Issue # 204
Date:
Tuesday April 6th, 1999 6:43 pm
The Wrestling Booking Sheet
Ratings for April 5th, 1999
RAW Nitro
1st Hour n/a 4.2
2nd Hour 5.5 4.2
3rd Hour 6.1 4.5
Composite 5.8 4.3
While RAW convincingly
defeated Nitro, Nitro also had a huge rebound from last
week (a .7 gain). Heat
pulled off a subpar 3.7.
Reported by Georgiann
Makropoulos of
http://www.1wrestling.com/
THUNDER
AIRS WEDNESDAY
For this week, Thunder
will air on Wednesday, due to Atlanta Braves baseball.
Same time, same
channel, different day...
ALL JAPAN TOKYO DOME LINEUP
Announced matches for
May 2nd at the Tokyo Egg Dome
1. Tsuyoshi Kikuchi &
Naomichi Marufuji vs. Makoto Hashi & Gran Naniwa
2. Satoru Asako &
Takeshi Morishima vs. Kentaro Shiga & Yoshinobu Kanemaru
3. Rusher Kimura,
Mitsuo Momota, Masao Inoue vs. Giant Kimala, Haruka Eigen,
Jun Izumida
4. Johnny Smith,
Masanobu Fuchi, Tamon Honda vs. Yukihiro Kanemura,
Gedo, Koji Nakagawa
5. Yoshinari Ogawa,
Maunukea Mossman, Masahito Kakihara vs. Hayabusa,
The Great Sasuke,
Tigermask (#4)
6. Giant Baba's "
Retirement Ceremony " : Gene Kiniski, Bruno Sammartino,
The Destroyer
7. Stan Hansen, Steve
Williams, Akira Taue vs. Gary Albright, Yoshihiro
Takayama,
Takao Omori8. Toshiaki
Kawada vs. Hiroshi Hase
9. Kenta Kobashi, Jun
Akiyama, Jisnsei Shinzaki vs. The Road Warriors &
Johnny Ace
10.Vader vs. Mitsuharu
Misawa (Triple Crown Heavyweight title match)
Reported by Masanori
Horie
http://welcome.to/robswrestlingworld
===========================================
ESPN FALLOUT
By Steve Appy
There has been a huge
fallout regarding last week's ESPN 'Outside the Lines';
everybody from Jim
Ross to Jerry Lawler have chimed in with their own
arguments.
Ryan Oaks has written
a terrific article below with his own thoughts; my own
opinions go in a
different direction.
The special was both
disturbing and negative. The Professional Wrestling
business was linked to
ugly words like cocaine, steroids, suicide. At the same
time, everything
stated was true. This is an ugly business, and fragile
psyches
are destroyed on a
regular basis. People really are dying, people really are
abusing drugs, and
they are doing it at a rate far greater than any other
profession.
Does ESPN (and their
parent company ABC) have reasons to target the wrestling
business. Sure they
do, for reasons Ryan states very well below. That doesn't
make the special
wrong, no matter how ugly the facts may be. For better or
for
worse, this is not a
wholesome hobby that we all follow so closely, and it would
be unwise to bury our
heads if the facts don't suit our agenda.
Instead of directing
our anger at the critics, perhaps we should address the
problems that have
caused so much grief. Don't shoot the messanger, instead try
to cure the patient.
===========================================
"Welcome to the
Jungle"
An Editorial Written
by: Ryan Oaks (JO13squad)
Hello again everyone,
and Welcome back to The Jungle! That's right, I know you
all haven't heard from
me in a while but I have come out of my silence because
once again, the
mainstream media is taking its best shot at the world of
wrestling, and trying
to ruin it again. Why? All because they are jealous that
Monday Night Football
doesn't come close to the ratings of either one of the
Monday night wrestling
programs. We'll get back to that later though.
Right now I am going
to give you my "Wrestler of the Week!" Well I picked this
weeks Wrestler of the
week because he comes out every week and makes me laugh...
so I guess you could
say that this week I have hopped on board the "Hooooo
Train!" That's right,
The Godfather is my wrestler of the week. Also, I would
like to talk about the
Undertaker/Ministry angle... Well, when it first
happened, I heard a
lot of "Boo's" in the crowd and all over the net... now I
don't know if any of
you remember or not, but I was one of the only ones who
said "its not good
now, but it can, and probably will get better." Now,
although the angle is
still somewhat slow, and the
Ministry still has
some un-needed members such as Mideon... at least it is off
and running. I look at
it this way, if they drop some of the dead weight, and
get the Reaper back
into the ring a bit more, the angle can work very well, it
all depends on how
they work it.
