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WRESTLING GLOBE NEWSLETTER
Friday May 1, 2009
by Mike Aldren
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Wrestling Globe Newsletter by Mike Aldren – All the latest professional wrestling news and analysis direct to your mailbox. WGN is read by industry power players, many top wrestlers and thousands of fans from all around the world.
To subscribe email to: [email protected]
Please send any feedback, news tips, live event info or interview recaps
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WORLD WRESTLING ENTERTAINMENT NEWS
4/30 Superstars TV results: Alicia Fox & Michelle McCool over Gail Kim & Maria; Evan Bourne over Paul Burchill; and Ted DiBiase over Carlito.
The WWE crews have a rare weekend off with no house shows scheduled this weekend. Raw is Monday from the HSBC Arena in Buffalo, with Randy Orton vs. Shane McMahon. They are also pushing a dark match locally of John Cena & Triple H (unlikely unless he returns to TV that night) vs. Legacy in a handicap match. The Smackdown tapings are Tuesday at the Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh.
Tonight’s Smackdown includes Edge vs. CM Punk in a non-title match; MVP w/ Sherri Shepherd vs. Dolph Ziggler for the U.S. title; John Morrison vs. Shelton Benjamin; and a four-way for of Kane, Chris Jericho, Rey Mysterio and Jeff Hardy for a Judgment Day title shot at Edge — said to be a really good show this week.
***
After he was informed he was being taken off the payroll, Superstar
Billy Graham, perhaps in anger against the company, shared his release
letter from WWE’s Joe Bogdan (Legal Affairs) to a select group of
people. The letter, dated 4/17, stated that effective 7/19 Graham was
being let go from his legends contract worth $500 a week. The letter
specified that he is forever precluded from “using any names, likeness,
costumes, props, gimmicks, gestures, routines, themes, personalities, or
caricatures, which refer or relate to, or which are confusingly similar
to those [he] used while bound by the contract.” Basically WWE are
claiming the rights to Superstar Billy Graham. The letter also said he
couldn’t perform in any wrestling matches, which having been retired
since 1987, at 65-years-old, was laughable, until his current contract
expires. Graham says he used the name long before his WWE days, and took
his moniker from the famous evangelist Billy Graham, and the song Jesus
Christ Superstar.
Batista will be supporting Manny Pacquiao for his fight against Ricky
Hatton on Saturday in Las Vegas. He will be in the ring with Pacquiao
before the fight, and then take a ringside seat next to the Vice
President of the Philippines, Noli de Castro. In a press release today,
Batista said: “I love Ricky, but Manny is in a league of his own. He is
off the charts. I am thrilled to be there to support him before the
bout.” Batista is of Filipino and Greek heritage.
Legacy are appearing tonight at Ilio DiPaolo’s Restaurant in Buffalo.
Spotted: Wednesday in Los Angeles, The Miz and Maryse hiking up Runyon
Canyon Park… Tommy Dreamer at the Mets-Marlins game.
Jim Ross has donated one of his custom-made Resistol cowboy hats to
raffle off for Dr. Death Steve Williams at www.WrestlersRescue.org
Top Shelf Talent (OVW tag champs in Louisville) are challenging The
Colons to a title match when WWE returns to Freedom Hall on 5/18 at
http://tinyurl.com/cvkcza
There are tryouts today in Tampa for WWE developmental. They are
charging $1000 to be evaluated.
Joy Giovanni, brought back for the Diva Battle Royal at Wrestlemania,
although if you blinked you would have missed her, didn’t get signed.
TOTAL NONSTOP ACTION WRESTLING NEWS
4/30 Impact TV results from Orlando, FL: Amazing Red & Suicide over The
Motor City Machine Guns in the Team 3D tournament; The British Invasion
over LAX in 4:14 in a Team 3D tournament; Awesome Kong over Madison
Rayne in a stretcher match; Abyss over Cody Deaner; and Kevin Nash &
Booker T over A.J. Styles & Samoa Joe.
4/30 house show results from Knoxville, TN: Consequences Creed over
Kiyoshi; Shark Boy over Brutus Magnus; Angelina Love over ODB; Eric
Young over Kip James; Abyss over Sheik Abdul Bashir; and Team 3D & Jeff
Jarrett over Bear Money Inc. & Booker T.
Told it was a good show. We didn’t get an attendance number, reports
suggest a few hundred. The building was set up for 5,000. Dixie Carter
was sitting in the crowd signing autographs and taking photos.
TNA run tonight at the Expo Center in Corbin, KY plus the Big Sandy
Arena in Huntingon, WV on Saturday, and the Expo Center in Pikeville, KY
on Sunday. We’re looking for reports from all these shows to:
[email protected]
***
The Miami Herald at http://tinyurl.com/dznsz3 has an extensive story
covering Kurt Angle‘s WWE release in 2006. The story reveals that WWE
fined and suspended Angle for a Wellness program violation among other
interesting notes on the program that has never been talked publicly
about before. A WWE statement dated 4/15 denied claims Angle made about
Vince McMahon refusing him rehab in a 4/9 Philadelphia Inquirer story.
