Repost - Furious Zone #48

Hey, why not? Here's some really old columns from 2002. This was back when I was writing for the now long defunct WrestleEmpire.com. I don't agree with half my sentiments from back then now. I certainly would never have referred to Scott Hall as a zero if I was thinking beyond my WCW hatred. Take my badly aged and somewhat uneducated opinions with a pinch of proverbial salt.

The Furious Zone #48 – “You climb obstacles like old people fuck”

Welcome to the dwelling of delirium here at Wrestle Empire.com. The excitement has been bubbling around here ever since I heard that the WWF was in negotiations with Hulk Hogan and Kevin Nash. I’ve never been more disgusted in my whole life. So this entire column could well be a series of expletives. I apologise for this ahead of time. In order to counter this particularly abusive tone I am debuting a new feature this week. It’s called the Furious Respect-O-Meter. The Respect-O-Meter will be a measure of what and who I like right now. Right this second. Excited? I’m so excited I may have to change my pants.

Well I watched the Royal Rumble and I was quite impressed. There was no exceptionally bad match on the card although it looked a little weak on paper. Jericho v Rock was a good match and although it didn’t put Jericho over (more on this in a sec) it was entertaining. I’ll take that. Regal-Edge was a showstealer and I don’t care what anyone says and how many morons in Atlanta sat on their hands during it – it was match of the night. Edge is showing the kind of form which could well see him step up to the next level in the next few weeks (not months, weeks) and challenge Chris Jericho for the WWF title. He won’t win but he’s a genuine threat already. Dudleys v Spike/Tazz was ok and I quite enjoyed it. Jazz v Trish was surprisingly good and is probably the best womens match I’ve seen on WWF PPV since the days of Alundra Blayze. If they let it go a little longer it could have grown into the best womens match in WWF history. Good sign for Jazz and for Trish. Not only was it loaded with hand injured psychology but it had some lovely sequences. Now the bad –

The Royal Rumble has recently been better paced than the rumble match at 2002. It seemed like we had stages in the match that were dominated by one or two stars. In particular the Undertaker had his little run and Triple H and Austin dominated a large spell. Having said that it was still good and Maven eliminating the Undertaker is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. There are other gripes though. Rob Van Dam and Booker T are great performers but their late entries did little for the match and they could have been better utilised on a longer run. I was hoping that RVD would come in at number one and stay there for 30 minutes or so. RVD is so over the crowd booed more when he was eliminated than when Austin went out. I think the WWF misused him in that respect. Also bad was Vince v Flair but I thought that would be bad so I wasn’t disappointed. To be real honest – I’m not that big a fan of Flair. This will probably catch me some flack from some wrestling purists but I never really liked him. I respect him and I appreciate his work but I think his promos suck. I do like a nice WHOOOO every now and again though.

So was the Royal Rumble worth the £14 I swore blind I wasn’t going to pay for it? Well it was better than most of the poxy British PPV’s that I pay the same amount for but it wasn’t as good as either of the past 2 years Rumble’s. It seems the WWF is heading in the right direction but they need a little more variety. None of the past 3 PPV’s have had variety but they’ve all been good. I guess the WWF is sticking with ‘good’ and not going for ‘excellent’ like last years Wrestlemania. Now that is how you book a show – technical masterpiece (Benoit-Angle), high flying table breaking match (TLC), hardcore match (Kane-Show-Raven), comedy match (Gimmick Battle Royal), solid main event (Rock-Austin). The WWF is only using the Rock-Austin match as a template when it needed all those elements for a truly great PPV event. The result is lots of ‘solid’ shows. All good reliable stuff but nothing amazing. The WWF needs more variety and a cruiserweight division would help matters.

Right – Jericho. I said prior to the rumble that Jericho would need to go over clean to make his title run worth shit. Take Triple H a couple of years ago where he needed the same sort of win over Cactus Jack to claim the same credibility and he got it, hence he’s now over and has been for over 2 years on one match. He built on that match. Jericho hasn’t had his one match yet because the WWF just don’t book him that way. He had a chance at the rumble to have his one match. All he needed was a clean win for a credible title reign. If you count using the ropes, the title belt, 2 of his buddies, a crooked ref and 2 ref bumps to retain his title as clean then he went over clean. I usually find a way to exaggerate the facts to make my point in these cases but with that match I didn’t need to. Rock also kicked out of 2 Lionsaults and powered out of the Liontamer twice. Hence killing both of Jericho’s finishers. It’s got to the point where I think I could beat Jericho in a fair fight. He had to use 7 big cheats to win against Rock. Normally one is enough for anyone else. I guess his own ability counts for nothing. The match, although entertaining, has buried Jericho’s title run deeper than a Steve Corino blade job.

Back to my original point in the opening paragraph. The WWF knows it needs something different on the card. So do they put Jerry Lynn, Rob Van Dam, The Hardys, Edge, Lance Storm and Al Snow in any combination of matches they want (any and all would work) or do they sign Rey Mysterio, Psychosis, Juventud Guerrera, Jonny Storm, Jody Fleisch and the Great Sasuke? No? What could be better than my proposals which would provide an entertaining 2 hours of undercard for any Rock-Austin-Triple H-Big Slow main event they wanted to put on? Oh yeah, I forgot.