Now its no secret to
any of you that have read my previous columns, that I am a
huge Foley/Cactus Jack
fan. I don't know about the rest of you, but I really
enjoyed the hell out
of having him as champ and I really don't think the Rock
should have been a 3
time World Champ within a matter of a few months. I just
thought I would let
you know how I felt about that.
Also, I just want to
say that this whole thing about everyone calling everyone
else a "mark" and
everyone giving their "professional opinion" on it is
stupid,
and I think that
everyone should just stop using the damn word, it would
definitely make things
a lot easier on everybody.
Okay, now I am going
to go to my sole reason for writing this article...
ESPN/ABC's attempt to
take a shot at wrestling, and piss alot of longtime fan's
off. Sure, I am not
denying that wrestling has its problems, but nobody is.
Of course, that goes
with the territory though... I challenge any person that
thinks they know what
they're talking about to prove to me that a sport exists
without any problems.
Give me a break, I am gonna have to agree with JR and a
lot of other people as
far as ABC being jealous of the success of the wrestling
business. You can't
tell me that they didn't pay that 13 year old kid to get on
Nation Wide Television
and claim that he thought wrestling was real because of
the blood baths!
Either the kid got paid or he just wanted to be on TV. Now
this week Vince is
going to appear on "20/20" and I guarantee you that it will
be pretty much the
same point as the ESPN show. Oh, and for all of you anti-WWF
people, like McMahon
says, if you don't like it or approve of it just turn it
off, its very simple.
If you want more of a G rated program turn on WCW.
I am sick and tired of
everyone taking shots at wrestling for the controversy.
Football
has steroids all over
the place, but you don't see ESPN running out to any of
the training camps to
question and investigate it... but then again wrestling
doesn't make ESPN any
money while football is one of their main attractions.
Well, I am done for
today, if you liked it great, if not then oh well, but no
matter which way this
is how I feel, and I think that if any of you feel the
same way about the
ESPN thing then you should let them know and if the ABC
thing
turns out the way I
think it will, then you should let them know too. So if
anyone has an address
to write to please give it to me so I can publish it for
all of you to write
to...
Congratulations, you
survived the Jungle!
Any and All questions,
comments, and letters of hatred are welcome...I love
to hear feedback, so
you can e-mail me at
JO13squad
===========================================
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===========================================
THE BOTTOM
LINE
Submitted by reader:
slush8
The new set doesn't
help, Flair is flabbier than ever, Hogan is still slow,
Goldberg is improving
but still has no personality, Schiavone just sucks, and
Sting isn't making a
lasting impression on me. Bottom line, WCW, with all the
changes they're trying
to make, Nitro still is awful. To turn Heenan into RVD
for a moment, Bobby
Heenan is the whole F'N' show! All I see good going is
Benoit & Malenko
wrestling Raven and
Saturn, who I hope,
(Raven and Saturn that is) get their dues by winning the tag
belts. Kidman and
Mysterio sure are not worthy tag champs. The
U.S. Title
tournament is a joke
as well. I think Bret Hart had the right idea, too bad
its just an angle,
when he should have been world champ months ago. He should
have really quit.
Bottom line, WCW is
sinking like a rock while the WWF is pummeling them. ECW is
on the rise too,
except for stations cancelling them. Is Uncle Ted's $$$
involved? Sorry Ted,
you can kill the leader, but not the movement. ECW's voice
will live on no matter
what you do.
And folks, just to let
you know, any of you who read my newsletter Gutbuster,
for now it is done
with. If we go back into production, I'll post a note in
this newsletter.
===========================================
FANTASY BOOKING- THIS
WON'T HAPPEN
Submitted by reader:
Moj8681
Now that Owen Hart and
Jeff Jarrett have lost the tag straps, its time for them
to go their separate
ways. First, Owen and Jeff complain that the loss was a
fluke. They are
granted a rematch at Backlash by X-Pac, but Shane McMahon
revokes the match,
instead placing his Corporate tag team of Test and Triple H
in the
match. He also says
that if Jarrett and Hart can beat a mystery team at
Backlash, they can
have a title shot the next night on RAW. During the match at
Backlash, Triple H has
the match well in hand, but Test double crosses him, and
becomes the new fourth
man of DX (assuming Kane is not in DX).
