Author: Isaac Sher

CRITICAL SUCCESS ON REAL.

Holy shit.  Please don’t go, Ziggler. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9qsXlgsbKA&feature=share

When Eddie Guerrero was still around, I remember seeing a few of his matches here and there, and I remember enjoying his “Mamacita” period with Chyna, but I suspect that I missed out on most of his really great stuff — like when he finally won the belt from Brock Lesnar, as I’d stopped watching wrestling at that time, turned off by the Katie Vick debacle.

So if I wanted to go back and watch some Greatest Hits matches and/or promos that featured Eddie, be it in WWE or WCW, what would folks suggest I go looking for?

The Cruiserweight Classic: A Post-Mortem

The CWC is over, and what a wonderful thing that was. Ten weeks of amazing matches, and a very interesting change of pace from the WWE’s usual product. For example, the balance of the material was far tilted towards focusing on in-ring action rather than DudeBro Soap Opera, although there was just enough of the latter to keep things dramatic and interesting.

I was very pleasantly surprised by the outcome – I had assumed that the finals were going to be Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Kota Ibushi, but both of them getting eliminated in the semi-finals was an unexpected twist.

So our first Cruiserweight champion is T.J. Perkins, which I think is a very strong choice. Perkins has great in-ring work, charisma, and a compelling underdog backstory. I can’t wait to see him defend his belt as the “cocky but vulnerable but skilled” face champ.

According to “Wrestling With Wregret” (a wrestling news/review Youtube show), the following ten folks from the tournament have been signed on to WWE as the backbone of the new Cruiserweight division on Monday Night Raw:

T.J. Perkins

Cedric Alexander

Brian Kendrick

Tommaso Ciampa

Noam Dar

Jack Gallagher

Johnny Gargano

Gran Metalik

Rich Swann

Akira Tozawa

This is a phenomenal roster, and I can’t wait to see what they do with it. Cedric Alexander really wowed everyone with his in-ring work, Brian Kendrick showed great personality and in-ring storytelling, Ciampa and Gargano have been TEARING IT UP ever since their star-making match together (dear god, that standing elbow to Gargano’s face), Metalik is poised to inherit the mantle left vacant by Rey Mysterio that Kallisto and Sin Cara never quite lived up to, Dar’s a young star in the making with potential bursting from every vein, Swann’s in-ring work was solid and entertaining with lots of personality…

And then you’ve got my two favorites, aside from the awesome TJ Perkins. “Gentleman” Jack Gallagher and Akira Tozawa. Oh my god, where to even begin with these two? Tozawa has this amazing intensity and in-ring swagger, not to mention speed and technique, and Jack is just FLAT OUT AWESOME. You will never mistake Gallagher for anyone else, not just in look, but in his distinctive in-ring technical style. Personally, I liked his matches in the CWC far more than Zack Sabre Jr., even though ZSJ was the one heralded as the “technical wizard”. Jack’s mat work was stylish, clever, intricate, and best of all, it looked like it HURT. It’s just as well that ZSJ isn’t sticking around, because having two British tech-wrestlers might’ve been too much of a gimmick overlap, and I like Jack much, much more (although ZSJ is awesome, let’s not gloss over his skill). Also, I love Jack’s persona and mike skills, he could be a massive fan favorite on Raw if he’s given a chance to really talk and develop that character. Also-also, I really want to see Jack and Tozawa not only have some rematches, but maybe even team up at some point in a fun “odd couple” pairing.

Now if only I got the USA network on my super-nofrills-basic-cable package – hopefully the cruiserweight matches will be available online in other forms so that I can watch them after the fact. 

I’ve been really enjoying the WWE CruiserWeight Classic series this summer, and it’s inspired me to do a bit of fantasy booking, in regards to what I’d like to see in WWE in the future.

Of the people we’ve seen perform, here are the ones I’d most like to see signed to join WWE’s roster, either in NXT or on one of the main rosters for Raw or Smackdown:

Brian Kendrick

Mustafa Ali

Akira Tozawa

“Gentleman” Jack Gallagher

Kota Ibushi

Cedric Alexander

Brian Kendrick’s got an angle ready-made for primetime. He’s best friends with Daniel Bryan, the current General Manager of Smackdown, so you draft him to that show. And he starts running roughshod over people, using dirty tactics and dangerous moves that would be forbidden to anyone else — but when people complain to Daniel Bryan, all the DB can see is his old dear friend, which leads to him either giving a blind eye to Kendrick’s sins, or even enabling them indirectly, until someone has finally had ENOUGH, and moves to take out Kendrick no matter what obstacles Daniel Bryan puts in their way.

