SUN. UPDATE: LESNAR REACTION; UFC SCORES BIG IN INTEREST; GATTI MURDER, JERICHO VS. MIZ, ANGLE
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We're looking for your thoughts on last night's UFC 100, so you can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to
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We're also looking for reports on tonight's TNA house show in Syracuse, NY, as well as Friday night's TNA house show in Jamestown, NY, Friday night's WWE show in Manila, Philippines
Raw will be tomorrow night from Orlando's Amway Arena. No matches were announced, but Seth Green will be the guest General Manager. ECW & Smackdown are taped on Tuesday night in Miami.
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We've got a look at UFC 100's attempt to become the biggest non-boxing PPV event in history with a look back at Dana White, Vince McMahon, the difference between the two, how both got into power, how history of given both men credit for things they didn't do, the real story of UFC's rise to prominence and what slowed it up, and what was really the night where UFC broke through as a television entity, and it was not Griffin vs. Bonnar.
We also have a look at Edge's torn Achilles tendon, and different ideas bounced around regarding what happens next, as well as what plans for Edge and the tag title that have been thrown out the window.
We also have a look at the public funeral of Mitsuharu Misawa, the biggest athlete funerals of all-time and where it ranks, as well as the new power hierarchy in Pro Wrestling NOAH including who gained and lost power, and what Misawa's wishes were for the promotion in the event he could no longer run things.
We've got a lot of history in this coming week's issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. We have a feature looking back at the biggest event of each year in pro wrestling since 1900, as well as all the record-breaking events in both recorded pro wrestling and MMA history. Japan, Australia, Europe, U.S., Canada and Mexico are all covered in a look at many of the biggest pro wrestling and MMA events of all-time.
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Also in this week's issue:
--80s and 90s star needs emergency surgery and career looks to be over
--Two big names for more than 20 years talk about doing a career vs. career main event on a major show later this year
--Unique match where all six wrestlers opposed their real life brother
--Retirement of a Hall of Famer and another says he's slowing down and may never wrestle outside his home town
--International promotion signs up with a Canadian company to market house shows, English language television, PPVs and merchandise in the U.S.
--WWE pulls wrestler from a major show for interesting reasons
--A look at the All Japan junior heavyweight tournament
--Heavyweight vs. junior heavyweight champion match takes place this past week
--Motor City Machine Guns lose belts in Japan
--Former ECW champ set to have a program with current IWGP champ
--First news on the G-1 Climax tournament
--Former promoter sentenced to a year in jail
--Update on Brian Blair's situation
--Update on Roddy Piper's legal situation
--Internal predictions for UFC 100
--Newest members of UFC Hall of Fame
--UFC gets gigantic television breakthrough
--Lots of new UFC matches and big shows for the rest of the year
--WWE's biggest star (according to Vince) and one of UFC's biggest stars hit it off
--UFC may sue rival promotion
--Update on next Strikeforce show and next Affliction show
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--A ton of interesting reaction to last night. I'm going to give my old boxing speech with a little bit of a twist. Anyone who has ripped on every athlete who at times shows unsportsmanlike like behavior can say anything they want about Brock Lesnar and that's fine. For those who think that it is going to mean more people will tune out UFC than people he has hooked as fans who want to see him get beat, you are probably as dead wrong as the people who said the same thing about Ali. For those who think Lesnar was a disgrace to the UFC for doing WWE antics, read a real history lesson of how the sport got popular. Ken Shamrock and Royce Gracie doing WWE interviews, and the funny thing is nobody was more arrogant on his interviews than Gracie, but he was small and beat big guys at first so he backed it up and became the first legend. Shamrock and Tito in 2002 saved UFC when it was one step from death. Did they save it because they were the top two fighters in the world on that night and all these sports fans wanted to pay to find out who was really No. 1?
No. They saved it because they went on "Best Damn Sports Show Period" and cut pro wrestling promos on each other and with no television at all, 150,000 people bought their PPV match, and the UFC owners realized that there was potential in this money losing outfit.
