WRESTLING GLOBE NEWSLETTER

EDITION NUMBER 26

13TH AUGUST 2001

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

www.oocities.org/wrestlingglobe / www.evanswrestling.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

IN THE WRESTLING GLOBE NEWSLETTER THIS WEEK

LATEST NEWS - MECW UPDATE + NASH TO JAPAN + MALENKO RETIRES?

RUDO RAMBLINGS - POSSIBLE EMLL PPV + STRANGE MATCH OF THE YEAR

THE PURORESU RUNDOWN - ZERO-ONE TOURNAMENT + FMW RUN BIG ANGLE

CLASSIC MATCH REVIEW

WRESTLING TRIVIA

THE MIND'S OBITUARY

THE DANGER ZONE - 2001 NEW JAPAN G-1 CLIMAX TOURNAMENT

PEARLS OF WISDOM - A LIGHT-HEARTED LOOK AT TODAY'S WRESTLING FANS

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

LATEST NEWS - by Matt Singh and Andrew Evans

Hi Globe subscribers, here's this weeks news…

World Wrestling Federation

It's almost a done deal that next years WrestleMania will take place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada at the Skydome, and expect some kind of official announcement soon to confirm this.

Dean Malenko may or may not have retired, as he more or less thanked the fans at Brian Pillman memorial show, but never said he was actually retiring. There has been talk of Malenko retiring for some months now, as he has been working as a road agent and trainer, and it now appears as though Malenko will move to WWF-affiliates to train and develop new talents. This doesn't effect Malenko's contract status at all.

Last weeks Raw pulled a 5.4 rating, which is down 0.3 from the previous week's number.

The World Wide Fund for Nature won a court case over the World Wrestling Federation in London, England last Wednesday (8/9). The World Wide Fund for Nature filled the lawsuit due to the World Wrestling Federation misusing the name "WWF". It's expected that Vince McMahon and the World Wrestling Federation will appeal against the decision, however if the verdict is upheld the World Wrestling Federation may have to change the domain name of its official web site (WWF.com). The whole dispute started when Vince McMahon seemingly broke an agreement with the Fund for Nature when he created WWF.com (in 1997), as the Federation had agreed to restrict the use of the name "WWF". WWFE is expected to make the appeal on 1st October when the case returns to court.

Jim Ross' meeting with Rey Misterio Jr. on Tuesday went well (who brought Juventud Guerrera along to the meeting with him), however, no form of contract was offered as Rey is still contracted to AOL/Time Warner. His contract will apparently expire in January 2002.

Shawn Michaels is still making on-sale ticket appearances, but a return to television doesn't look likely before the year's end.

World Championship Wrestling

The Wall has been released from his WWFE contract after continuing drug problems.

Booker T has a knee injury, but won't miss any television time. Billy Kidman also has a knee injury, and will miss around 2-3 weeks of television time. On a final injury note, Sean O'Haire has some arm problems, but won't take any time off television.

Elsewhere

Main Event Championship Wrestling (MECW) staged a free show at the ECW arena last Saturday night, drawing a reported 1,100 fans. Quick results from the show are…

- New Jack over Tony DeVito,

- Danny Doring and Chris Chetti over Christian York and Joey Matthews,

- Buff Bagwell over Jack Victory (more on this match later),

- Julio Dinero and Chris Hamrick over Prince Justice and Rob Williams,

- Curt Hennig over Chris Harris (to retain the MECW Title),

- Public Enemy over FBI (to retain the MECW Tag Team Titles),

- Crowbar over Roadkill and Billy Riel (three-way dance),

- Rockin' Rebel and Mike Rotundo over Gary Wolfe and Johnny Hotbody, and...

- Sabu over the Sandman (to win the "Alternative Pro Wrestling" Title, in a ladder match).

Buff Bagwell was originally booked to job to the NWA World Heavyweight Champion, Steve Corino, but when Bagwell was informed of this he threw a fit and was instead booked to go over Jack Victory. As NWA Champion, Corino isn't supposed to job much, if at all, otherwise he is likely to gain a ton of heat from the organisation.

MECW's next show is scheduled for September 2nd, again at the ECW Arena, however, this time admission will be $20-$35.

The Brian Pillman Memorial show, held last Friday, raised around $40,000 for the Pillman Family.

