New URL for The John Report

I will not be updating johnreport.wordpress.com anymore. I have moved it over to http://www.thejohnreport.net permanently. I’m still using WordPress for my posts and the content isn’t going to change. Everything got transferred over smoothly thanks to my friend Melanie from diva-dirt.com doing a great job. It’s just that I wanted my own URL that was easier to remember. We were hoping to get a .com, but all the ones I wanted were taken, so this will have to do. I think it rolls off the tongue. Thejohnreport.net is pretty easy to remember. Spread the word, update your bookmarks and head on over there now.

I’ll have a retro PPV post up shortly. Remember, it’s http://www.thejohnreport.net from this point forward. We’re growing!

WWE NXT Review for 3/2/10 by Doctor Money

I’m back for another vintage edition of the WWE NXT Review. I’m tweaking the review a little this week based on the comments from last week’s. Please comment and let me know if you like this way better or last week’s better and that’s the style I’ll use from here on out. Let’s get right into it and see what we have in store this week.

As we start the show our host, Matt Striker tells us that success or failure for the Rookies is based upon votes by the Pros. The pros are not allowed to vote for or against their own Rookie. Ok, well at least they’re making it seem like a competition, because last week it just seemed like we were just going to have a bunch of random matches. I don’t know if I like the whole voting concept, I would have preferred the Rookies earning points for wins, but it’s something. Let’s see how it plays out.

The Raw Commentfest for 03/01/10

I wrote the Raw Deal last night, posted it at 1am and you can read that right here. Commentfest, featuring Facebook and Twitter, is going to be a Tuesday evening posting between 5-8pm ET.

Thoughts from the Facebook friends aka CommentFest
Here are some random thoughts from some of my facebook friends (just head to Facebook.com/thejohnreport) after I asked for some comments about the show. The comments in green are from the commentfesters while the comments in the brackets are from me. We got 1600+ comments this week.

Are You Ready? No, I said ARE YOU REEEEEEEEADY?!? For the hottest 2 hours on the World Wide Web! Are you ready for the most midget kickin’, bullriding, Cheech and Chonging, Mickie James-Canton loving, Michael Cole slapping, crazier than Crazy Crazy & Crazy Orton Lady, too. Whiter than Sheamus, tougher than Super Cena, pulling more booty than Granpa Dave, no more glowsticks for HBK. The limo crashing, quad tearing, VINTAGE~! festival that is COMMENTFEST!!!!

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the festival of comments, otherwise known as the best part of monday night wrest… errr, sports entertainment. Allow me to introduce our host

He spends most of his days cooped up in a bank,
comes home at night to watch Grandpa hit on the skanks
Enjoys the social life, not averse to a party, … See More
still knows where to draw the line (unlike Jeff Hardy)
Blogs on the shows, talkin some smack,
dedication is not something that he lacks
But when it comes to Raw, he’s wheelin and dealin
Even though his material Creative is stealing
A fan of Serena, though his #1 is Ms. James
Other ‘festers beware, he’s already made claims
One last thing before we go, and start this show,
Let’s give him 2000+ to read through tomorrow

Ladies and Gentlemen….. John Canton (Haha this was fantastic although the bank thing came to an end. New and better job in effect now.)

The John Report: The Raw Deal for 03/01/10 (DX/Showmiz)

Welcome to the Raw Deal. Check out the column I wrote about Triple H earlier on Monday. I’ve received a lot of great feedback on it. It’s a look at his career through the years while also looking at other aspects of his history in the business as well as some questions for the future.

Live from Oklahoma City, Oklahoma this is the Raw Deal…

I miss Jim Ross. That’s what I think of when I see Raw’s in OKC. Oh, and Kevin Durant is absolutely disgusting. He’s one of the five best players in the NBA at the age of 21. Filthy.