Mustafa Ali jobbed out in the first round, but I found him charismatic and interesting, so I really want to see him given a chance in NXT, to see what else he can do.

I want to see Kota Ibushi and Akira Tozawa arrive in NXT — and immediately align themselves with NXT’s current top champion and their former colleague in New Japan PW — SHINSUKE NAKAMURA. This would lead to the three of them forming a new power faction that rules NXT with deadly force. Maybe even have Asuka join them, cementing the faction’s dominance over NXT by having it include both their men and women champions.

But a faction needs at least one solid talker. Shinsuke’s good, but not great, Kota doesn’t appear to speak any english at all, and Tozawa doesn’t seem like he’s much of a talker, more of a shouter-grunter — so “Gentleman” Jack Gallagher gets recruited by them to be their mouthpiece.

Then you’ve got Cedric Alexander. His match against Kota Ibushi has been one of the major highlights of the CWC so far, so he could be used in one of two ways — either Ibushi’s rival within NXT, constantly pushing himself to catch up to Ibushi’s sky-high level, or Ibushi takes Cedric under his wing as a student/sidekick, making Cedric the newest member of this faction I’ve talked about.

Your thoughts, fellow wrestling fans?

Some thoughts of the Cruiserweight Classic so far:

– Mustafa Ali and Kenneth Johnson really impressed me.  Johnson’s still a little rough around the edges, and Ali threw a couple of strikes that looked a little weak, but overall, I really want to see these two get more airtime even though they’re already eliminated from the tournament.

– Daniel Bryan has a very bright future ahead of him on commentary, and he’s got great chemistry with Mauro Ranallo.  I love it when they both geek out simultaneously about a particularly awesome spot.  “SHOOTING STAR PRESS!”

– I want TJ Perkins to go far in this tournament, he’s VERY interesting.  Ditto Cedric Alexander, but it seems safe to assume (sadly) that Kota Ibushi’s going to knock his teeth out in round two.

– I have never seen Tozawa wrestle before this, but now I’m a fan.  Any suggestions on his past matches?

Overall, I’m really enjoying the CWC, and I’m glad that TripleH has said repeatedly in interviews that this is not going to be a “one and done” issue, that they definitely want to do more with cruisers in general down the line.

Well, it looks like the Draft is set! The first episode of live Smackdown on 7/19/16 will be where the draft takes place. I can’t wait!

Question for all you fellow Wrestling fans:

Who is your favorite mid-card (or lower) wrestler that never quite made it to the big time, or in your opinion lived up to their potential? The one that you felt could have done so much more, but for whatever reason — be it injuries, backstage politics, getting buried by creative teams, or other factors, they just never got as far as they could.

Speaking for myself, I nominate Shane “The Hurricane” Helms, whose superhero gimmick was just wonderful and brilliant, especially with that awesome feud he had with The Rock in 2003. And yet, he never really managed to go anywhere afterwards. WHAT’S UP WIT DAT?

How about you? Your thoughts?

OH MY GOD.

A sitcom… about the backstage shenanigans of G.L.O.W. — GORGEOUS LADIES OF WRESTLING.

Someone over at Netflix is smokin’ the good stuff.

http://themuse.jezebel.com/netflix-has-ordered-a-comedy-series-about-a-1980s-femal-1779694553?rev=1464730295965&utm_campaign=socialflow_jezebel_facebook&utm_source=jezebel_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

The folks at WHAT CULTURE WRESTLING are some smart and amusing folks, but this is an awesome video even by their usual standards.  Great stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaHVDE7iX3k

I heard a podcast by Jim Cornette where he said that locker room morale for Lucha Underground is really low, with a lot of people trying to get out of their contracts. Anyone else heard anything about that?

He’s clearly biased against it because he hates the fantastical storylines, so I wonder how much of his claim is filtering through that bias.