The Wrestling Menu - More Al Snow, Discipline & DVD's
Submitted by DaveyBoy on Wednesday, December 11, 2002 at 4:10 AM EST






THE WRESTLING MENU #26

Welcome one and all to the 26th edition of The Wrestling Menu, the column that is sure to satisfy your taste buds when it comes to discussing all things wrestling.

Just some housekeeping before I get started today; WOW is all I can say about the feedback I have received for my History Of Al Snow column that I posted last week. There was a lot of it & practically all of it was positive. Can I once more thank everybody that sent me an e-mail saying how much they enjoyed the column & thanked me for writing it. Everybody who e-mailed has got a response & that is the least I can do for you taking the time out to give me some feedback on my column.

There were 3 main queries I received about Al Snow stemming from the column. The first was about my comment that he appeared on the AAA 'When Worlds Collide' PPV. I should have clarified that Al wrestled in a dark match before the actual ppv began. Secondly, a few people asked why I did not mention Al's European title run, where he often came out in a European country's national costume. The answer is; I'm not sure. I did have the information, but in attempting to not have the column be too long, it got left on the cutting-room floor, so to speak.

The final & most common query was relating to the comment which stated that Al, Dan Severn & The Blue Meanie came up with the idea for the 'Head' gimmick. The reason why this was queried was that Mick Foley said that he came up with the idea in his book 'Have A Nice Day'. GTP (writer of the excellent 'Digging Deep' on the Lords Of Pain Columns Forum) was kind enough to e-mail me the exact wording from Mick's book:

"Man, it hurts to admit it, but Al Snow did think of Socko. Well, I guess we're even now, aren't we Al, seeing as I invented your whole "head" gimmick? The only difference is, without Mr. Socko, I'd still be a fairly popular wrestler, without my "head" idea, Al would be doing my yardwork."

Compare that with this from an interview with Al Snow that I had the pleasure of reading:

Question: Did Paul Heyman come up with the HEAD gimmick and then present it to you, or did you and Paul come up with it together?

Al: Dan Severn, The Blue Meanie and I came up with the gimmick and initially Paul didn't thrill over it, but then things clicked and he has gotten behind it 100%. I thought I would be a heel but Paul kept saying I would be the next cult babyface, like Cactus. A very big compliment!

From them 2 quotes, you can all make up your own mind. But the combination of Mick's quote sounding a bit like his usual ribbing of Al & not understanding why Al would lie about the topic in an interview, resulted in me going with the latter scenario for my column.

If you didn't have the opportunity to read the Al Snow History column last week, you can still do so by clicking 'Columns' on the LOP front page & then clicking 'The Wrestling Menu'. Enough with Al, as your Appetizers will now be served:


APPETIZERS - The Oz Perspective

For those of you that have either missed or haven't had the chance to read my previous columns (or just plain forgot), I am your chef, DaveyBoy & I am coming to you live from Melbourne on the south-east tip of Australia. When I started writing The Wrestling Menu, one of my main objectives was to provide all you readers out there with a different perspective of wrestling; one from thousands of miles away. It took me a while to think of a way of doing this, but while on the LOP Columns Forum, I believe I partially came up with the best possible solution.

What I am going to be doing from now on (probably monthly), is take something that has happened in Australia (or is associated with Australia) and somehow relate it to wrestling. The topic will be called "The Oz Perspective" and will be featured in the "Main" section of my column. The occurrence relating to Australia will most likely be of a sporting nature, but may involve general Australian news or television. Previously I had compared a woman walking very close to an AFL footballer on the field, with possible security concerns for the WWE & used the example of AFL players ousting their coach, as an analogy to wrestlers providing feedback to WWE management.

OK, so let me explain what gave me the idea to talk about the topic I have chosen for today. It actually happened a few months ago now in the latest AFL (Australian Football League) season. The star player of the Richmond Tigers (& probably top-10 in the league), Matthew Richardson, threw his hands up in disgust at a poor pass that was meant for him. Think of a bad pass from a Quarterback in the NFL, except that in the AFL, the play continues on when the pass is incomplete. It may not sound much, but the body language was clear for all to see & Richardson may as well have gone up to the passer & screamed obscenities in his face. If it seems a little familiar to the NFL fans reading this, it could be compared to the Culpepper-Moss hissy fit that the 2 Minnesota Vikings stars threw on the sideline earlier in the season.

Now I can't recall if any repercussions were felt from the Culpepper-Moss embarrassment, but Richmond felt that they needed to act in their situation. They had numerous choices for the disciplinary action that they could have handed to Richardson, but ultimately chose that for embarrassing the club, he should be embarrassed (for want of a better word) himself. No, they didn't tie him to a gate naked in the middle of nowhere. They dropped/omitted him from the team & made him play at a below-par suburban ground in the clubs reserves team. If you like, compare it to a star baseballer being sent to the minor leagues for a week.


