by Bob Morris

"You don't really need to find out what's going on.
You don't really wanna know just how far it's gone.
Just leave well enough alone…eat your dirty laundry."

-- "Dirty Laundry," Don Henley

Sometimes the news and rumors that winds up going all over the place on the Internet makes me wonder just how much we need to know anyway. Kind of like what Henley was trying to say in his song about all those people who love to gossip about celebrities, in particular, the various tabloid papers and tabloid TV shows of the 80's.

And yet, in this very column (gee, I sounded like Vince McMahon just then) I'll be addressing a few of those items that have been discussed around the Internet.

But first, I want to dip into the mailbag for something that I haven't had a chance to get to. I probably should have covered this in my Nitro report, but hey, like I said, I'm a sellout and need the money.

Anyway, GMEN27@aol.com wrote to me in response to some of my writings a week ago, titled "In Defense of Vince Russo." He wrote the following:

"Yeah, the title is not a misprint.  I actually like the booking of Vince Russo.  Call me what you want but the guy receives so much criticism that isn't deserved.  You see, I am the average Joe wrestling fan.  In the 1980s and 1990s I watched the WWF religiously.  Even at the age of 10, I could predict the outcome to almost every match even though I was a "mark."  The booking was always the same: "faces go over" and I was sick of it.  I watched week in and week out to see if something suprising or shocking would happen
and I was constantly met with disappointment.  In reality, the Shawn Michael's heel turn and the return of the Warrior at WM 8 were about the only exceptions.  Then in 1997, this new style of booking took over the WWF and I was hooked.  There was drama and intensity.  Truly anything could happen in the WWF.  People getting beat up in ambulances, chaotic brawls, and crowds that were on fire.  I had finally gotten my wish as a wrestling fan.  No squash matches, no 1970s Jim Cornette booking, and I was happy.  This continued in 1998 were you really never knew what was going to happen on RAW.
 So sue me, I liked Crash TV.  This is where you come in Bob.  In your article you spoke as if you were representing the average fan.  You believed everyone would be happy once again to see cruiserweight matches and clean finishes.  That is not always the case.  I appreciate the talent of 3 count/Jung Dragons, but let's face it, the average fan does not really care about them wrestling.  In your Nitro recap, you said the fans were "popping
for the wrestling."  Were they appreciating the talent of the 6 workers or were they just popping because they were happy to see 3 count get beat up?  I would bet on the second option.  You see excellent workrate and clean finishes do not automatically equal better ratings.  The average fan needs angles to relate to and characters to get behind.  That is why I watch wrestling.  You see, workrate and clean finishes really don't mean that much
to me.  The Internet has an obsession with clean finishes.  I really don't see what the big deal is.  Is a 2 minute match automatically good because it had a clean finish?  The Observer gave Nitro an A simply because of the clean finishes, not commenting on how good the actual angles or matches were.  Bob, I think you have fallen in the trap of the "being of smartness."  You are entitled to your own opinions but I don't know if you can speak for the majority of fans.  In ending I say "Russo, keep writing for the average fan."

In response to this, I would like to make the following points.

Russo is writing for WCW presently, and the typical WCW fan differs from the typical WWF fan. WWF has traditionally gone after the entertainment-oriented fan, while WCW was aimed toward those who liked less entertainment. Which explains why WCW did so poorly back in the early 90's…the company couldn't do entertainment. When the nW o came along, WCW had an entertainment angle that worked, but WCW also had strong wrestling matches to keep its core audience happy.

When Russo came over to WCW, he tried to implement his WWF formulas into WCW, and while some of it worked, a lot of it did not. Furthermore, Russo tends to move too quickly with storylines, and with constant title changes and face/heel turns, it becomes harder for some people to sit back and enjoy the programs. And too much entertainment in a wrestling program can be a bad thing, especially since history has shown that the entertainment aspect of wrestling wears off over time, while the wrestling matches keep people tuned in. The reason the WWF didn't go under after the Hogan era was because fans became hooked on guys who could work like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels, but Vince McMahon nearly killed his company by trying to recapture the entertainment of the past, with Diesel replacing Hulk Hogan and Sid and Mabel replacing whatever big man happened to be the opponent.

I will not argue that there are wrestling fans who prefer entertainment over clean finishes, but WCW needs to find the appropriate balance between the two. In the past couple of weeks, it wasn't just clean finishes I noticed, but as I detailed in last week's installment of the Wrap-Up, for example, we saw Sean Stasiak and Chuck Palumbo develop personalities in some entertaining segments. Furthermore, there were run-ins and brawls between wrestlers, but they didn't disrupt the matches, yet at the same time, the issues were furthered. It is possible to do this.