The real history that all the UFC historical retrospectives left out, was that it was the TV shows the two weeks before the Leben vs. Koscheck fight on Ultimate Fighter that was the real building blocks for the success of the sport, not the Griffin and Bonnar fight as has been reported in many places over the past week. Leben vs. Koscheck in a taped match in front of a dozen people in a warehouse like gym drew a higher rating than Griffin and Bonnar did.
In no way do I want to diminish that Griffin-Bonnar was the perfect fight on the perfect night and in the long-term helped more, because they delivered the great fight as opposed to just the great hype that delivered television ratings, but disappointed in the end. What was Matt Serra before Montreal? What was Frank Mir and Michael Bisping this past week? Play some tapes of Ali's promos for Frazier.
There are a lot of very good reasons not to like Brock Lesnar. But whatever media and Hardcore backlash there is against him, which admittedly is some of the most entertaining stuff in a long time, is because he's a former WWE wrestler, not for anything he did. Tank Abbott flipped off fans, and said he was sexually aroused when watching a replay of his match with Paul Varelans. Was Lesnar doing it anymore than Tito Ortiz and his Gay Mezger is my bitch T-shirt, or his grave digging, and take Ortiz out of the history of this sport (and some people are attempting to do that as we speak), and 2006's records never exist. Take 2006 out of the sport's history and you're at a completely different level of interest, media acceptance and CBS, Showtime, and others never get into this game in the first place. The most important fight in getting mainstream interest was a crap third fight with Ortiz and Shamrock. Buy rates mean something to company profitability, but in the media world, ratings are king, because it's a world they understand. What very slowly got the mainstream media into MMA, and as Dana White likes to remind me, took me from one place in life to another, is the media couldn't deny the ratings of the Ortiz-Shamrock match in 2006 on Spike when in 18-34 males it beat several games of that year's World Series. Was that the two best fighters in the world vying to see who was really No. 1? No, it was just a match that the two combatants and the promotion made people want to see more than any other match up to that point in history. And those viewers seeing that crap fight were so turned off by it, that a few months later, when the natural build led to Ortiz vs. Chuck Liddell, the company's bank account grew like never before.
We watched people piss in beds and piss in fruit and jack off on sushi, and guess what, more people still watched last night's PPV than any non-boxing event in history most likely. But some guy cutting a WWE-style promo, which Frank Mir and Michael Bisping both did better than he did on television over the past week, is going to turn off more people than he turns on. Hell, if guys in WWE were cutting WWE style promos as good as Mir, Bisping and Lesnar, WWE would be the one whose business would be turning around. When you actually think about the argument, it's almost absurd.
Could it hurt sanctioning in New York and Massachusetts? It's a weird world we live in and anything is possible. In a logical world, that punch Dan Henderson threw was 100 times worse, but you never know how things can mushroom. But I'm guessing it will have no effect. But you never know.
If you are consistent in your beliefs, that's cool. If you're a reactionary fool on this one, calm down and look at the world, and sports in general. When boxing people say what Lesnar did was worse than anything Mike Tyson did, I'm baffled. Did he bite a man's ear off? Did he threaten to eat any children? He cut the best and most talked about promo of his life and what will be the single most talked about promo of the year. And that's bad? Why, because he came from WWE? Why don't they blame the University of Minnesota while we're at it. Is anyone aware of how Lesnar acted as the U of M wrestling matches during his junior and senior year when they had dual meets against the other powers and fans booed him out of the small gyms? Dana White can say Lesnar was acting, and he has to, but he was just being himself, ratcheted up a few notches, because he is in the sports business, which is why he trained his ass off. But he's in the entertainment business, which is why 1 million or more people plucked down $45 last night.
Why is he now the biggest PPV draw in the world since Oscar De La Hoya is now retired? And by the way, when Oscar De La Hoya set his record two years ago, answer this question: Was the reason he set the record because he had an adversary who was or wasn't playing a villain role on purpose to drum up interest in his match?
