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Submitted by Degenerate on Tuesday, September 18, 2007 at 4:52 PM EST
 I welcome you all here once again, to the column whose train keeps on running even though it's been out of fuel for the past couple of weeks. I'm your usual host of the evening, Degenerate, rolling in some new stuff for you all to read. At least I hope the nifty graphic I was given makes someone keep on reading down below. The new banner comes from some awesome people at LOPForums.com. A whole lot of thanks to KrazE for making the awesome Puerto Rican-flavored banner, and to aisce for being the middle-man in this whole deal. Hey, someone has to do the dirty work. It's not easy being in a conversation with a prima-donna like myself. Like most of my columns, this one was done again after some inspiration came over me yesterday, and thanks to the powers of column-writing, I'll be able to vent a bit about what's bugging me. Even though it's a topic that I swore I would never write about again, I feel it necessary to get my voice heard about it. Even if it only reaches a few people and it changes even fewer minds, I'll be okay with it. Venting seems to be the "in" thing to do nowadays anyway. Just do get too used to it from me. Before that, we can't forget our present issues, can we? * I caught some glimpses of Unforgiven this weekend, and it really didn't grab my attention at all. In fact, I was reading a computer programming book I recently purchased, so either I'm the nerdiest person in the entire universe, or the show was really bad. I'll take a bit of both. I did enjoy Khali's end atop Smackdown, simply because I knew that soon there would be Fatal Four Way matches and other specialty matches (a la JBL when he wasn't over as champion) that wouldn't fit well with Khali's style. After all, he can't crush more than one head at the same time. I do think Batista is passé now. Unless this leads towards a Batista vs. Cena feud down the road (Wrestlemania 24?), I'd say take the big man out of the spotlight for a while. And why, WHY did the show end with Mark Henry again? Didn't they notice how much having Mark Henry in a Pay-Per-View Main Event (Royal Rumble 2006, anyone?) blows? I wanted Mark to stay one or two years, but after that showing, I'd say "Good Riddance". * Why are people angry about The Sandman getting dropped from the WWE roster? It's not like he was doing anything special, nor I think there were plans for him to do anything special. Sadly to say to all those Sandman fans out there, the guy was simply like a fish out of water in the WWE. His bread and butter, what brought him to pro wrestling prominence, was his brawling style that was brought out in full force in the original ECW, yet is totally non-existent in the WWE. Like I've said many, many times about other wrestlers, just because they were awesome in independent companies outside the WWE, that rarely equates to having major success in the WWE. It's never the same, and The Sandman was just another victim of that theory. * Was it just me, or did someone else totally miss the fact that TNA fired Andrew "Test / Punisher" Martin shortly after being hired in the company? It was odd that I hadn't seen him on television for a while. I just chalked it up to the fact that there's only one hour of TNA every week. Then I read a news byte saying why he had been fired. I guess that's how important he was in the wrestling world. The reasons given were that he has a nasty attitude backstage, and the fact that he's freakin' huge. I'm no bodybuilding expert, but I doubt that people can get that huge and ripped by diet and exercise alone. Still, I think the effects of having huge, muscle-bound wrestlers on your roster is starting to be seen in wrestling companies around the globe. Bring back skinny Zach Gowan! * Speaking of the TNA roster, I didn't find surprising that Rikishi, or should I say Junior Fatu, was signed to the company. What I find surprising is the fact that his signing is apparently just because they're trying to get all the name value they can shove in the upcoming two-hour expansion. I just don't agree with this logic. I think TNA has enough wrestlers already to have a decent two-hour show. Bringing in more wrestlers will lead to homegrown TNA talent being shoved down the card in order for these possibly washed-up and injury-prone wrestlers more space. Alienating those who brought the company to the dance? Bad move, TNA. * I may watch Survivor for the very first time, solely to watch Ashley on the show. I've noticed that most of the times on the commercials and clips of the show, the women are in either very tight or very skimpy clothing. In the commercials that are being whored throughout the NFL games on CBS this season (Go Chicago Bears!), there's a part where Ashley's shown in a small little bikini. That's enough to sway me to watch once or twice. It'll be curious to see Ashley's sizable rack seem even larger when her body weight shrinks due to not having decent food to eat or anything. Hmm, maybe that's why they put these hot chicks on those shows. * One quick final note: When the WWE called in the 11 suspended wrestlers to their headquarters after finding out about the entire problem, Chris Masters missed the flight in, further angering WWE officials. Dude... Very stupid move. Hitchhike to Stamford, jack someone's ride, take a hostage and demand to be flown in to Stamford by private jet, run cross-country with your steroid-ridden body. JUST GET THERE. No excuses. * I just added this in before submitting the column, but I wanted to add this here. A wrestling journalist (does such a thing