I will say that I have liked some of Russo's ideas. I thought his stuff with Ric Flair was very good. I thought he was getting better on the mic as well. But such things like putting the World title on David Arquette were disasters, and it got a little old to watch stuff like so many people turning on Diamond Dallas Page (he had four people turn on him in a three-month span, and that's excessive, IMO).

Russo has some good ideas, I won't argue with that, but he needs to adjust because he's not booking WWF anymore. He needs to fine-tune the WCW product, find the proper balance between wrestling and entertainment, and put together storylines that last for several months instead of just a few weeks. No, I don't think we need a year-long title reign for anybody, but I don't think it's asking too much to let Jeff Jarrett keep the World title for an uninterrupted three months to see how well he truly works as the top heel.

WCW and WWF have generally appealed to different audiences. Trying to turn WCW into WWF won't work, because the WWF fans will see no reason to change the channel, but WCW fans may see a reason to do so, especially if they detest what they see on WWF programming.

Now to get to the various items that have been floating around this week in wrestling.

* WCW: I know there are a lot of people on the Delphi forums questioning why Bob Ryder wrote what he wrote about Bill Goldberg. I've heard one theory in particular that maybe the reason Goldberg acts the way he does is because he sees the actions of guys like Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, and Scott Steiner, and assumes that you have to act like them to get what you want. Well, given that Steiner has been taken off next week's WCW shows, I wouldn't say you should act like Steiner. But seriously, with regards to what Goldberg has done, two wrongs don't make a right. Ryder's comments notwithstanding, WCW has got too many people playing backstage politics, and none of it should be tolerated. There needs to be one individual declared to be in charge of everything, much like it is in the WWF with Vince McMahon, who lays down the law for everyone in WCW. And anybody who doesn't want to play by the rules needs to be shown the door. And for those who made that argument regarding why Goldberg may be acting the way he reportedly has, then how come a guy like Billy Kidman, despite saying several times he wasn't happy with the politics in WCW, and looked at getting his release twice, has gone out there every night, done what he was told to, and hasn't been reported to refuse to do something. The truth is, the blame for what Goldberg has reportedly become must first be placed on Goldberg himself. Just because Hogan acts like he owns WCW doesn't mean Goldberg should do the same.

* ECW: I wouldn't call this promotion dead just because they are about to be taken off TNN, but it is pretty laughable that TNN is going to cancel it effective Sept. 22, when WWF is supposed to begin airing its own programs in September. Something tells me we have not heard the end of the war between ECW and TNN, even if ECW manages to get a time slot for its program on USA. But I do have one request: I beg of Paul Heyman to bring the Network angle to a closure, or at least steer all of this stuff away from the fact that people in ECW don't like TNN. I think Cyrus is an entertaing performer, but it's probably time to move on to something else for him and his stable, rather than an angle that takes shots at the cable network your show airs on, and seems to like slapping you in the face all the time. It would be best for Heyman and company to show they can be professional, since they are claiming TNN didn't act that way.

* WWF: I think everything that has been said about the Viacom deal has already been said, so it pretty much becomes a "what he said" bit, whether you look at what either Dave Scherer or Wade Keller wrote about the switch. But I would like to address one matter that constantly bugs the hell out of me with WWF, and that's the fact that Road Dogg and X-Pac constantly go over anybody who isn't named Chris Benoit (in the past two months, if I recall correctly, Benoit is the only wrestler who got a victory over either guy), despite the fact the two are not over and get most of their heat by leeching it off of the heat HHH has shown he can draw. I don't think the Clique is back in power, but I do think there is evidence to suggest that Road Dogg and X-Pac have copies of that incriminating evidence Ray Traylor uses against Vince McMahon to justify them constantly being put over (if you don't know what I'm talking about, visit Steve Schroeder's wrestling glossary at www.theshooters.net). At any rate, X-Pac is presently the wrestler who pisses me off more than any other WWF wrestler. His career has gone like this: He first signed with WWF, put on some great matches, then the Clique came along and he became a lazy bastard. Then he gets released and signs with WCW, does well for himself at first, but as his buddies Nash and Hall start ruling the roost in the backstage political games, he got lazy once again. He gets released and ends up going back to the WWF, showed people he could still work his ass off despite a neck injury, but over time, he got lazy once again for who knows what reason. I have a feeling that those who speculate the Clique is coming back into power have remembered how Sean Waltman's laziness creeping in each time politics started to raise its ugly head, and wonder if it may be happening again. I'll refrain from any more of that speculation, but will say that somebody needs to whip Waltman into shape, or quit putting him over people like Chris Jericho until he gets his act together and actually starts drawing heat on his own.

I think I've covered enough for another week…see you on Monday for the Nitro report.