Because Lesnar became a celebrity from WWE, and because of that, a lot of people like paying to see him fight, either to beat people up, or to get beat up. Who drew more new fans to the sport this past year, St. Pierre, Anderson Silva, Fedor or Lesnar?
Some great athletes really aren't nice guys. But that doesn't diminish them as athletes, nor hurt their sport one iota. In the plethora of stories, how many people mentioned how many new fans Lesnar has made for UFC with his fight with Mir and fight with Couture getting hundreds of thousands of first-time buyers? One of the key reasons UFC 100 is going to set records and has already started setting them even before the first PPV returns have come in, is because Brock Lesnar came from WWE and he can really fight. Guess what? The fact that some people look their noses up or have nervous breakdowns about the latter part of the statement is exactly the emotional reaction that makes him so valuable to the sport in the first place. No, it's not the WWE. You have to really be able to fight.
What Lesnar did by ripping on Bud Lite, particularly come so soon after the Dana White/Loretta Hunt deal, was absolutely bad for the company. That's the company'ss leading sponsor, and if I was Dana White, I'd be furious over that one. That was stupid, but I doubt Lesnar was aware of the White/Hunt thing and how everything went down from that. He was just trying to be funny, and actually, if it wasn't the lead sponsor and the timing wasn't absolutely horrible, it would have been funny. Hell, that was the one thing he said that almost the entire crowd cheered and laughed at live. But that line also had zero impact on fans paying money to see him beaten the next time he fights.
But for every MMA fan who criticizes Lesnar's behavior as bad for the sport, it was not even within an earshot of the two worst things of this past week. Just in the last few days, what did Quinton Jackson do a reporter? And then the professional fighter as opposed to a blowhard pro wrestler nearly got into a fight with another fighter at the show last night? Has Lesnar ever got in a situation while at ringside at a UFC show that he ever nearly came to blows with someone? And it's not like Jackson had a spotless track record over the last year. Or what if Lesnar did what Dan Henderson did, which was something a whole lot more significant?
But it got nowhere near the reaction. It's all about emotion and frame of reference. GSP is a babyface that people wanted to see win, and they were happy to see him do the right game plan to achieve his victory. Dan Henderson was there to shut up a loudmouth Brit who was obviously playing a role. And he shut him up, and then shut him up once time extra for bad measure. Lesnar was a heel people wanted to see lose, and were furious to see him succeeding with a game plan that was working. All of those elements were part of the emotions of the night. The goal, in the end, is to make people care.
The history of what has drawn the biggest PPV numbers, what made the sport and saved the sport is a lesson very much worth examining for anyone arguing about what is good or bad for the future of the sport. That duality of the reaction of the crowd live, and a large percentage of those who complained about Lesnar's tactics (but not all), says something pretty significant about MMA and its fan base.
That's not even a bad thing. But it's simply accepting the truth of what all of this is, as opposed to people who live in the world of pretend. And then somehow complain about pro wrestling.
--In the top 100 things being searched for on the Internet on Google as of a few hours ago:
2. Lesnar vs. Mir
4. UFC 100
7. Rena Mero
9. Lesnar interview
11. Fedor
13. Dan Henderson vs. Michael Bisping
16. Georges St. Pierre vs. Thiago Alves
18. Henderson knockout
20. Jonny Jones vs. Jake O'Brien
39. UFC post fight press conference
41. Mark Coleman vs. Stephan Bonnar
59. UFC results
68. Shane Carwin
95. UFC 101
99. Brock Lesnar UFC 100
That's not a sports list. That's everything in the world. Gatti's wife is No. 1. Aside from stuff related to Gatti and UFC 100, there is nothing else in the top 100 related to sports.
--UFC 100 was also the No. 1 topic talked about yesterday on Twitter
--Coverage of Lesnar was also the No. 1 news item of the day on Yahoo! at one point today
--Web site buy rate predictions
700,000 to 800,000 4.0%
800-900,000 1.5%
900-1 million 2.9%
1 million to 1.1 million 7.2%
1.1 million to 1.2 million 8.5%
1.2 million to 1.3 million 16.7%
1.3 million to 1.4 million 17.1%
1.4 million to 1.5 million 14.8%
1.5 million to 1.6 million 12.4%
1.6 million to 1.7 million 3.9%
1.7 million to 1.8 million 1.4%
1.8 million or more 9.5%
Anything over 1.5 million and Dana White has to do a backflip off the Mandalay Bay Events Center.