Shawn & Hunter begin PromoMania
We start out Promomania with a promo from Shawn Michaels talking about WrestleMania. You have to love how the guy still gets these ridiculously huge pops even though he blatantly cost The Undertaker the World Title just eight days earlier. Goes to show how much people want to see Shawn/Undertaker and don’t really care about Undertaker losing the shiny belt. Shawn said Undertaker’s 17-0, but that nobody gave Taker a run for his money like Shawn did last year. He also talked about how the locker room (what, no catchy name for them Universe for the fans?) was full of people that doubted he could beat Undertaker at WM. He wanted somebody to meet him face to face to talk about it. Out came Triple H. Hey, I read a column about him today. Did you? Shawn was pissed off thinking that HHH doubted him. No Shawn, HHH loves you. He believes in you. He gave a nice pep talk saying that the fans and cameras don’t matter, he’s speaking to Shawn only. Shawn’s the best ever. This is true. I liked this. They got around to the point of the whole thing being that after HBK beats Undertaker he’ll still be in WWE, so the night after WM they can defend the tag titles they will win back as they get their rematch. That’s a clever way of saying they don’t really want to win the tag titles, but they might as well milk the DX thing for one more night. I liked the segment. Best part of the show. If it ended here 9/10. Too bad there was more to come.

The John Report: Respecting The Game

“It’s not an easy life. Careers are short, careers are fast. I’m not that tough, I’m no tougher than anybody else in our business, but I respect our business. I love our business. I put my life on the line every day for our business and I gladly do it. And I will continue to do it until I can do it no longer. You have to earn respect in the business. It’s not given to you. You earn it.” – Triple H talking about the wrestling business to Tough Enough students during season one.

When you think about World Wrestling Entertainment over the last 15 years one of the first names that will pop in your mind is that of Hunter Hearst Helmsley or Triple H. The Game. The Cerebral Assassin. The King of Kings. Pick a name, you know who it is. There’s a good chance you have a strong opinion on him too. He’s been in WWE’s main event for over ten years now. At the past ten WrestleMania’s, he’s wrestled in the WWE or World Title match eight times and one of those times was due to injury. Some think he’s a great company guy while others think he’s selfish. Some think he’s still got it while others think he’s overrated. Either way, HHH is the kind of guy that draws attention good or bad among fans of all kind. In my decade of writing online, there’s no person in WWE that can either be as loved as he is by one side or as criticized as he is by the other side.

Your Questions, My Answers – Volume V (Formspring.com)

The last one of these I posted is from two weeks ago. These answers are from questions over the last week, so while there are a lot of questions answered here, I didn’t have time to post all of them. The ones from Feb 14-20 aren’t here. I’m not going back in the archives that far. The answers are from questions you asked me at http://www.formspring.me/johnreport and I’ve now answered over 1,200 questions over the past month. If you go there you can see the archive of answers too. Feel free to keep asking them. I enjoy doing it. I’ve tried to make it about 80% wrestling related with some sports and other subjects sprinkled in. Sorry if there are repeat or similar questions too. There were a lot of Miz/Bryan ones especially. Enjoy

So lemme get this straight. Sheamus shows up, gets to be dull, and he’s the WWE Champion *snaps* like that while Bryan Danielson gets to be unused then forced to work his way through NXT while being coached by The Miz. What is the world coming to?

Sheamus is 6’5″ and 250 pounds. Danielson is 6’0″ 200 maybe. Vince loves big guys. Shouldn’t surprise you by this point. If WWE was based on talent instead of size first then things would be different. Nothing against Sheamus, who I like. It’s just harder for the smaller guys.

What do you think was WCW’s best year or years for the time you watched it?

I’d say 1996 and 1997. Those were pretty good years in terms of angles as well as quality matches. It started to go downhill a bit in 1998.

Rumour has it the bull on RAW only asked Kelly for directions, but she assumed it was a superstar and thought she better ride it. Your opinions?

Bwahahaha. This made me legit LOL. Awesome.