Meanwhile, Jeff and
Owen defeat the reunited team of Mark Henry and D-Lo Brown.
The next night on RAW,
Jarrett and Owen defeat X-Pac and Kane to regain the tag
team belts. At the
same time, the
LOD has been storming through
the competition
upon their return. At
the May PPV, the two teams meet, and
LOD takes the gold.
The following night on
RAW, Owen and Jarrett say that the competition in the tag
ranks is a joke that
they let
LOD win. The ex-champs say
they want some singles
competition. They go
their separate ways on peaceful terms.
Jeff Jarrett, along
with Debra, in the weeks and months to come, gain much
success, and regains
the Intercontinental Championship. Owen takes on upper card
athletes like X-Pac,
Kane, and Triple H. Finally, in June, at King of the Ring,
Owen
dismantles Shamrock.
The night after, he says that Shane McMahon (now the
leading McMahon in the
WWF) has misused and held him down. He then mentions
that
Austin is unstoppable. He
defeated the Rock several times, and at KOTR,
beat Paul Wight. Owen
reminds everyone of how he was the one to stop
Austin's
rampage before. Shane
enters the scene the agrees with Hart. They bring up past
incidents, where Owen
broke
Austin's neck, and also how
Owen "injured" Dan
Severn and Shawn
Michaels. Owen replaces Shamrock in the Corporation and is
billed as the "REAL
Hitman of Wrestling" He and Austin collide at the July PPV
and Owen wins his
first world title.
===========================================
NITRO ON THE REBOUND
Submitted by reader:
ErhnamMan
I settled into my
chair in front of the television at
7:59 p.m. on Monday, as I
have done every week
for the past two years. I turned the station to
TNT to get
ready for a boring,
predictable hour of Nitro, and then two exciting hours of
RAW. And then BAM!
Nitro has a new set! This is the most exciting thing WCW
has done since Sting
appeared in black and white for the first time. I guess
the bookers at WCW
opened their eyes and realized that fans liked change. As
pumped up about the
new look as I was, I knew that at the top of the hour I was
going to flip over to
WWF.
Then, The Man of Six
Moves (Goldberg) storms out and then Nash gets in his face.
Nitro, in Tony's
words, was heating up. I enjoyed the kendo stick match,
which
was a surprise because
Kendell Windham was in the ring. Later in the hour, when
the 4 corners match
was made, my eyes were wider than they have been while
watching WCW since
Torri Wilson was introduced. After the Steiner/Meng match, I
looked at the clock
and noticed I had forgotten to watch the beginning of RAW.
I flipped it over to
USA and watched RAW until a
commercial break, then flipped
it back to Nitro. For
the first time in many, many months, I found myself
watching WCW and
switching to WWF during the commercials.
The suspicions of
Hogan towards Nash was good, the tag team championship was
awesome, and the main
event was incredible. The low point of the night though,
with the exception of
the black and white battling it out, was the fact that
Hacksaw Jim Duggen had
to wrestle
Lenny Lane. If Duggen is
going to make such a
big impact, shouldn't
he wrestle someone more formidable? Without those two
segments, and that 15
minute commercial break, Nitro was almost flawless.
Finally, WCW looks
like it will even up the ratings war in the future.
its nice to see Sting
back, and Macho Man's voice was music to my ears. If WCW
keeps up these kinds
of shows (which is improbable), then my prediction is that
WCW will rise above
WWF once again. I just hope that the endless nWo saga will
end soon. Then I will
enjoy WCW fully.
===========================================
NITRO THOUGHTS
Submitted by reader:
Justin Miller (miller.2421@o...)