Who is the greatest welterweight champion ever?
GSP 51.0%
Matt Hughes 38.6%
B.J. Penn 3.6%
Pat Miletich 3.1%
Matt Serra 2.1%
Carlos Newton 1.6%
Who was the biggest pro wrestling star of the first half of the 20th century?
Lou Thesz 38.5%
Gorgeous George 31.1%
Ed "Strangler" Lewis 12.3%
Frank Gotch 9.7%
Jim Londos 4.8%
Whipper Billy Watson 2.2%
Yvon Robert 0.8%
Bill Longson 0.2%
Earl Caddock 0.2%
Joe Stecher 0.1%
Very clearly the two most underrated drawing cards in history are Jim Londos and Bill Longson
Lou
--Police have detained Amanda Rodrigues Gatti, the wife of Arturo Gatti, as a suspect in the death of the famous boxer yesterday. The 23-year-old wife of Gatti was taken into custody when police believed there were too many contradictions in her testimony. Authorities are planning on presenting formal charges against Gatti. Police became suspicious when Amanda could not provide an explanation of how she spent ten hours in a hotel room with her husband before noticing he was dead. There were reports that the couple was fighting and drinking on Friday night.
--Pro Wrestling Fusion on 8/22 in Daytona Beach at the Coliseum at North Beach with Awesome Kong, Too Cold Scorpio, Dark City Fight Club, The Shane Twins and Prince Iaukea. They also run 8/1 in Temple Terrace, FL at the Rec Center
--Wanderlei Silva appears as a special guest on the 7/24 Wild Bill's Fight Night show in Atlanta, which has 12 live fights.
--The Fedor/Dana White story in Time Magazine is at http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1909703,00.html
--CHIKARA on 7/31 in Reading, PA with The Colony vs. The Order of the Neo Solar Temple at the Riverside Beneficial Association
--Ed Loredo with Paul Lazenby at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/Edward-Loredo
--A funny story on the five worst haircuts in pro wrestling, listed as Tyson Kidd, Kane, Molly Holly, Jimmy Jacobs and Luna Vachon, is up at http://tuccioholic.com/haircut.htm
--American Steel Cagefighting on 7/31 in Salem, NH at the Icenter headlined by Nate Lamotte vs. Doug Gordon
--Alex Marvez on Brock Lesnar's antics at
http://msn.foxsports.com/boxing/story/9798494/Lesnar-loves-being-UFC%27s-biggest-villain --More on Lesnar at http://www.cbssports.com/mma/story/11946109 .
--And more at http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/21878284/ns/sports-other-sports/
--Leaving Las Vegas, the story had a big color photo of Lesnar on the front page of the Review-Journal
--Lorenzo Fertitta at http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2009/jul/11/ufc-co-owner-addresses-fans-e xpo/ He confirmed signing Mirko Cro Cop to a three fight deal.
--Kevin Eck has a series of interviews with Van Hammer about how he got in the business, got his immediate push, his years in WCW, his substance abuse problems and more at http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/sports/wrestling/blog/2009/07/post_4.html
--Former WWE writer Alex Greenfield has a TV show called "Meteor" airing tonight on NBC at 9 p.m. It's a disaster movie starring Christopher Lloyd, Billy Campbell, Jason Alexander and others. You can see a trailer at http://www.nbc.com/survival-sunday/
--Chris Jericho talks about The Beatles visit to the Philippines in 1966 at http://asia.cnet.com/blogs/babelmachine/post.htm?id=63012119 He and Miz also continue their deal.