The John Report: Talking Smack for 02/26/10 (Edge/Miz)

Welcome to the Talking Smack column where I offer up a quick rundown of WWE’s Friday broadcast, Smackdown. I’ll do the blog plugs at the bottom. Among the posts this week were thoughts on the NXT debut as well as the releases of Helms, Maria & Burchill on Friday. As for this column, it’s going to be a bit shorter than my usual. I was out partying on Friday night, got home really late, had a few too many drinks (hi Straight Edge people) and I’m not in the mood to write that much. I’ll cover the show, but it won’t be nearly as detailed as my usual. Hope you understand. Let’s get to it.

———–

Taped from Milwaukee, Wisconsin let’s talk some smack…

The new WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION Chris Jericho comes out with the title bragging about how after over a year of fighting he’s back on top as champion. I love this man. I loved this promo. Asking the camera to zoom in on the title to see his name and “World Heavyweight Wrestling Champion” on it was great. Hey, he said wrestling. That should say sports entertainment. Quick, call the belt maker guy. We need a new one. Edge came out talking about how Jericho may have won, but he also gets speared by Edge a lot. They even got the crowd into chanting “spear” which is good because I’ve never heard that before. Jericho got pissed, attacked him with the mic and then went for the Codebreaker only to receive a spear from Edge. Good opening segment. Love this feud already. Looking forward to the next month of build.

Retro: WrestleMania X7 (2001) Recap

Friday is going to become my retro column posting day. With WrestleMania coming around the corner, I figured it would be a good idea to re-post the various WM columns I have in my archive. I currently have writeups for WM 17, 19, 21, 22, 23 and 25 in my archives. Why don’t I have all of them? Because at various points in my writing career I wrote less. I’m a pretty random guy in many ways. Anyway, here’s the original writeup for the best PPV in WWF/E history: WrestleMania X7. It’s in its original form. I’m not editing. It was written in 2001, so any predictions about future possibilities can be laughed at if you want. If you’ve never seen the show, find it and watch it. If you have seen it, reminisce with me. And then watch it again. It should be viewed multiple times. Enjoy.

WrestleMania X7 Recap
Originally written April 2, 2001. The show took place in the Houston Astrodome and the announcers were Jim Ross and Paul Heyman.

This was undoubtedly the greatest WrestleMania of all time. After seeing it live I also think that it is the best PPV I have ever seen. Why? Let’s get to it. This is not a full play by play recap of what happened; it is basically just my thoughts on each match. I’ll use the standard five star rating system to rate the matches. Without further Apu, here she blows…

WWE News: Helms, Maria & Burchill Released, Bryan Interview

NOTE: I updated this post at about 2:45pmET to include the release of Maria.

World Wrestling Entertainment has released Shane “Hurricane” Helms, Maria and Paul Burchill. Katie Lea Burchill is still in WWE although they barely use her. Neither release is much of a surprise because WWE’s roster is very big right now and with ECW evaporating there was word that some releases would happen. I’m not about to guess who might be next. If you look at the roster and notice who’s not being used you can obviously tell who the likely next releases might be.

EDIT at 2:45pmET: “WWE has come to terms on the release of WWE diva Maria as of today February 26, 2010. We wish Maria the best in all future endeavors.” Diva of the year! Wow. Was her birthday yesterday too. Some quick thoughts:

Random Top 5 List: My Favorite WWE Video Packages

We all know that one of the best things about WWE are the awesome video packages they do. The Michaels/Undertaker one from this week’s Raw was exceptional. I wrote that it was one of the best ever. It’s arguable. There are so many. What I decided to do was think of the five that really left an impact on me and this is my list. I’ll write a little description of each and then embed the video so you can watch. In the comments section, feel free to share some of your own.

1. Austin/Rock WrestleMania X7 “My Way” from 2001
This is the video package hyping up what was the main event at the PPV that I feel is the best in company history. I don’t even like Limp Bizkit that much, but this song fit perfectly because it was a battle of ego between the two top guys in the business. I have seen it so many times. I still love it. Always and forever.