MAIN - DISCIPLINE

So how can all this be related to wrestling? Well, there are many actions that can occur both in & outside of the squared circle, that may result in the WWE possibly choosing to take some sort of disciplinary action. In my opinion, this could actually have been done very recently. Think back to the Survivor Series pay-per-view, when Rico became frustrated with Jeff Hardy for not arriving back to the ring in time for a scripted spot. He consequently was clearly heard to yell his frustrations at Jeff.

Now, please let me make this clear; I do not want to get into an argument/discussion about whether or not Jeff was to blame for what happened. It's unimportant to the point I am trying to make. You see, I believe that in any workplace, publicly berating a colleague is a definite no-no. This is more so the case with any professional sport and the WWE, as any actions are seen by literally millions of people worldwide. Those actions can be perceived to be in some way reflective of the company & subsequently result in negative repercussions, such as less advertising revenue or potential employees not wanting to work in that environment.

Before I talk specifically about the Rico scenario, let's first take a look at some history. The first example that comes to my mind when talking about past disciplinary action that the WWE has taken against one of it's wrestlers, is the infamous 1996 'Curtain Call' incident. Briefly, this is
when Triple H & Shawn Michaels broke character at a house show to farewell good friends Kevin Nash & Scott Hall from the company. HBK was the world champion at the time, so it is rumored that Triple H was the one to bear the brunt of Vince McMahon's anger over the situation. Triple H was apparently supposed to win the King Of The Ring tournament that year, but after the incident, he could hardly win a match, let alone a major tournament. Of course, whether you like him or not, Triple H rebounded from this exceptionally & is one of the major stars of the industry today.

Another possible example of discipline being used by the WWE is D-Lo Brown. Brown's career was seemingly going nowhere but upwards. But his career has been where it is to this very day, ever since an in-ring accident caused a life-altering injury to his opponent, Darren Drozdov. Is his lack of success, since the injury to Droz, a result of Brown's reduced confidence, or discipline being taken to the extreme? Your opinion is as good as mine. More recently, it was rumored that the same fate that was received by Triple H & D-Lo would also be given to Test, if he did not change his ring attire & cut his hair. He has done both & is currently receiving a push of sorts. Coincidence?

Now let's briefly discuss the forms that the disciplinary action can take. Already mentioned is what I like to call 'being buried'. Basically, that
means the wrestler will have his status on the card reduced & his win-loss ratio will also head south. The second form that discipline can take is if the wrestler is fined. For most people in the world, a fine is what will hurt most, as we will often think with our hip pockets. However, to WWE superstars probably earning hundreds of thousands of dollars each year, fines may not have enough of the desired effect.

Similarly, suspension without pay, may not hurt the wrestler's hip pocket. But it could cause the offender some embarrassment, as the explanation for their absence would be solely decided by management. Furthermore, not being involved in storylines may adversely affect that performer's momentum & motivation. The final form of disciplinary action that can be used, is the most serious. That is, simply being fired. If the action done was bad enough to contravene a contract, then this is definitely possible.

So back to Rico & his act of frustration at Survivor Series. Firstly, it should be remembered that other wrestler's (Kurt Angle & Scott Steiner) were caught saying things they shouldn't have, by the (possibly too effective) microphones at Madison Square Garden. Having said that, what Rico did should not be tolerated.

Please remember that this is only my opinion & not necessarily correct. But like I said before, publicly berating a colleague should not be tolerated by any organization. If he had done so after the match backstage, then fine. But it should not have happened on air. The form of punishment he should get, is not my decision to make. It would depend on the action that the WWE has handed out to wrestler's in the past & the relevant severity of the actions. Without knowing all the facts, I should not pass judgement. If forced however, I would suggest a fine. Rico would probably be one of the lower-paid performer's on the roster & this would hurt his wallet enough to make the point quite clear. A severe talking-to would also obviously be included.

In conclusion, I believe that it is important for the WWE to take disciplinary action against any on-air performer they believe to have done
something bad enough to warrant it. Discipline is required to keep the ego's of these superstars in check, whilst at the same time, ensuring that the company receives all potential favorable outcomes in a number of areas. This includes the smooth running of the human resources currently under contract, by not allowing the perception that a few main-event stars have control of what happens on WWE programming.


DESSERT - DVD's

Now before I talk about 2 WWE DVD's that I have purchased & seen in the last fortnight, and what a goldmine the WWE could be sitting on, I should state that the size of DaveyBoy's wallet has some significance to this discussion. I only have a DVD player included with my PC & do not have one as part of some sort of super-duper home theatre package. Consequently, any advantages that DVD's provide with regard to picture & sound quality are practically useless to me at the current time.

