2012 Wrestling Thread: Jericho returns tonight, Dragon is champion, RAW and TNA still unwatchable...

It could well be, for once. Rock/Cena is going to be a spectacle, no doubt about it. HHH/Taker in a hell in a cell will probably be exciting and brutal at least, if last year's match was anything to go by. And Punk/Jericho ought to be a real highlight if they get time. Unfortunately there's little doubt for my money that Sheamus is gonna squash Bryan flat and put him back down to the upper mid-card, because that's the way WWE has tended to roll with sneaky heel champs against big hulking babyfaces at Wrestlemania (Cena/JBL was pretty bad for this). But again, if that match gets a bit of time then both those guys could shine.

Biggest news (well, it's still all just rumours, I suppose) is that Brock Lesnar's signed a deal to rejoin the active roster and is going to bring the Pain to Miami and fuck up someone's night (John Cena?). Even if that doesn't happen I'll be happy to watch though. Wrestlemania's the one night a year where it all pretty much sells itself.

Yeah news of certain people arriving in Miami means that this could be crazy. Or you could remember it is April Fools.

Bryan-Sheamus has potential to be fun as hell, and Punk-Jericho should be shit-hot. Things could get brutal and bloody in the cell match, their last go-round and all. Oh and Rock-Cena is a thing if you want it to be.

Personal recommendation: 'See' it, don't buy it.

WRESTLEMANIA!

All right, this better be good.

Lilian Garcia... hmmm, they couldn't be bothered getting a celebrity singer? What is the point of WM without shit celebrity appearances? Anyway, this is so dull, America America America.

Nice to see that Bryan-Sheamus has made it from the dark match last year to the curtain jerker this year. Fucking title, worth less than the IC title.

In 7 years they would have worked their way through the card to headline WM35

Let's go Dragon.. But Royal Rumble winner opening show. Pish. Worthless achievement these days/.

"Opinions are like noses, everyone has one." King needs to retire.

I am not drunk enough for this.

SD Jones gotta be embraced right now.

Bob Backlund v. Diesel a fucking five star mat classic compared.

I got the American Dragon ROH DVD and it starts with an hour long 2 out of 3 falls classic w/ Paul London. Just sayin'

well after years not watching the value of the world heavyweight championship has certainly been proven to me.

"No-one... NO ONE SAW THAT COMING." Ok Michael Cole.

We are going to get 25 minutes of Orton-Kane and we got 18 seconds of the best guy there.

hahahahaha, fuck that! So glad I'm not paying for this shit. That was a world title match?! Poor Bryan

Teams should have names. Team Jonny v. Team Teddy is lame, they should be like the Dynamic Aces v. the Doom Alliance or something.

Say what you want about the WWE bookers, they know how to troll the smarks. I wonder if this has all been a long practical joke with the whole Bryan title run just an elaborate set-up for that punchline. Still, frees up an extra 20 minutes for Rock and Cena to flex at each other.

Oh shit NOW its Kane v. Orton. Its like they want to make me hate this ppv from the start.

good to hear that wwe themes are still in the age of nu-metal. shouldn't we be onto sick dubstep drops nowadays?

Say what you want about the WWE bookers, they know how to troll the smarks. I wonder if this has all been a long practical joke with the whole Bryan title run just an elaborate set-up for that punchline. Still, frees up an extra 20 minutes for Rock and Cena to flex at each other.

― Windsor Davies, Monday, 2 April 2012 00:16 (34 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Alternatively, you could just say they have no fucking idea what they are doing. Get the best mat wrestler since the child killer and have him fued with a broken Mark Henry, Big Show and then bury him. Make the Royal Rumble seem so worthy by making the opening match two years in a row, whereas Jericho will be up near the top of the card by winning a Raw 11 man Battle Royal.

Now hyping up Brodus Clay the monster and having him debut as the funkasaurus was great trolling. This was just shit.

good to hear that wwe themes are still in the age of nu-metal. shouldn't we be onto sick dubstep drops nowadays?