And finally, Kevin Nash will return to the ring 3 days after his AOL/Time Warner contract expires. As he announced on his web site this week, he is booked for New Japan's annual 4th January Tokyo Dome show, and he will team with Scott Hall, re-forming The Outsiders.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

STRONG STYLE TAPES

Strong Style Tapes is the leading source of wrestling action from around the World in the UK. Official tape distributor to the UK's leading wrestling promotion, the FWA, SST imports the best from America, Japan and Mexico; all in the best quality available and ready to send to anywhere in the world. Join the loyalty card scheme for further savings off already low prices and enter competitions to win free videos. For more information on tapes and ordering, visit http://www.strongstyletapes.com or email SST on strongstyletapes@hotmail.com. Or, for an off-line catalogue, either email SST with your address or fax / voice mail it on 0870 127 7895.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

RUDO RAMBLINGS - by Martin Walton

Plenty of news this week including information on a possible EMLL PPV and the details of the strangest match this year!

In EMLL news, there are tons of rumors going around this week that EMLL will stage a PPV next month, with the likely main event being the big blow off to the Ultimo Guerrero vs. El Satanico feud that has been raging on for most of the year. Tarzan Boy returned on this weeks TV show and took part in an angle during the main event with former foe El Satanico. Tarzan is expected to return to action at the end of the month. Rising mid-carder Zumbido injured himself last Tuesday at the Arena Coliseo in Mexico City after he took a bump to the floor and dislocated his shoulder. He's expected back in 2 weeks.

Main results of this week's TV taping on August 7 at the Arena Coliseo looked like this:

MAIN EVENT: Cien Caras/Apolo Dantes/Dr. Wagner Jr./Shocker beat Lizmark Jr./Mr. Niebla/Gigante Silva in a Handicap Match

SEMI-MAIN EVENT: La Fiera/Villano III/Villano IV defeated Satanico/El Averno/Emilio Charles Jr.

TERCERA: Violencia/El Veneno/Valentin Mayo beat Alan Stone/Chris Stone/Tony Rivera

In AAA news - the main results from the big AAA TV taping on August 6 in Leon looked like this:

TERCERA: Mascarita Sagrada 2000 beat Rocky Marvin to win the Mexican National Mini's Title

CUARTA: Los Vatos Locos defeated La Ola Lila by DQ

SEMI-MAIN EVENT: The Monster/Pentagon III/Mascara Malgina/and EL TIRANTES (he's a freaking ref!) beat Mascara Sagrada/Mascara Sagrada Jr./La Parka Jr./El Alebrije

MAIN EVENT: Hector Garza/Cibernetico/Abismo Negro defeated Canek/Latin Lover/Perro Aguayo Jr.

Elsewhere, last week I was talking about old Indy promotion GWAS starting up again. Well, it seems that it's definitely happening as they are running their first show on August 19 in Nezahualcoyotl (try saying that).

And now for the weirdest story in the history of Rudo Ramblings... On July 30 on an Indy show in Nuevo Laredo, Damian 666 clashed with Fugaz in a bizarre hair vs. hair match. Not only were the wrestlers hair on the line but each guy picked four of the fans whose hair would be on the line too! Fugaz lost the match so he and his four fans ended up getting their hair shaved off! Only in Mexico. See you all next week.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE PURORESU RUNDOWN - by Andrew Evans

Here is this weeks news from the world of puroresu:

It appears that All Japan booker Gen'ichiro Tenryu is going to set up Kouki Kitahara and Arashi to challenge for the All-Asian Tag Titles on 8/26 at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo. It's unknown if the team they will facing will be Nagai and Kakihara (the champions) or if the champions will be stripped (due to Kakihara not showing up on 7/14 at Budokan due to a knee injury) and the AJ representative team would be Araya and Okumura.

All Japan announced the card for their "Fan Day" show on August 19th at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo. The line-up currently looks like this:

- Hiroshi Hase vs. Kazushi Miyamoto (Miyamoto's debut match)

- Yuto Aijima vs. Gran Naniwa

- Yoshiaki Fujiwara and Yoji Anjoh vs. Mitsuya Nagai and Nobukazu Hirai

- Toshiaki Kawada vs. Shigeo Okumura

- Taiyo Kea, Masa Fuchi and Nobutaka Araya vs. Gen'ichiro Tenryu, Arashi and Kouki Kitahara

On Sunday night at New Japan's show at the Sumo Hall in Tokyo, Masa Chono and Tatsutoshi Goto teamed up to defeat Shiro Koshinaka and Osamu Nishimura. After the match, Chono introduced two new T-2000 members - Giant Silva (of WWF "Oddities" fame) and Giant Singh.