--The new season of Big Brother started on CBS this past week and one of the contestants claims to be a professional MMA fighter
--If you haven't seen enough Dana White promos, here's another at http://video.telegraph.co.uk/services/player/bcpid3347407001?bclid=132615 9103&bctid=29012753001
--Oh dear God at http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-simers-ufc12-2009jul12,0,3013466.colu mn
--Mark Coleman's post-match promo at http://www.ufc.com/index.cfm?fa=videoPlayer.home&gid=21187
--Kurt Angle's movie career and a look at wrestlers in movies is at http://www.filmsinreview.com/2009/07/05/interview-kurt-angle/
--In Your Face Wrestling on 7/18 in Queensbury, NY at the Adirondack Sports Complex
--What may have been the inspiration for Ron Killings' new character is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkxyLDO5maY (thanks to Adam Mingione)
--The only Dory Funk vs. Terry Funk singles match ever, held in 1981 in the finals of the tournament to crown the International heavyweight title, which went nearly one hour, is at http://www.dory-funk.com
--Newsweek has a story on Bonnie Hammer and the success of the USA Network, which includes quotes from Vince McMahon, at http://www.newsweekcom/id/206261
--Pro wrestler reacting to Brock Lesnar at http://www.examiner.com
--A story on Bud Osborne, a former wrestler throughout Canada in the 60s and 70s, who passed away on 6/21, at http://www.edmontonjournal.com/sports/wrestler+fans+loved/1780845/story.h tml
--wXw from last night in Mannheim, Germany before less than 150 fans: Terry Frazier b Mark Haskins, Karsten Beck b Carnage, Bad Bones b Joel Redman , Steve Douglas & Sternau b Axeman & Bernd Foehr, Tommy End b Emil Sitoci, Absolute Andy b Sha Shamuels (thanks to Timo Knopf)
--Vyper Fight League on 7/18 in Louisville at Vypers Pit Arena (the Danny Davis Arena) in Louisville
--Shane Shamrock Memorial Cup from last night in Dundalk, MD before 400 fans: Team Macktion b Ryan McBride & Teddy Stigma, Cobian b Bruiser, Rehobeth Beach Crew over Sugarmask & Stevie Richards, Cole Calloway & Rhett Titus and D.J. Hyde & Dino Devine to win the tag titles, Quenan Creed b Cloudy, Aden Chambers b Ray Alexander, Adam Carelle b American Marvel, Kenny Dykstra b Cheech, McBride b Stigma, Daffney b Roxie Cotton, Jake Manning b Caleb Konley, Ruckus over Christian York and Josh Daniels, McBride b Kirby Mack, Creed, Chambers Carelle and Dykstra to win Shamrock Cup
--1PW from last night in Sheffield, England: Jerry Lynn b El Generico, Sterling James Keenan b Doug Williams, Colt Cabana b Johnny Kidd (70s legend), Project Ego b Kevin Thorn & Dragon Aisu, Adam Curtis Stable b Britrage & Lionheart, Nigel McGuinness b Johnny Moss, Darkside b Joe Egan in an MMA vs. boxer match that died live, Martin Stone b Abyss-DQ in a 1PW title match by Stone retained. Bret Hart was there and gave a speech during intermission. (thanks to Matt Barker)
--Insanity Pro Wrestling on 8/1 in Indianapolis at the Fountain Square Salvation Army Corps featuring Jimmy Jacobs
--There is a fight party on Friday night in Kennesaw, GA at Cowboys at 8 p.m.
--NWA Anarchy from last night in Cornelia, GA: Todd Sexton b Kareem Abdul Jamar, Malachi b Bo Newsome, Veterano IV b Mike Posey, Steven Walters & Derrick Driver b Dany Only & Stryknyn, Azrael b Iceberg-DQ, Mike Mosley & Andrew Alexander b Dustin Knight & Anthony Henry, Bordie Chase b Orion Bishop, J.T. Talent & Drew Pendleton III b Billy Buck & Chris King, Ace Rockwell b Shaun Tempers, Mikal Judas & Truitt Fields b Phil Shatter & Kimo-DQ (thanks to Larry Goodman) ________________________