The 2 DVD's I speak of are 'Before They Were WWE Superstars' & the 'Global Warning Tour'. I was going to fully review the latter a'la a 'PPV Review', but ultimately decided against it. This is because my judgment would be anything but unbiased, seeing as though I was there on the night to witness my first ever live WWE show. I'll just give some quick notes on each of the two:

GLOBAL WARNING TOUR

The first thing I noticed about this DVD was unfortunately a negative. This was that of the 9 matches that occurred on the night of August-10, 2002, only 6 of those were on the DVD. Sure, 2 of the lower-card tag matches that were left off only would have provided those that were there with any memories, but leaving off the better-than-expected Kurt Angle vs Test match was definitely a mistake in my opinion. The other thing that disappointed me about the DVD was the sound quality. Now, like I said before, I haven't got a home theatre package hooked up to my DVD player, but the sound just didn't do the night justice. I can assure you that the 56,734 people at Colonial Stadium that night were a lot louder.

Now for the positives; 4 of the 6 matches shown are practically ppv quality. Noble vs Hurricane, Edge vs Jericho, Storm/Christian vs Mysterio/Kidman & the Triple Threat Undisputed Title match between The Rock, Brock Lesnar & Triple H. On top of this, in between the matches, there were great little tidbits such as Noble & Nidia learning to surf, Storm, Christian & Angle going to the zoo, Edge, Kidman & Torrie out on the town & shots of the superstars at the Fan Frenzy event & a charity dinner. The main part of the DVD went for approximately 2 hours.

Of the extras (just over an hour in total), the aftermath of the main event was shown where The Rock & Triple H beat up on Paul Heyman & The Rock had some nice things to say about Australia. Apart from a few other recaps, there were 3 matches shown from the last time the WWF came to Australia in 1986. The matches were the debuting Rougeau Brothers (pronounced Ragoo by the Australian version of Finkel) vs The MoonDogs, Don Muraco & Mr Fuji vs SD Jones & King Tonga (aka Haku & Meng) & finally the main event pitting Andre The Giant against Big John Studd. Now none of the matches were excellent or entertaining, but they are in a way collectors pieces showing how wrestling has changed over the years. Hell, just hearing Gorilla Monsoon & Lord Alfred Hayes commentating brought back memories.

Would I recommend buying the DVD? Probably not (unless it's discounted), seeing we have 12 pay-per-view's a year. But it's worth a look if you can rent it somewhere.

BEFORE THEY WERE WWE SUPERSTARS

Now there is 2 reasons why I bought this DVD. Firstly, it was on sale for half-price & secondly, we don't get WWE Confidential down under, so none of these sorts of segments ever grace our television screens. I found the 70 minutes main portion of the DVD highly entertaining, funny & sometime enlightening. Sure, the pasts of the superstars were pretty much glossed over. But the point that these guys all grew up similarly to you & I was made quite clear.

Some of the extras (again over an hour) I loved. It was great to see some of the wrestlers in their debut, or the first time they won a title. Hell, I didn't even know that Molly wrestled for the WWF before she became Randy Savage's Valet in WCW. How about 2 classic Jericho putdowns, even though he wasn't one of the featured superstars. Just a very enjoyable watch indeed.

So this got me thinking that the WWE are really on a goldmine with what they could do with DVD's. Apparently there is a ton of extras on the Hulk Hogan DVD (which I can't wait to see), a Ric Flair vs Ricky Steamboat match on a Triple H DVD & the infamous Bash At The Beach '96 match on the NWO DVD. Do you see what I'm getting at? Seeing as though the WWE owns the WCW video archive & (maybe) the ECW video archive (or part of it), they could stack their usual productions with heaps of old & rarely seen footage that should have us fans queuing up to add some of them to our library. All I can say is that I hope that the WWE swallows their pride in including some great footage from their old competitors, as at the end of the day, both us fans & the WWE will eventually win.


Guys, I gotta apologize for both this column & the Al Snow History column last week being so damn long. I don't really have any set guidelines for how long my columns should be. I just choose the topics & talk about them. Whenever I've stated my opinion & backed it up, that's where the column will end. Still, I understand that I've had 2 long ones in a row now & if you've made it this far, then I thank you. Hell, if you've made it this far, why don't you send me an e-mail of what you thought about this column. I can assure you that I appreciate any feedback & that you will get a reply from me. My e-mail address is DaveyBoy123@bigpond.com .

Armageddon is now less than a week away. I can see the buyrate being fairly low, but I've also known the WWE to come through with the goods on pay-per-view when you least expect them to. My fingers are definitely crossed. Next Wednesday, I will have a rundown of the card with my usual ratings scale & follow that up with my own unique look at the following night's Raw. Until then, this is Davey Boy signing off & asking you to remember that dinner is best served in 3 courses.









*NEW GALLERY* Very CONTROVERSIAL Shots of Randy Orton in His Hotel Room!!

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