exist?) is claiming that Randy Orton attempted suicide earlier this year. While there's no concrete evidence in the story, the reasoning included in the news clip is that while Orton's name was part of the wrestlers who got caught in the steroid scandal, he's the only one who's still on television while the rest are suspended. If this journalist is basing his claims on this and not direct proof, it seems like it's just a suspicion based on nothing. Also, if Orton tried to commit suicide a while back, don't you think these news would be out there by now? It's weird that last week I wrote a column about wrestlers feeling depressed, and this comes out. In any case, if these news turn out to be true, I hope Orton got the help he needed, and that his life is on track now. In my nearly twenty years as part of the WWE's viewing audience, I don't remember a time when I have been so damn angry at something they've done in the company. I was there throughout the InVasion debacle and I didn't care. I was there when Bret Hart Triple H won a gazillion championships and I didn't care. I was there when guys like Booker T, RVD and Kane were never given a chance to shine, and I didn't care. Hell, I was there when the WWE fired my vampire-goddess Ariel and I still didn't care. Okay, scratch that last one out. I'm sure no one in this world outside of Shelly Martinez cared about that. Still, they're currently doing something that I'm finding more difficult to swallow every time I read some news about it. Yesterday I took some time off from my job - sitting down for eight hours a day isn't as easy as it seems - to stroll over to this very site to get my fix of wrestling news, as I do every day. The way I usually read these news is that I click on the headlines without even reading them until the actual news loads in my browser. So I clicked on this link, and saw an interesting tidbit about a WWE DVD that's going to be released by Silvervision, a U.K. company, about the WWE's shows in Italy earlier this year. I obviously don't care about this DVD, but this part of the news byte made me care: A match featuring Chris Benoit has been edited off of Silvervision's exclusive WWE in Italy DVD set that features the the TV tapings from their tour there last April. The match was a six-man tag team match between The Hardys & Chris Benoit vs. Chavo Guerrero, Gregory Helms & MVP in which the faces went over. The match aired on the 4/20 SmackDown. This obviously wasn't the first match the WWE has edited out after the entire Benoit situation. The segments where Chris Benoit appeared in the 4 Horsemen documentary were edited out, which are a sizable portion of the documentary. I'm not sure if he was edited out of any recent WWE Pay-Per-View DVD's which he appeared before his death, or if many segments where he appeared in other shows are being removed from the WWE's 24/7 service. This isn't only happening inside the WWE, but outside as well. The Wrestling Observer Newsletter has a Hall of Fame deal, which Benoit was inducted into back in 2003. Now they're going to do a so-called "recall election", where if 60% of the voters agree, he'll be booted out of that Hall of Fame. Upon reading these news, along with what has happened before, some anger came over me due to the reasoning behind this. In the column I wrote the day after his death, just when details about the actual murders were beginning to surface, I wrote somewhat controversially that Benoit should be remembered not for his heinous acts he committed on the last two days of his life, but he should be remembered for what he did for more than 20 years before those two days - be one of the best damn wrestlers that ever lived. Many agreed with me, some didn't. After all this has simmered down a bit and some things are more cleared than when I wrote the column, my way of thinking hasn't changed one bit. The fact that someone who gave his life to be inside the ring, creating so many memorable moments and making so much money for the company, can be shoved aside like the WWE is doing is pretty disrespectful to the in-ring work Benoit did for them. Unfortunately, the wrestling world is notorious for doing that. How many wrestlers have been a huge part of the company for years, only to be basically blackballed after their careers are over due to some outside stuff? It kind of makes me wonder how the actual wrestlers feel and how it affects their loyalty. This issue is touchy, as I mentioned before, because of the committed acts. But if Benoit is being deleted from WWE history, then why not others? Why not remove Eddie Guerrero from older WWE DVD's because of his massive drug and alcohol abuse? Why not remove Edge for being a cheating bastard? Why not remove all the current suspended wrestlers because it was proven that they're steroid users? I know all of those are a stretch, and none of them can't compare to murder. But my point is that if one person is being purged from the history books without taking any consideration of their professional career, why doesn't it happen to others? This might be something of a personal issue for me. These are obviously my own opinions. But in removing Benoit from all video, I believe there will be some adverse side effects that will affect the company directly. A clear reason will be lost revenue in DVD sales. Not because people will quit buying the DVD's because they're edited, but because some DVD's will need to be removed from the market. I'm sure the WWE has completely removed the Hard Knocks: The Chris Benoit Story DVD immediately after they found out about the facts. In fact, a quick check in Amazon.com shows that they're only selling