WWE said that a prior to Angle’s release “a physician informed WWE
management of concerns regarding Mr. Angle’s addiction issues and
recommended to Mr. Angle that he attend a rehabilitation program. At
that time, Mr. Angle refused to attend rehabilitation.” They said
because Angle refused to go to rehab they released him, although at the
time it was widely reported they mutually agreed to part ways. John
Laurinaitis and Dr. David Black, who overseas the Wellness program, are
both quoted with Laurinaitis saying he was concerned about Angle’s pain
pill addiction back then, and confirmed Angle was offered rehab during
and after working for the company. Since leaving WWE, Angle has said in
several interviews that Vince refused to send him to rehab, claiming
Vince told him to work through his personal problems because he was an
Olympic Gold Medalist. Dave Hawk, Angle’s agent, was also quoted in the
story glossing over the matter saying Angle and WWE mutually agreed to
part ways although he did admit Angle was offered rehab prior to his
release.
Knockout Roxxi Laveaux was called by Terry Taylor and released. She
micro-blogged on her Twitter: “I wish TNA the best in their future
endeavours.” As noted, she was in the midst of a 60 day suspension due
to a backstage altercation a few weeks ago with Rhaka Khan.
Evan Ginzburg’s Legends Radio at www.legendsradio.net has a new show
online with ODB.
Tickets for the 6/21 PPV at the Palace of Auburn Hills, MI go on sale on
5/8. Prices are $150.00, $100.00, $75.00, $45.00, $25.00, and $7.00.
There are people pushing to bring back Petey Williams. Since his
surprise release he has been working for All Japan. The crowd over there
love his Canadian Destroyer finisher.
OTHER WRESTLING NEWS
The Shimmer women’s group run this Saturday and Sunday at the Berwyn
Eagles Club, 6309 26th Street in Berwyn, IL. They are taping Volumes 23
through 26 of their DVD series including Serena Deeb vs. MsChif; Ashley
Lane & Nevaeh vs. Rain & Jetta; Portia Perez vs. Allison Danger;
Cheerleader Melissa vs. Wesna Busic; Amazing Kong vs. Mercedes Martinez;
Sarah Del Rey vs. Madison Eagles; Daizee Haze vs. Nicole Matthews; Nikki
Roxx vs. Cat Power, plus Daffney, Lexie Faye, Amber O’ Neal, Ariel and
many more. Full details at www.shimmerwrestling.com.
The Iron Sheik did the Howard Stern radio show on Thursday promoting his
roast DVD. It was the usual craziness. Sheiky started the interview
calmly but Stern was trying to rile him up. They played a segment from
the DVD where Eric Sims (Sheik’s agent) was roasting Sheiky telling
really bad jokes as the audience hurled insults at him. Sims, who was in
the studio, said the problem wasn’t his jokes, it was just the way they
worked things out there at the roast that day. Sheiky started talking
about how he likes to smoke marijuana. Sims said that Sheiky is a drug
addict at home but when he’s out with him he’s fine. Sims said that
Sheiky is always asking him for money, but Sheiky didn’t know what Sims
was talking about, and called him a dumb son of a b**ch. It was hard to
tell if they were working but Shieky was clearly drunk. Before the Stern
show, they did Opie and Anthony, and as previously noted, Sheiky was
given too much beer and he pissed his pants. They started arguing over
gimmick sales with Sims saying Shieky has a drug problem, and that’s
where all his money goes. Stern asked Sims how much a Polaroid costs.
Sims said that it’s between 10 and 20 dollars depending on where they
are. Sheiky said that was bulls**t, because his autograph is 20
dollars, and doesn’t know why Sims was saying it was 10-15. Sims said
that he pays Sheiky a guarantee when they make appearances. Sheiky said
he doesn’t make much money and sometimes doesn’t get paid at all…
Stern asked Sheiky about being hospitalized for chest pains last week.
Sims said Sheiky was smoking in the hospital, and he was there due to
excessive drink and drugs. Sheiky denied it. This is his OWN agent
talking here people. Stern asked Sheiky if he had seen The Wrestler,
which he hadn’t, but heard they stole his gimmick in the movie. Sims
said that movie was dead on about how the wrestling business is. Sheiky
claimed they were going to use him for the movie but the producers
changed their minds…
The conversation moved on to Hulk Hogan who Stern said was broke. That
is so far from the truth it’s laughable. Technically Hogan hasn’t got
much money to hand because his bank accounts are frozen due to the
divorce battle. Sheiky said that Hogan isn’t a good man and talked about
him sleeping with his daughter’s friend and Nick’s car wreck and how he
was treated when he worked with him. He said that Hogan is a two faced
son of a b**ch. Stern then played some clips of this guy calling Sheiky
a pot smoking f**. Sheiky started yelling at the monitor and saying that
he would f**k his a** with his 10 inch c**k which would make him a piece
of s**t. Sheiky started really freaking out screaming at him. Next they
got some guy on the line pretending to be Hogan. Sheiky started going
off at the fake Hogan. I could go on and on but you get the picture.