NOAH is running an angle where Mitsuharu Misawa is going to start screwing Jun Akiyama over by doing "surprise unannounced title matches" on the upcoming 8/26-9/9 tour. Misawa says that he's going to make Akiyama defend the GHC belt on no previous notice. Misawa said that he wanted to do the same tactic with the Triple Crown championship in All Japan but Motoko Baba wouldn't let him do it.

Shinjiro Ohtani announced that ZERO-ONE would be running five shows in Tokyo from September 1st to September 15th to raise capital on their own so that they can function as a business. Ohtani announced that he would be promoting a 10-person, two-block (5 each) singles league that would run over 5 shows. Ohtani announced that himself, Alexander Otsuka, Masato Tanaka, Sean and Justin McCully, Samoa Joe, Yuki Ishikawa, Kazunari Murakami, Kohei Sato and Mr. X (presumably Daisuke Sekimoto) would take part in the tournament.

Big Japan's Daisuke Sekimoto made a challenge this week at the ZERO-ONE office in Tokyo to Shinjiro Ohtani and Shin'ya Hashimoto.

FMW is now recreating Azusa Kudoh's (Gosaku Goshogowara) character into a black monster named "DNA." Early in the week, it was announced that the three big singles matches headlining FMW's 11th August show in Komazawa would be DNA vs. Kodo Fuyuki, Tetsuhiro Kuroda vs. Mr. Gannosuke, and Hayabusa defending the WEW Singles Title against Kintaro Kanemura. The stipulation was that the winning team would get control of FMW. Basically, if Fuyuki's team win, then Tokyo Pop money mark Stuart Levy gets the company and puts himself over in Japan, and if the babyface team wins, Shoichi Arai keeps the company. In the first match, Biomonster DNA defeated Kodo Fuyuki in 3 minutes 25 seconds with a "bio-kick" for the win. Mr. Gannosuke then defeated Tetsuhiro Kuroda in 16 minutes 30 seconds with an arm-lock for the submission. And to finish the night... Kintaro Kanemura defeated Hayabusa in 18 minutes 35 seconds with a Thunder-Fire to win the WEW Singles Title. As Fuyuki's heel team won 2-to-1, Fuyuki (who storyline owned 47% of the stock) gained Hayabusa's 5% stock share in FMW to now own 52% of FMW, with Shoichi Arai owning only 48% of stock. Fuyuki immediately fired Arai and Vice President Mr. Yoshida after the match.

Battlarts announced that they will be involved in a gigantic show on August 19th in Chiba at the 7,000-seat Tokyo Bay NK Hall, which is right next to Hilton's Tokyo Bay hotel, a very fancy place to be. Booked for the show are Alexander Otsuka, Mohammed Yone, Yuki Ishikawa, Katsumi Usuda, Shinjiro Ohtani, Daijiro Matsui and Naoyuki Taira.

W*ING ran their first show at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo in a long time, on August 6th, and after the show, famous Japanese independent promoter Kiyoshi "Mickey" Iberagi announced that W*ING would run their next show on October 21st at Differ Ariake in Tokyo.

(Credit all information: www.puroresupower.com)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HIGH IMPACT VIDEO

Check out High Impact Video at http://welcome.to/highimpactvideo/

High Impact Video specialize in ECW and All Japan tapes. Prices are £5 and £6 respectively, while comps are £8. Also buy 5 tapes and get one completely free tape!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CLASSIC MATCH REVIEW

Bret Hart, Owen Hart, Jim Neidhart, British Bulldog and Brian Pillman vs. Steve Austin, Legion of Doom, Ken Shamrock and Goldust