― Boo-Yaa Too Rough International Boo-Yaa Empire (Merdeyeux), Monday, 2 April 2012 00:19 (42 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

They played some Skrillex once for something, the internet reaction was hilar

Actually the opening match wasn't shit. I'm just annoyed that I'm gonna have to suffer these two big piles of shit when I could still be watching Sheamus-Bryan.

Bets on who goes through the Spanish announce table?

twitter down the middle between 'lol people who pay for 18 second matches' and 'i paid 65$ for this shit?'

it's good to ease myself back in with this match that could've taken place with zero differences ten years ago. none of this silly new stuff that bryan's bringing in.

Maaaan, so it's gonna be an hour each for the HIAC and the m/e then. I could do without that.

the tweet to put it all in horrifying perspective:

Tony Schiavone ‏ @TonySchiavone_

Wow, #JeffHardy lasted longer than #DanielBryan when he lost the title. #Wrestlemania #IWantWrestling #WWE

ok this is just embarrassing.

and another advert.

hope big show wears a special wm knit hat for all to enjoy.

oh and on the 'titles mean jack shit' front - three of them - half of the wwe titles - aren't being defended tonight.

Enjoying Michael Cole's attempts to sell Big Show as a legit superstar with all those titles seconds after a video package that was specially put together to show what a joke he's been for more than a decade.

my stream died and i missed most of that. big show win? i presume this is his retirement lap

Yeah, Big Show squash. Divas tag match to get longer than the WHC and IC title matches. Amazing

what everyone wants to see is big show againgst mid card villains

cody rhodes looks alright, i'm guessing that big show is more or less uncarryable these days though.

Cant find a working stream now. Dunno if I can be arsed with this

Cody Rhodes was really good earlier in the year. He had a bit of a Mankind thing going on where he was 'deformed', wore a protective mask like footballers w/ face injuries and had a creepy screwed&chopped theme tune. Then they dropped it all for some reason.

Having the full Rick Astley shows that Vince needs to leave 2009 internet land NOW.

ok i guess my stream got bored and is rick rolling me, although i still just assume this is vince on twitter.

Cant find a working stream now. Dunno if I can be arsed with this

― Windsor Davies, Monday, 2 April 2012 00:49 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

you want me to give you a shout for when jericho-punk is on?

Thanks for the offer man but I'm just gonna call it a night. Work in the morning, can't justify staying up for this stuff. I'll torrent it tomorrow for the 3 main events.

cool, goodnight homie.

Womens Champ: Beaten by someone who hasn't ever wrestled before.

P certain Punk is just gonna take a curly turd on his title later.

holy shit matt strykers tan. he's like 7 different colours.

the women's wrestling seemed a lot better than it was back in the day. still not good enough for the bookers to take it remotely seriously, i guess?

tna take it seriously and actually get p big ratings off it compared to their male wrestlers. but lol tna.

my stream died :(

oh its cool, in the ten minutes it took me to get a new working one, taker was still walking to the ring.

hoyl shit he came as shredder

undie's dropped down from the 328lbs he was billed as for years, i guess that's the cancer for ya.

ok this hair shit is stupid beyond belief. he is the fucking undertaker, not some emo girlfriend with issues

between my internet being shitty, streams dying and this being lame as hell, i think i'm gonna tap out soon.

we're probably going to get another half hour of this at least, right? hm.

Sean fucking Mooney!

SummerSlam tonight. One of the big four. And I, ILX's biggest wrestling fan, care enough that's i've watched 1 match from Raw since the 1000th episode.*

I'm gonna watch tonight. But seriously, if they have booked the middle aged parent who has wrestled three times in the past year, once against Kevin fucking Nash, to beat a fucking former UFC champion I think I'm done. I'm just never going to ever spend another penny on WWE. And I don't think I'm alone there - they are going to turn off so many tweens who are already starting to turn on this bullshit if they try and make Triple H look legit in this. Just break him within 2 minutes and move on to Brock Undertaker at WM29.