used copies from other Amazon users. But what about some others which prominently feature his likeness, such as the Wrestlemania XX DVD? Will they re-release it in a box set with the Main Event - one of the most memorable Wrestlemania Main Events, nonetheless - edited out? That'll be the most stupid decision I think they can make. Another side effect that could occur would be the fact that they're depriving the next generation of wrestlers of using this to hone their skills. Besides actual in-ring work, I think video footage is the best training aid available anywhere. I'm sure that before all of this happened, a lot of wrestling schools used Chris Benoit matches extensively to teach their students, or made it required viewing. In the Chris Benoit DVD mentioned above, there's a non-televised match featuring Chris Benoit vs. William Regal from a Brian Pillman Tribute show. In the commentary, Dr. Tom Prichard, a renowned wrestling trainer, said he often used that particular match to show to his trainees. I recognize there's a whole lot of other wrestling footage out there that can be used, but if you want to train the best, why not show everything from some of the best? Even though I've written about this topic twice already, I have to be honest with something, though. I hadn't watched any Chris Benoit related matches since his death. Not because I hated him or anything lame like that, but because I was afraid that my mindset about being able to separate his ring work with his murdering act would disappear the moment I saw his image on the screen. In some way, I didn't want that to happen. Before writing this today, I took the plunge last night, and sat down to watch the Wrestlemania XX DVD (before the WWE comes knocking on my door and demand I give the DVD in exchange for one with the Main Event edited out). And you know what? I still enjoyed the hell out of it, and I still felt the warm, fuzzy feeling I always did when I saw the embrace at the end between Benoit and Guerrero. I'm glad to know that I can still do that. Again, this is something of a personal issue, and maybe all I'm saying that could happen will never actually occur. Maybe removing Chris Benoit from every single WWE-related item will help clear their somewhat tarnished image and make people forget that someone who did a fatally wrong move was ever related to them. But clean image or not, one of the most prominent figures of professional wrestling, one who could get people to watch wrestling solely due to his in-ring work, is being phased out, never to be seen again. And that's going to be a shame for future wrestling fans. If you try to erase history, you will never learn from it. Well, that little romp was rather interesting. I know there will be a lot of different opinions on this. I'm curious to see how others think about this. Am I the only one who thinks this way? Anyway, let's turn our attention to the kind folks of the Columns Forum for some more fine reading. As I mentioned last week, the Columns Forum currently has a writing competition dubbed Wargames 2007 for all up-and-coming writers. The first round is over, and eight people moved on to the second round, which consists of columns made by teams of two. Let me tell you, writing a good column by yourself is difficult, but making a good column with someone else can be more difficult, especially when the teams are grouped together randomly. So stop on by and check these columns out, and feel free to vote. That's what makes the world go around over there. Just like I did last week, since I'm a judge in the tournament, I won't post those team columns now to avoid any unfairness in the rest of the teams. In any case, since last week's competition is over, I'll be giving my three picks from the first round of the tournament. The 16th Stop on the Road: Vol. 11 - Totally-Not-A Dream Match By The Letter P With Brock Lesnar's apparent arrival to TNA, The Letter P (Don't ask me why he chose that letter) takes a run-down of Brock's career in professional wrestling so far, and how that will equate to him going into unfamiliar territory in TNA. If anything, just read it to see how he ripped me to shreds in his dialogue. The Superfiles!--Special Edition--WarGames: Silent Weapons for Quite Wars By SUPERFAN! We see them every week. Thousands upon thousands are shown on wrestling programs. We all notice them, but never really stop to think about what happens to them after the show is over. The resident superhero SUPERFAN! takes an inside look on the life and times of... wrestling signs. Shuffle Up and Deal: Vol. 6, Everybody's got a price By Jetsetpoker There have been many undeserving wrestlers who have held the most prestigious title of World Champion in wresling. However, there are many very deserving ones who never got the chance. The person from the Columns Forum most likely to end up bankrupt due to gambling, Jetsetpoker, tells the tale of one particular man who never got his chance - The Million Dollar Man, Ted DiBiase. That wraps up this juicy column up for all of you. I hope you enjoyed it. Like I said, I'm curious to see how people react to this. So send all comments, even the hateful ones that wish death to me, via E_Mail to dennmart@gmail.com, or if you have an account on LOPForums.com (how many times have we gone over this?), head on over to my feedback thread and leave something there for all to see. Remember, don't do anything bad, or else your family will probably delete you from all their home videos. Take it easy, Degenerate ***DIRECT LINK*** Over 14 Total HIGH QUALITY Maria 2008 PB Photos! MUST SEE!
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