The entrances are totally surreal. The U.S. team gets booed but Austin gets a few cheers. The Hart Foundation come out one by one. Each time the tempo rises and the crowd gets a little more wild. Pillman, Neidhart, Davey Boy, Owen and Bret in that order. Suggestion when watching this match: don't turn the volume too high! The building literally shakes when Bret's music hits, the fans going absolutely nuts. You'd be hard pressed to find greater crowd reaction than this. The two teams go face to face and JR mentions that a camera crew are filming the Bret Hart documentary. The controversy of the next few months probably hadn't even crossed anyone's mind at that point. Bret and Austin start with the crowd heat swinging, depending on who's attacking. Austin puts on the million dollar dream but Hart uses the turnbuckles to turn it into a pin attempt. Shamrock and Neidhart are tagged in and Shamrock puts on the ankle lock almost instantly, Pillman having to save. Pillman drops Shamrock with a backbreaker and hilariously grabs one of Shamrock's hands and makes it tap. Pillman = WWF Attitude before it existed.

The match continues with several pairings squaring off. The action is good but not great. The crowd heat and drama are what really make the match special though. LOD hit Owen with the Doomsday Device causing The Anvil to break the cover. The referee loses control and the match breaks down into a cluster brawl with the 10 guys fighting all over the place. Austin hits one of Owen's legs with a chair and then tries to attack Bruce Hart at ringside, after he throws a cup of beer at Austin. Owen is helped to the back by officials, with a leg injury. In the ring, Austin fights off the entire Hart Foundation and hits the Stunner on his ex-partner Pillman. Rather than cover him though, Austin just pushes him out of the ring and Bret attacks. Bret gets revenge for Owen by assaulting one of Austin's legs, hitting it with a fire extinguisher at one point. Austin too is helped to the backstage area. The vicious brawl continues and minutes later Austin hobbles back to the ring, the fans booing violently.

Austin and Bret take the match back to where it started and Hart locks on the Sharpshooter. Austin reverses it and puts on his own Sharpshooter! Owen is back and makes the save! Austin lariats Owen out and then tries to attack Stu Hart. Bwahahaha! Bret rolls Austin into the ring where Owen sneaks up and schoolboys him for the sudden 3 count at 24:30! The brawl continues with the other Hart brothers jumping the railing and running off Team USA... all except Austin who refuses to back down. The entire Hart family jumps him as JR screams, "He just doesn't give a damn!" and "He isn't afraid of anything!". This match helped define the WWF's most successful character of the 1990's, maybe ever. The other Hart's celebrate in the ring to end the show. When I first watched this I was so absorbed by the compelling drama that I kind of overlooked how good the match was. The individual weaknesses of those involved were masked well by the strong brawling and crowd heat. This was sports-entertainment at it's peak, before it was burnt out with ideas being rehashed over and over.

[***1/4]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

WRESTLING TRIVIA - by Andrew Evans

1. What year did All Japan hold their 20th annual Real World Tag League Tournament?

2. Frank Hill and Joe Scarpa are the real names of which former WWF tag team?

3. At ECW Living Dangerously 1998, who did Doug Furnas replace, to take on Masato Tanaka?

4. Name Barry Windham's wrestling father.

5. Who wrestled the final of New Japan's 1995 G-1 Climax Tournament?

6. On Nitro, shortly before WCW Bash at the Beach 1997, who dressed up as La Parka to wrestle Randy Savage, only to surprise Savage with his finisher, score the pinfall, and unmask?

7. Rick Patterson plays which character in Japan?

8. How is the arena "Viking Hall" better known?

ANSWERS ARE GIVEN AT THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE MIND'S OBITUARY - by James McGill

The Undertaker has been my favourite wrestler since 1992 when I discovered the wonders of the WWF as a 10 year old and I love this man like a father, but I'm really getting sick of his no-selling and general lack of effort recently. Ever since he was depushed from feuding with Austin and replaced by Benoit and Jericho he has almost stopped trying and this feud with DDP is an absolute embarrassment as far as I'm concerned. He has ceased to entertain. When DDP was revealed as the stalker I was happy because I thought this would be an interesting angle, but oh my God it has been abysmal. I cringed watching Raw and the shrine debacle and I was wondering, doesn't DDP even feel embarrassed to be participating in something as lame as this - does he have no pride? The one thing I did realize is that he's probably a complete sleazebag in real life because you can tell by the way he talks to the photographs of Sara. I find him vaguely distasteful and I would be unsurprised if most female fans weren't a little intimidated by his bizarre sexual tendencies.