*tbf that match was Bryan Danielson v. John Cena and it was a masterpiece. You should go find it. Daniel Bryan really is the best wrestler since Eddy and a couple more years like this in the big leagues and he could hit Flair/Macho heights. Seriously. I'm not kidding, he's that good. He could have an interesting match with the Giant Gonzales, who i'm certain died two years ago.

I doubt I'll watch either. Shame, really. I've been watching tons of wrestling through all the documentaries on Netflix but the current product seems less and less appealing.

The new iPad app is cool though.

I've just looked at the card.

Pre-show Santino Marella (c) vs. Antonio Cesaro (with Aksana) Singles match for the WWE United States Championship[10]
1 Triple H vs. Brock Lesnar (with Paul Heyman) Singles match[11]
2 CM Punk (c) vs. Big Show vs. John Cena Triple Threat match for the WWE Championship[12]
3 Kane vs. Daniel Bryan Singles match[13]
4 Dolph Ziggler (with Vickie Guerrero) vs. Chris Jericho Singles match[14]
5 The Miz (c) vs. Rey Mysterio Singles match for the WWE Intercontinental Championship[15]
6 R-Truth and Kofi Kingston (c) vs. The Primetime Players (Titus O'Neil and Darren Young) Tag team match for the WWE Tag Team Championship[16]
7 Sheamus (c) vs. Alberto Del Rio Singles match for the World Heavyweight Championship[17]

Ziggler-Jericho might be cool. Del Rio is fucking awful. Primetime Players are fucking awful and the tag team division of letting minorities pick up a paycheck is embarrassing, especially knowing how good Truth is. Big Show v. John Cena is a title match in 2012. IN 2012. They first fucking fueded around Wrestlemania fucking 20, eight years ago. Big Show won his first world title and Kane wrestled at SummerSlam in 1995! Triple H, Jericho AND Mysterio were wrestling then too. I'm so fucking bored of these guys and then guys like Claudio are in the dark match so Rey Rey can wear an awkward fat covering t shirt.

Ziggler-Jericho looks like the only slightly bright spot on a pretty dire bill.

Yup.

this felt like an old school show where everyone before the main event was told to 'tone it down'. ziggler, bryan, mysterio etc. all seemed a bit slower than usual, less big spots than they could have had. fucking triple h.

still, the three way was surprisingly good. big show actually getting the opportunity to be a bad ass giant properly for the first time in a decade, leading to a match without him.

and the main event was alright. really though i just loved that triple h obviously booked a big 5 minute send off to himself where everyone would be teary eyed and chant his name and instead we got YOU TAPPED OUT YOU TAPPED OUT etc.

also fred durst is still alive

I only caught the main event. It wasn't bad; at least the fear that Triple H would win was false. I'm afraid that means a Trips beats Lesner redemption match for Wrestlemania, especially since Triple H lost to Undertaker the last two years..

oh dear god i fucking hope not. the only thing triple h should do near wrestlemania is be beat down on raw by brock, leading to taker coming out to save him and build their match. fuck another one of those matches, even if it wasn't shitty.

I don't want another Taker v. Lesner match either. Let Lesner be a monster and let Taker rest. 20 was enough.

well 1 match a year is resting! it is either brock v. rock or brock v. taker. personally i want him to destroy someone like orton or mark henry at survivor series, enter the royal rumble and throw out like ten dudes (and then have a maven moment) and then go for taker. keep him away from punk and the title.

alternatively v. bryan and have something like the bryan morishima matches would be incredible and i'd go back to loving the 'e forever

I'd like Taker to continue to rest and not return. Let it be over for good.

Lesner v Bryan would be cool.