Just a sad situation.
A judge in Pinellas County on Thursday denied Hulk Hogan’s motion to
prevent Charlie Hill, the 19-year-old lover of his ex-wife Linda, 49,
from driving his cars. Hogan argued that his estate would be liable if
Hill got into an auto accident. Good point. In court documents the judge
wrote that it “would appear to be exceedingly imprudent” to prevent Hill
from getting behind the wheel. The judge added that it was speculation
that liability could result. A rep for Hogan told TMZ: “This issue
certainly isn’t over… clearly from [the judge’s] statement from this
hearing that in principal he agrees with our position but legally does
not feel he is able to grant an injunction.”
Chance Eric Wright, 19, who murdered his 4-year-old nephew with a
tombstone piledriver, was sentenced to 12 to 15 years in prison, this
past week in North Carolina. Wright pleaded guilty in February in Onslow
County Superior Court to charges of second-degree murder and child abuse
inflicting serious injury in the 4/13, 2008, death of Alexander Rustin.
Wright’s parents testified during the sentencing that their son had a
learning disability, and would never intentionally hurt someone. Rustin
died of severe head trauma suffered while Wright, who was babysitting at
the time, practiced pro wrestling moves on him. The injuries went
undetected until the next day when Rustin complained to his parents that
he was having difficulty breathing. He was airlifted to Pitt County
Memorial Hospital in Greenville but died two days later due to a
subdural hematoma.
Ric Flair recently signed a deal to be a spokesperson for the lottery in
the Carolinas… The Shelby, NC Star at http://tinyurl.com/cslchd has a
story noting that Ric, David, and Reid Flair are scheduled to appear on
Saturday at the Rec Center for a charity show to raise for the Shelby
City Parks and Police Department. If he attends this would be Reid’s
first public appearance since his arrest last weekend.
More on the murder of Lemar Skipper, 22-year-old son of former WCW
wrestler Elix Skipper. The Columbus Dispatch reported that Skipper was
shot multiple times after answering a knock at his apartment door around
3:45pm on Wednesday. He shared the apartment with his godmother, who was
unharmed. A patrol officer picked one of the men identified fleeing from
the scene. Police said at this point they were treating him as a witness
and are following up leads to identify other suspects. The article noted
this was the 27th reported murder in the city this year.
Kurt Nielson, who ran the official Playboy Buddy Rose, posted a message
on Buddy’s passing including quotes from his widow at
http://playboybuddyrose.com/message.html
Lanny Poffo at www.lannypoffo.com sent us the following on Buddy Rose:
“I’ve just learned that my friend, Paul Perschmann (Playboy Buddy Rose)
died. He was 56. I used to watch his matches in Oregon and Washington in
1978. When he lost a haircut match, he got a wig and performed. When
Jimmy Snuka would take his wig off, the crowd would pop. I watched,
waited and remembered. In 1990, Brutus Beefcake cut off my hair. I
bought several wigs and pretended to be humiliated when Hulk Hogan would
take off my wig. The fans enjoyed it but the credit goes to Buddy Rose.
I stole his gimmick… God bless you Buddy!”
Some injury notes from Ring of Honor. El Generico is taking some time
off to see if his knee can heal without surgery… Jon Davis, who
dislocated his wrist last weekend in Dayton, has some tendon damage
which will require surgery.
Little Guido (Nunzio) is booked for the 6/13 ROH show at the Hammerstein
Ballroom in New York City.
In an interview with James Guttman, Manny Fernandez ripped on Ric Flair
calling him, among other things, “a boring garbage champion.” He said he
never really meshed with Flair in the ring because he felt he gave him
the same match every time, while he put over Harley Race for being able
to adapt to any style.
Dory Funk Jr. at www.dory-funk.com posted a photo of him backstage at
the WWE Hall of Fame with Mickey Rourke, and his students Wahoo McDaniel
Jr. and 7-foot plus Jason the Giant.
The guys at www.blogtalkradio.com/HitTheRopesRadioShow has a new
interview up with Jimmy Snuka.
www.carnagecrew.net has a new interview up with Matt Hyson, the former
Spike Dudley.
Amy Dumas and Val Venis have been added to the 5/30 Legends of the Ring
convention in Monroe, NJ.
WG Diva of the Day — Torrie Wilson — http://tinyurl.com/c9wzq6
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