Since he is considered the second most prominent member of the Alliance, it would be common sense to suggest that despite his obvious shortcomings, DDP should be used better than he is being currently. Not only does he portray a slimy little pervert, perhaps a realistic part of the character, the major problem has been his complete mistreatment at the hands of The Undertaker. Now I realize that DDP isn't the rising superstar who would actually benefit any from being put over by the Taker considering he is like 45 years old, but I think he deserves to look a little better than a seedy little wimp that gets made into the Taker's bitch every time they have a confrontation, and although he's a respected locker-room leader and Great Guy in General you would think Mark Calloway would be a little more professional than ruining a guy's career almost single-handedly. It has become extremely boring to say the least because this angle has been running for 6 weeks now and after the tag-title match at Summerslam it will probably continue for another 4 weeks until Unforgiven and I think I'll be moderately chagrined by this time to put it mildly. It's certainly a mind-numbing prospect and I can only hope DDP retires or dies or something.

The other major cross-promotional feud has fared much better, although a cynic would perhaps argue that it would be rather difficult to be any worse. I'm obviously talking about Rock and Booker T and as I mentioned last week, this feud is a definite stepping-stone for Booker into the big-time. In my eyes, and probably in the eyes of fans across the world, Booker started as an uninteresting mid-carder trying desperately to fit in and has been transformed into to a genuine threat. At first I was embarrassed for him because I could hardly decipher what he was talking about and he seemed really bush-league on the mic, but his delivery has really improved in the past couple of weeks and that is a promising sign because improvement is always a delight to observe. I was amused by his acting despite all the moaning and complaining about it on the Internet and I particularly liked the "Ah got ya locket right heah, suckah!" line. This Summerslam match should be enjoyable and I hope the injury doubts looming over Booker prove fruitless because this is his big chance to really make a name for himself.

Steve Austin and Kurt Angle should also provide an exciting climax to Summerslam because, well, it's Austin and Angle and those names speak for themselves. I have been impressed by how quickly Angle has been received by the fans because although he's always achieved a big face-pop on entering arenas there are many who genuinely despised the Olympic Hero. Although I might be jumping the gun here I honestly think that if Angle avoids serious injury for the next few years then he'll go down in history as perhaps the best ever. He really is that good. And his moonsault makes me feel like crying because it's incredibly beautiful and maybe I'm getting carried away but when he floats through the air, the fans breathless as he plummets toward his stricken opponents' knees, it really is like poetry.

Austin seems to be reverting back to the paranoid nutcase he was before he became a comedian and although I like it I certainly detected a big face pop as he squashed Matt Hardy, and that is disappointing. His music on Raw was also dire and I much preferred the slowed-down remix last week. Although it's a pity he's gaining face heat again I can't say I'm surprised because I was chanting Austin-Austin-Austin in my head when he was giving Matt a verbal beat-down backstage. Some people are just too cool to boo and I think Austin will always be in this bracket.

That's my opinion about the current state of affairs leading into Summerslam - mostly enjoyable with the drivel being overshadowed by the excitement of fresh feuds and new stars standing on the verge of greatness.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE DANGER ZONE - by Martin Walton

2001 NEW JAPAN G-1 CLIMAX TOURNAMENT

As we left it last week, the tables at the half way stage in the G-1 Climax tournament looked like this:

Block A

Tadao Yasuda - 6 points

Manabu Nakanishi - 4 points

Yuji Nagata - 3 points

Tatsumi Fujinami - 2 points

Kazunari Murakami - 1 point

Minoru Tanaka - 0 points

Block B

Hiroyoshi Tenzan - 4 points

Keiji Muto - 4 points

Masa Chono - 4 points

Satoshi Kojima - 4 points

Osamu Nishimura - 2 points

Jushin Liger - 0 points

The rest of the tournament panned out like this over the last week:

August 8 in Miyagi at Sendai City Gym, before a sell out crowd of 6,000 (third straight sell out)

Block A

Tatsumi Fujinami (4 pts) defeated Minoru Tanaka (2 pts) in 8 minutes with a dragon sleeper.

Kazunari Murakami (3 pts) defeated Manabu Nakanishi (4 pts) in 2 minutes by DQ (Nakanishi went berserk and started kicking the crap out of Murakami).

Yuji Nagata (5 pts) defeated Tadao Yasuda (6 pts) in 8 minutes with a Nagata Lock II (thank god for that, it would be a crime if Yasuda had went over).