Oh I'd love Taker to never come back and I really want this to be the year they get rid of ANYONE who wrestled on tv in the nineties, even Jericho. But he hasn't had an official retirement match and his last match is not going to be w/ kane v. jinder mahal, tyler reks and other jobbers.

http://botchamania.com/some-guy-reviews-chynas-new-film/#more-2101

Right on cue, she rolls under the bottom rope, then just keeps rolling over and over until she falls out the other side of the ring. Stone and Sanders stand there dumbfounded. Then Sanders gives a Flair “woooo”. Gold.

Here’s Gene on Chyna’s rolling.

Gene: What is this move? Very curious. Cut to two dicks in her mouth.

http://t.co/aJl3pv2o

THE ROCK IS IN HACKNEY. BEATING UP OUR CRIMINALS.

is he putting a hand on the bbq?

Oh man, I hope Jerry's okay. Fingers crossed.

I just saw RAW, needless to say it was tough to watch when you know what's about to happen. But in a way, he was lucky it happened at a live event because there were doctors right there. If he'd had a heart attack in the hotel before the show then he'd probably be dead now.

It was scary live, as things trickled out through the show and through twitter. But he is lucky, and I hope he has a quick and easy recovery. And that he stays out of the ring.

Maybe it's not a good idea for 60 year olds to be wrestling, but it's not like he was one of those typical wrestling burnouts. He was always in shape, didn't drink or do drugs, I'm not sure about his history with roids or painkillers but he didn't wrestle a very demanding style so he doesn't fit the profile of someone who would abuse that stuff. I'm not sure this could have been prevented if he hadn't been wrestling regularly, but yeah, I hope he doesn't try to make an in-ring comeback after this.

http://img.metro.co.uk/i/pix/2012/09/17/article-1347878816953-150EFE4A000005DC-508827_466x336.jpg

that's awesome.

What happened to Lawler? (Have been away two weeks and am only checking ilx because of flight delay and free airport wifi).

Jerry had a heart attack on RAW when he was doing color commentary. Rushed him to the back, was revived by emts on the way to the hospital, is now recovering at home in Memphis.

Was nice seeing Jerry via satellite. He looks great.

"Marty Jannetty on facebook: 'o hell yes, imma ax this now. Shawn, my good friend, what up bee otch?? I gotta book coming out, well not yet, there’s a few moral issues, you may wanta contact me first, cause I’m telling bout my life, you being a part f it, well hell, call me, but in truth, I’d rather you not, the book will be soo much better if I don’t fall for your shit, but if you say, `Don’t say that,’ I’ll remember what yo religious fake ass said about me in your bullshit book. Anyone wanting to see real, will, I ain’t protecting yo as.' Our education system has failed us." - (WON 2012-01-23)

lol Punk beating up a fan the day his dvd is released and he has to fight Vince

USA chant to support South African Justin Gabriel this week.

Also a fucking you can't wrestle chant to.... CLAUDIO? WTF?

Sheamus and Big Show had... a really good match? Huh? Still gonna skip Big Show's retirement go round.

Kofi and Miz was dope but it ended too quickly.

Main event was fucking horrible. Punk made Honky Tonk Man look like a tough guy and Ryback still seems to have no idea what he is doing (great clothelines though.) Nick Patrick-ing it when you have Lesnar or even just Heyman to mess with a dude, or you could go for some sort of Dusty finish or just a Diesel-Bret Hart cheeky roll up or just fucking anything other than evil ref. Evil refs are the worst, the guy is obviously a failed actor from FCW (Maddo I wanna say?) who should be future endeavoured/put under a mask and started again.

USA USA USA USA USA

Yeah let's go the Ghanian who acts Jamaican, beat that Swiss fella for America!

Tyler Black (Seth Rollins) and Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose) debut in the main event! FUCK YES! Also the son of Sika from the Wild Samoans! Hell of a potential stable there!

Survivor Series was mostly rubbish. Ryback should be nowhere near the main event. Randy Orton is so very dull and the booking of the match was atrocious. Sheamus and Big Show bored me nearly to tears. Having discussions about how no-one cares about rugby must be a way to fuck with Claudio for some reason.

First match was fun though and JBL can make anything fun.