed to a fate worse than a lifetime of needing the very best acne treatments available.