THE WWF IS GOING TO SIGN HULK HOGAN, KEVIN NASH AND SCOTT HALL.

Why? Why in the name of all that’s good would the WWF want to sign these 3 zeros? Build for the future; don’t sign guys who’ll be worth shit in a year. Shit in a year? Hell they’re shit now. Scott Hall is the only one of the 3 who can still wrestle and he’s unpredictable; childish, irresponsible and quite frankly he isn’t a draw. Plus he’s an alcoholic with ungoing family problems. The WWF fans probably won’t know who he is because most of them came in around 1998 when Austin was the king. Hall hardly has the talent to get noticed amongst the most loaded roster of all time. Hall is nowhere near the likes of Angle, Benoit, Storm and Triple H in workrate and nowhere near the likes of Austin, Rock and Jericho in the mic department. He may have been 5 years ago but wake up Vince, it’s 2002. Scott Hall is a thing of the past. I won’t pop for the guy because I just don’t care about him. I personally would put any member of the WWF’s current roster over Hall clean in any match you care to name. Hardcore Holly is better than Hall. Taka Michinoku is better than Hall. These guys are buried in obscurity. D’Lo Brown is better than Hall. Sean O’Haire is better than Hall. Both these guys are in the minors. If I’m pissed off about Hall you had better believe it’s ten times worse for the other two.

Nash is a joke. Nash has never been able to go. Nash has been carried by anyone who’s ever had a good match with him. Nash knows all of 3 wrestling moves. Nash is the laziest worker in the business today. Do you think the fans and the locker room are going to respond to a guy that lazy? That pathetic piece of crap? I hate Nash more than any other wrestler on this planet. I can’t even name a year to say this about – “Nash hasn’t been worth shit since….” Because Nash has been worth shit since he was born. How anyone ever let him wrestle is beyond me. He just can’t do it. He reminds me of Superstar Billy Graham. The Superstar didn’t bother wrestling either. He just got over on looks. He had the look of a champion and guess what? Vince put the WWF title on both guys. What a fucking surprise. Couldn’t put it on Curt Hennig, Chris Benoit or Owen Hart but sure give it to Nash. Nash the overrated piece of shit. If Nash makes me sick than I can’t look at Hogan.

Hulk Hogan began his reign of terror somewhere around Wrestlemania 3. Before that it was tolerable. Then he just became superhuman and no sold everything, everyone’s finishers, everyone’s signature moves. It was his massive kick out at Wrestlemania 5 against Savage from his big elbow that really did it. Why did he have to no sell it so much? Why not just barely kick out at 2 and ¾? Because Hogan is an egomaniac. Worse still, away from the actual wrestling part of the business, Hogan is a politician. Hogan wants control. Hogan wants success for himself and his buddies and screw anyone who can’t draw. If you can’t draw you’re not worth shit to Hogan. Hogan only respects one thing and that’s money. If you haven’t got any or you can’t make him any you’re worth shit to Hogan. And the WWF is putting these 3 guys in its locker room. They must have lost the plot. All 3 are known troublemakers. All 3 are washed up. All 3 are politicians who will play people in the locker rooms like the proverbial musical instruments they perceive them as. These men cannot be trusted. These men have earned my disdain. For these men I say nothing more.

Well that’s the abuse out of the way. Now onto the almighty praise as we check out the Furious Respect-O-Meter for January 22nd 2002.

1. Bret Jones. Bret, although unknown among the throngs of visitors to the Zone, is a genius and a scholar. Not only did he correctly identify which film my title quote came from last time out (Martin Scorsese’s Bringing Out The Dead) he also accredited it to the correct character. Let the name Bret Jones be forever connected to success and respect.
2. Jeff Jarrett. It wasn’t until I sat down and did a flashback to 1998 and 1999 that I realised how good Jarrett actually is. I apologise to the Jarrett clan if I ever took his name in vain. He is a true hero of wrestling.
3. The Undertaker. I may not like him but he let himself be eliminated from the rumble by Maven. That alone should be enough to kick-start a career for the young man. It’s selfless acts like that, which make wrestling entertaining. Austin did it for Angle. Michaels did it for Austin. Foley did it for Triple H. The list goes on. I’m glad the Undertaker has done something worthy of my respect so early in the year.
4. Jazz. Having a good match in the WWF when you’re a woman is virtually impossible. Meet the woman who will change all that.
5. Tommy Dreamer. Having looked back at my fair share of ECW events from the past it’s now very easy to see where the respect for Tommy came from. He is a great worker who puts his heart and soul into every match. The WWF doesn’t seem to realise they have another Mick Foley right under their noses.

With that I’m out of here. I would like to point out that I screwed up a little in my rumble predictions but, for a change, I actually picked both main events correctly. An inverse Furious set of predictions if you will. Again I have set a challenge to one and all. If you can name the source of the Furious Zone 48’s title quotation you will get your name in big shining lights, just like Bret Jones. Respect the man or name the quote. For until you best him, he is your champion.

The rage is relentless.

Arnold F

PS I was reading Power Of Wrestling magazine today. David Kimble is a tool and Bill Apter is a hypocrite (mayhap some wacky quotation based humour with the fools from POW next week?)