Block B

Jushin Liger (2 pts) defeated Satoshi Kojima (4 pts) in 16 minutes with a palm strike (this pretty much eliminates Kojima).

Masa Chono (6 pts) defeated Osamu Nishimura (2 pts) in 26 minutes, 16 seconds with an STF.

Keiji Mutoh (6 pts) defeated Hiroyoshi Tenzan (4 pts) in 18 minutes with a Shining Wizard knee (very big result, this pretty much signaled that Mutoh and Chono were going through).

August 10 in Tokyo at the Sumo Hall, before a non sell out crowd of 9,000 (not a good sign)

Block A

Manabu Nakanishi (6 pts) defeated Minoru Tanaka (2 pts) in 9 minutes with a Torture Rack (Tanaka is the best Cruiserweight in the world but is always destroyed by heavyweights).

Kazunari Murakami (5 pts) defeated Tadao Yasuda (6 pts) in 3 minutes when Murakami punched out Yasuda.

Yuji Nagata (7 pts) defeated Tatsumi Fujinami (4 pts) in 11 minutes with a Back Drop Suplex Hold (Nagata takes the group after a late run).

Block B

Jushin Liger (3 pts) and Osamu Nishimura (3 pts) went to a 30-minute draw.

Keiji Mutoh (8 pts) defeated Masa Chono (6 pts) in 8 minutes when Mutoh used two Shining Wizards on Chono for the win (Mutoh wins the group).

Hiroyoshi Tenzan (6 pts) defeated Satoshi Kojima (4 pts) in 20 minutes when Tenzan used a Tombstone Driver (these two are the current IWGP Tag champions; it’s expected that the two will feud with each other soon).

Final standings looked like this after all group matches:

Block A

Yuji Nagata - 7 Points (who meets Chono in semis)

Tadao Yasuda - 6 Points (who faces Mutoh in semis)

Manabu Nakanishi - 6 Points

Kazunari Murakami - 5 Points

Tatsumi Fujinami - 4 Points

Minoru Tanaka - 2 Points

Thoughts: Yasuda goes through to the semis as he defeated Nakanishi earlier in the tournament, as much as I don’t like Nakanishi, he would have been a better choice to go through than Yasuda. Nagata rallied in his final two matches and ended up winning the group, it finally seems that they are handling Nagata correctly after some Vince Russo booking in the first few days.

Block B

Keiji Mutoh - 8 Points

Masa Chono - 6 Points

Hiroyoshi Tenzan - 6 Points

Satoshi Kojima - 4 Points

Jushin Liger - 3 Points

Osamu Nishimura - 3 Points

Thoughts: Mutoh winning the group is a smart move as he needs to be kept strong in the run up to his match with Toshiaki Kawada at the Tokyo Dome. Chono advancing however is a terrible move, Chono is already massively over and advancing doesn’t benefit him at all. Apparently Tenzan’s push was derailed after some established stars voiced their concerns about Chono pushing one of his buddies. Kojima despite claiming a win over Chono, was pretty much buried and even lost to Jushin Liger.

August 11 at the Sumo Hall in Tokyo before a near sell out crowd of 10,000

G-1 Climax semi finals

Keiji Mutoh defeated Tadao Yasuda in 11 minutes, 22 seconds with a reverse cross-arm scissors hold (thank god Yasuda is out).

Yuji Nagata defeated Masa Chono in 13 minutes, 44 seconds with a Nagata Lock.

Thoughts: For once Chono and co made the right choice with the booking. Nagata and Mutoh simply had to go through and now we have a final between the best two heavyweights on the NJPW roster.

August 12 at the Sumo Hall once again before a sell out crowd of 11,500

G-1 Climax final

Yuji Nagata defeated Keiji Mutoh in 22 minutes, 3 seconds with his "Nagata Lock II" finisher.