I must say, that last
night was probably the best Nitro® I've seen in a long
time. I like their new
set, though it has hints of copying Raw is War® (Ringside
Hosts, but that's
where they should of been from the start anyway). It was
nice
to not see Larry Loser
out in the announcers table this show. Perhaps they can
keep it that way. Fat
Tony® and Booby® made a good team, when Fat Tony® wasn't
bothering the hot dog
guy. (Ok, cheap shot, sue me!) I was actually impressed by
most of the matches
that they had on the show. All in all I was very impressed
with the way they
filled their three hours of time on Mondays. What they need
to
do now is drop the
first hour if/after their ratings go back up and go on a
full
scale challenge to Raw
is War®. The last few weeks I've been watching more Raw
is War® rather than
Nitro®. If this week's Nitro® wasn't a fluke, I just might
have to go back to the
opposite and watch more Nitro® than Raw is War®. Oh and
here's what I see
happening Wednesday: Jericho finds a loophole from the DQ
yesterday and Booker T
has to rematch with him, so he winds up winning. Good
King Eric®: Let's keep
this up and you just might have a decent show on your
hands.
===========================================
HEAT OMISSION
Submitted by reader:
Sable16911
You left this out in
the Heat report and I thought some people that didn't see
Heat would like to
know what the envelope the Undertaker first handed Shane
when
he had him hostage to
give to Vince contained. There was a bunch of photos of
Stephanie McMahon, at
the mall, in her room, getting in her car and so on. That
bear that was burnt
was a gift to Stephanie when she was a baby that she kept,
like her stuffed
animal she never went anywhere without, like a security
blanket.
===========================================
NEW DIMENSION WRESTLING NEWS,
RESULTS, & RANKINGS
North Carolina 4/2/99
Attendance: 194
New Dimension
Wrestling, Thomasville, at the National Guard Armory,
Lieutenant
Tim Sells pinned Mr.
Excellent...Manny Fernandez defeated High Octane...Brute
Shooter pinned
Steel...Sergeant Max Rhodes & The Southern Stud wrestled to
a
double countout...The
Natural Jeff Knotts pinned Alex The Great...Rikki Nelson
pinned Cham Pain...The
Dirty White Boy defeated Beastmaster Rick Link & The
Gravedigger in a steel
cage match for the NDW Hardcore Title.
New Dimension
Wrestling announced a return date of Saturday, June 5, 1999.
West Virginia 4/3/99
Attendance: 286
New Dimension
Wrestling, Charleston, at the Univ. of Charleston, The
Natural
Jeff Knotts & Joey
Bravo defeated Outcast & Punchy McGee...Sergeant Max Rhodes
&
The Southern Stud
wrestled to a double countout...Beastmaster Rick Link pinned
Brute Shooter...Bambi
pinned Peggy Lee Leather...Manny Fernandez & David Jericho
wrestled to a double
disqualification...Manny Fernandez & Beastmaster Rick Link
defeated Sergeant Max
Rhodes & Joey Bravo in a shootfight challenge...Tully
Blanchard defeated
Rikki Nelson by disqualification.
New Dimension
Wrestling announced a return date of Friday, July 16, 1999
New Dimension
Wrestling Rankings: (as of April 6, 1999)
Champion: Rikki Nelson
1. Tully Blanchard 6.
Ricky Morton
2. Venom 7. Mr.
Excellent
3. Rick Link 8. David
Jericho
4. Manny Fernandez 9.
Surge
5. Dirty White Boy 10.
Gravedigger
New Dimension
Wrestling Schedule (thru May)
Sat., April 10, 1999
Cana, VA St. Paul School, 8:00p.m.
Fri. April 16, 1999
Bluefield, WV Bluefield Auditorium,
8:00p.m.
Sat., April 17, 1999
Oak Hill, WV National Guard Armory,
8:00p.m.
Fri., April 23, 1999
Columbia, SC Capital City Stadium
Sat., April 24, 1999
Columbia, NC Columbia High School,
8:00p.m.
Sat., May 1, 1999
Binghamton, NY Municipal Stadium
Sat., May 15, 1999
Philadelphia, PA ECW Arena, 8:00p.m.
Fri. May 21, 1999
Lynchburg, VA City Armory, 8:00p.m.
Sat., May 29, 1999
Lynchburg, VA City Stadium, Time TBA
New Dimension
Wrestling News/Gossip
Tuesday, April 6, 1999
-NDW Security Guard
John Robinson was hit by Manny Fernandez & David Jericho
during their match on
Saturday night in Charleston, WV. outside of the ring.
Once Robinson was down
he swung back at Fernandez and hit him which was an
obvious mistake, Manny
then began to "shoot" on him with the help of Jericho and
left the security
guard laid out for several minutes.
