The Gorilla Press: Steamboat Shipwrecked, ECW in TNA, NXT JNX?
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Sunday, July 4th, 2010
THE SHEET
McIntyre, Barrett’s VISA issues resolved [Baltimore Sun]
Former WWE Champion Brock Lesnar makes UFC Return [UFC.com]
Daniel Bryan’s blogs about WWE release [PW Torch]
TNA Knockout Velvet Sky signs an extension [PWInsider]
GORILLA CLIP OF THE WEEK
With the re-return of ECW all but a foregone conclusion, the infamous chair throwing incident of at Heat Wave 1994 serves as a suitable clip for this week.
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SHOWSTOPPER
RAW
Not so sublte Apple ad campaign paying dividends. The mysterious RAW GM angle, an entity who’s only portion of weekly dialogue is the renowned Apple sign on soundbite, has become both intriguing and annoying. Michael Cole’s involvement in the angle, while getting more heel heat each week, kills any potential of a payoff that would see him revealed as RAW’s new GM which is unfortunate as he among the most logical of choices.
All signs point to Abraham Washington to be revealed as the RAW guest GM given his history with FCW (breeding ground for the Nexus superstars) and his proficiency on the mic that originally made him a strong internal candidate for the role previously given to Bret Hart.
Ricky Shipwrecked. Yet another brilliantly done Nexus attack saw WWE Legends as the latest victims. The WWE plugged some lingering holes in the storyline with its one week rule of no contact between WWE superstars and the Nexus. This opened the doors for a Nexus attack on the WWE Legends (as opposed to superstars) who were also very good in their role.
While the beatdown angle has been done almost to perfection since the first time we saw it about a month ago, it’s getting closer to that time where the WWE needs to decide what direction to take from an in ring standpoint with the Nexus stable. These upstart superstars can only beat up so many superstars, legends and officials before people stop caring.
WWE JNXT. Wade Barrett’s potentially damning absence from WWE TV this week was yet another example of why the WWE NXT angle has been cursed from the start. Barrett’s sudden deportation from the United States due to VISA issues has been yet another bad occurrence in an odd string of events that includes the firings of Daniel Bryan and James Dudley III (the WWE NXT limo driver), the sudden departure of Bret Hart from WWE TV, and the recent hospitalization of Ricky Steamboat following the aforementioned Nexus attack.
With Barrett, and fellow WWE superstar Drew McIntyre’s, VISA issues apparently resolved, perhaps this is a sign of better days for an angle that has otherwise been WWE HXT.
Big Nasty’s WWE NXT Power Rankings
1. Kaval- As expected, Kaval has been far and away the best worker in an otherwise green crop of supestars who are collectively a more inexperienced unit than the season one rookies. Kaval’s “Welcome to the WWE, Indy Punk” treatment while embarrassing has not been as bad as it could be, and Laycool’s constant praises of his talent are positive contributions to his progress.
2. Alex Riley- Alex Riley is a main event waiting to happen, and his stay on WWE NXT only seems to be delaying the inevitable. Riley has definitely stood out from the crowd and will be continuously featured as one of the main characters of season two.
3. Michael McGillicutty- Despite his rather vanilla packaging, Michael McGillicutty has shown strengths both in the ring and on the mic that will go a long way in the grand scheme of things.
4. Lucky Cannon- The artist formerly known as Johnny Prime has stood out as one of the key babyface superstars on WWE NXT. As somewhat of an anti-Alex Riley character, the WWE can create compelling feud between the two to play out over the course of the second (and probably last) season.
5. Percy Watson- Percy’s charisma has carried him throughout the young season, and if and when he develops in the ring (and even if he doesn’t) the WWE could have a bona fide star on their hands.
6. Husky Harris- Harris has been nothing short of a disappointment thus far, and his awkward 15 minute match with MVP did him no favors during the same week that saw him nearly get eliminated.
7. Eli Cottonwood- While Cottonwood’s in ring work leaves much to be desired, his dark, Gene Snitskyesque promos do show some promise.
8. Titus O’Neil- [Insert "Make it a Win" joke]
IMPACT
TNA, back to old tricks…That’s a bad thing. TNA Impact this week featured more of the same cluttered storytelling, questionable booking, and onslaught of angles, all of which failed to stand out as important or unique.
The most frustrating aspect of TNA’s booking pattern is the fact that many hot shot angles (a la Sarita attacking Taylor Wilde out of nowhere) are not even mentioned the following week on TV, further legitimizing the school of thought that these angles didn’t even matter in the first place.
Lethal’s push has been fine, yet he went over the giant Matt Morgan, due to blatant outside interference, to the indifference of the Impact Zone. If Abyss is being built up as TNA’s resident monster heel, why did he job cleanly to Jeff Hardy on free TV? The ECW invasion during the Knockouts match made sense from a ratings standpoint, as TNA was using their highly rated Beautiful People segments as a platform for what will be their next big angle. However that does not take away from the fact that the execution of the latest ECW invasion was sloppy and not intriguing.
Bischoff and Hogan came off as whiny heels, running to the President and insisting that the likes of Abyss and Sting be punished for their bad behavior. There has been talk of an impending Bischoff heel turn, but the way TNA has been frantically stuffing each and every single one of their angles down your throat to their own detriment, will anybody care?
SMACKDOWN
The Dashing Rhode to the main event. There comes a time in a very select few WWE careers where a superstar cuts a career making promo that is a catalyst for subsequent main event success. Triple H’s “I am the Game” promo and Austin’s “Austin 3:16″ speech are examples of the impact that conceptually great promo can have on a career.
Cody Rhodes’ “Dashing” promo last week on Smackdown seems to be the impetus of a major rise of the WWE’s next great heel.
Cody Rhodes looked at home in the main event this week alongside Jack Swagger against Rey Mysterio and the Big Show (and why not, he was key part of the Legacy stable lead by consummate main eventer Randy Orton). The wide open Smackdown Money in the Bank match could be the opening Cody Rhodes needs to not only maintain his momentum, but continue to make the transition to the main event.
“Sloshed” Sarita Deeb. As part of a promo absolving CM Punk of any wrongdoing in the vegetative state angle, Sarita was shown on a surveillance camera drinking and getting very comfortable with an unnamed male companion. This was a rather odd turn in the Straight Edge Society angle (TV-PG boozing?), and it will be interesting to see where things go as it pertains to Sarita’s involvement in the SES.
It seems too early to begin teasing any hint of a SES split. But the one positive that will come out of Sarita leaving the SES would be the fact that it would probably lead to the in ring debut of Sarita in the WWE, who is a very good worker in her own right.
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TIP THE HOST
Less is more. One more host to go and (hopefully) we’re home free. We leave Rob Zombie with a $5 tip.
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THE SHOOT
Read more about the cursed WWE NXT angle in this article written by Big Nasty on The Bleacher Report.
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Tags: Drew McIntyre VISA, Gorilla Press Pro Wrestling Blog, TNA News, Wade Barrett Visa, Wrestling News, WWE NXT, WWE NXT Curse