Thoughts: Once again the right move as Nagata finally establishes himself as a legitimate main event player. Word has it that Mutoh will go on to defend his Triple Crown titles against Nagata at the All Japan Budokan Hall show on September 8. There’s no doubt that Mutoh will go over in that match as Mutoh is set to drop the straps to Toshiaki Kawada at the Tokyo Dome show later that month. As for this year’s G-1 Climax in general, it was really a mixed tournament with the ridiculous push of Yasuda (the equivalent of the WWF pushing Mark Henry) while rising stars Kojima and Tenzan were held down once again. Yet the elevation of Nagata was crucial in the long term, already in his early 30’s, this was the last chance for Nagata to break the glass ceiling. Hopefully they don’t drop the ball in the upcoming months.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PEARLS OF WISDOM - by Andrew Evans

A LIGHT-HEARTED LOOK AT THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF WRESTLING FANS TODAY

"SMARTS"

- "Smarts" will know every corner of the business... and more. They are often knowledgeable enough to make money from the wrestling business in some shape or form.

- They are very well respected by all the other groups of fans, apart from a select few.

- Are widely seen as the highest "rank" of wrestling fan.

"OLD SCHOOL FANS"

- The closet relative to the "smart".

- They are very likely to have a hatred for Vincent K. McMahon and the current WWF product.

- Also likely to have a room full of Ric Flair and / or Freebird tapes.

- Will reminisce about the days of Ray Stevens, Bruno Sammartino and erm... Ox Baker.

"WRESTLOS"

- These people just like their wrestling. It doesn't really matter to them what style or which promotion. They have no bias in particular, and are fans of all the different styles around the world.

- Also likely to run the Wrestling Globe Newsletter.

"SNOBS"

- "Snobs" are likely to watch A LOT of puroresu, and mark out for... Misawa, Kobashi and Kawada.

- They make every effort to inform everyone how many [*****] matches have been put on by... Misawa, Kobashi and Kawada.

- Did I mention that they particularly like... Misawa, Kobashi and Kawada? Oh...

- Snobs are also very likely to complain about American wrestling with a passion, and for no apparent reason, will make Rob Van Dam the focus of their attacks.

"INTELLIGENT SMARKS"

- The group with the most diversity. There is a whole range of different types of people that fit into this category.

- Your average "intelligent smark" will have enough intelligence to use their relatively new knowledge of wrestling in a decent way.

- They will also continually sing the praises of Chris Benoit's "workrate", and mock Billy Gunn in every possible way (real name, ring name, "workrate", hairstyle etc).

"MARKS"

- Well, we all know what a mark is...

- They will always cheer for the babyfaces, and boo the heels.

- They are also likely to have a ton of Rock merchandise... and a foam finger.

"BITTER FANS"

- At least 90% of today's "bitter fans" were fans of WCW before it was sold to WWFE.

- Like old school fans, they will usually hate Vince McMahon and the WWF, and ECW... but are sometimes unsure why this is exactly.

- Other groups of fans are desperate for them to shut up. Just for a minute. Please?

"UNINTELLIGENT SMARKS"

- These people are usually fresh out of their mark status. The majority have recently learnt some insider terms and some real names, which makes for a terrible mix...

- Much to the annoyance of the smarts, they will then use their newly learnt terms in phrases such as, "My cat took a huge bump off the table yesterday" or "I mark for The Amanda Show".

- They will almost certainly take a "Matt Bloom Sucks" sign with them to any live event they attend, or at least something equally pointless.

- These people often find it funny to shout, for example, "Papa Shango!" at the Godfather or "Sexton Hardcastle!" at Edge, even though they never saw them wrestle under those aliases.

So, there you have it. There are a fair few groups of fans, and I'm sure most of us have come across at least one of each type at some point. Of course, there are some overlaps in the criteria, but it may be interesting to identify which type of fan you are.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

TRIVIA ANSWERS - by Andrew Evans

1. 1996 - won by Toshiaki Kawada and Akira Taue - the first tournament was in 1977.

2. Strongbow Brothers.

3. W*ING Kanemura.

4. Blackjack Mulligan.

5. Keiji Mutoh and Shin'ya Hashimoto.

6. Diamond Dallas Page.

7. Leatherface.

8. The ECW Arena.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If you have any ideas or suggestions for the newsletter, then please e-mail us with them! Feedback on the newsletter is more than welcome and e-mail can be sent to any one of the addresses below.

Also, if you are responding to any advertisers after seeing their adverts here, then please mention the Wrestling Globe Newsletter when doing so!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

WRESTLING GLOBE NEWSLETTER CONTACTS

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

No part of this newsletter may be re-printed or re-used without the prior consent of the Wrestling Globe Newsletter. Wrestling Globe Newsletter 2001 ©.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------