-NDW Wrestler "The
Natural" Jeff Knotts lined up the steel cage for New
Dimension Wrestling
this past Friday night in Thomasville, NC. Upon NDW
Wrestling having to go
get the cage 60 miles from the wrestling facility, it was
discovered that the
trailer the cage was on was 13 months out of expriation on
the license tag, the
brake lights on the trailer did not work, and there was
suddenly a flat tire
on the trailer. Because of the cage not being returned
that night, Knotts was
fired from his full-time job as a manager of a Greensboro
nightclub the next
day.
-New Dimension
Wrestling has hired Big Tony as head of security this past
weekend. Big Tony will
be responsible for overseeing the set-up and breakdown
of the wrestling
equipment and work as head of security on the wrestling
shows.
On both shows this
past weekend fans began chanting Tony at ringside during the
shows. Tony kind of
reminds everyone of Steve the security guard on the Jerry
Springer talk show.
-The problems continue
for NDW Wrestler Beastmaster Rick Link as he has had
battles both in and
out of the wrestling ring this past Friday night. An
unidentified redhead
emerged at the show again stalking Link while he had his
regular girlfriend
their as well. It looks like female redheads are nothing but
trouble
Visit the NDW
wrestling website to get all of the current happenings on
the
hottest independent
wrestling promotion in the United States today, New
Dimension Wrestling.
New Dimension
Wrestling hotline: 336-882-4921 (24 hours a day, 7 days a
week)
New Dimension
Wrestling worldwide website: www.ndwwrestling.com
For all of the latest
news, results, rankings, upcoming shows, merchandise, and
wrestling school visit
the hottest independent wrestling website on the web
today!!!!
Or write to:
New Dimension
Wrestling, P.O. Box 10211, Greensboro, NC 27404-0211.
New Dimension
Wrestling merchandise: Mail payment to NDW P.O. Box address,
e-mail at
CPlano or call 336-882-4921. T-shirts, hats, and videos,
calenders, pens, are
for sale at reasonable prices!!!
NDW/T-N-T Hardcore
School of Wrestling, Rick Link, Instructor, call
336-218-7677,
336-882-4921 or e-mail at
CPlano. Serious applicants only
need apply. Training
to be wrestlers, managers, valets, and referees.
Andy Durham Sports
Show, every Tuesday night on 950AM WPET, Greensboro, with
you
hosts Andy Durham &
Bruce Mitchell, 7:00p.m.
Ripley Von Slam's
Slamfest, every Tuesday night on 89.3FM WSOE, Burlington,
NC,
6:00p.m.
That's all for
today!!!!
Chris Plano
New Dimension
Wrestling, LLC
New Dimension
Wrestling and NDW are registered servicemarks licensed
exclusively
to New Dimension
Wrestling, any reproduction or retransmission of the name or
acronym without the
express written consent of New Dimension Wrestling is
strictly prohibited.
New Dimension
Wrestling, a Limited Liability Corporation (LLC)
===========================================
The staff of The
Wrestling Booking Sheet
Editor: Steve
Appy
Columnist:
Mark George
Columnist: SamJerry
Columnist: Fritz
Capp
Columnist: Rick Phelps
Columnist: Cindy
Barnes
Columnist: Josh Hewitt
Columnist: Swami
Columnist: Tom Misnik
Columnist: Nate Pelley
Columnist: Robert Troy (Osiris)
Columnist:
Tom
Kirkbride
Columnist: Ryan S. Oaks
Columnist: Darren Kramer
Any submissions sent in by readers or columnists become the
property of The Wrestling Booking Sheet, and are subject to
editing due to grammar, spelling, or content. Any
information taken from The Wrestling Booking Sheet must be
credited properly, with our E-Mail address listed. We have
no problem if you want to use our stuff; just credit it
properly.
Copyright- Steve
Appy of The Wrestling Booking Sheet ©1998, 1999, 2000
"When you're young and you
pick up a guitar, it feels so powerful. It feels
like you pulled the sword from the stone. I used to believe
that it could save the world. But I don't really believe
that anymore." - Bruce Springsteen
"The greatest challenge of
adulthood is holding on to your idealism
after you lose your innocence and believing in the power of
the human
spirit after you come crashing into the limits of the real
adult
world." - Bruce Springsteen
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