Friday 31 October 2008

SD Jones Passes Away



As you may have read in my piece for The Sun, Special Delivery (SD) Jones has passed away aged 63, he was a WWE legend and one of the core enhancement talents for the company during the 1980s.

Wrestlers Rescue

Wrestlers seem invincible to us fans, the larger than life characters seem impervious to pain and do things many of us can only dream of in their in-ring careers.

But what happens to them once injury or retirement forces them to leave the spotlight and roar of the crowd behind.

This is a question former ECW and WWE employee Dawn Marie asked, and the answer made her become heavily involved in a new organisation.

Wrestlers Rescue hopes to help former grapplers, many of whom now struggle to live comfortably, after their many years of wrestling and the associated lifestyle have taken their toll on their bodies.

Many now tour conventions/Indy shows to ply their wares for a meagre living, others have adopted other careers, or rely on state hand-outs to survive.

The Wrestlers Rescue mission statement is to create awareness and to help raise monies to support the health care needs of retired professional wrestlers, who now suffer due to their career choice in wrestling.

The overall plan being to not only put in place some form of financial advisory for active wrestlers and their future retirement, pension, college funds, savings etc and also set up a health care programme that the wrestlers can buy into and reap the benefits of if they need it.

With many former stars joining the rally for support the organisation are already planning fund-raising events in the US to kick-start their campaign.
See www.wrestlersrescue.org for more info and how to donate.

Written By Phil Allely

Tuesday 28 October 2008

TNA News: Legend's Title, New Women's Champ, Main Event Mafia

Booker T has unveiled the newest TNA Title, he will be defending the Legend's Championship at Turning Point against Christian Cage. See my piece on the sun's website for details.

In other news Awesome Kong has won her second Knockouts title from taylor Wilde at the live Impatc taping last week.

and Nash, Angle, Sting, Booker and Scott Steiner are all now working under a group name of the Main Event Mafia, which you ahev to assume is a direct spin-off of the old v new feud that we've seen them have with samoa Joe, AJ and others recently.

Tuesday 21 October 2008

Nick Hogan Released From Prison

Hulk Hogan's son Nick has been released from prison after he served his term for his part in a crash that has left his friend in a coma.
Nick is said to be staying with his mum Linda.

TNA Bound For Glory My Comments

As you I'm sure know I did not review TNA's BFG PPV as my good buddy Simon was there live in the US and has put his review up on the Sun's website (so go there and check it out), but I do have some comments from the PPV.

The newly re-named Steel Asylum match was a fast-furious and entertaining match-up, as always the problem was too much going on at the same time. I bet there were some sore guys the next day.

The bimbo brawl with Cute Kip/Beautiful People taking on Rhino, Rhaka Khan and ODB was as expected a dull one, Kip is past his prime, Khan is not a wrestler and Angelina/Velvet have come on in grappling, but to be honest look better than they can wrestle.

the X Division title match between bashir and Creed was well-paced and inventive too, expect Creed to raise the belt soon.

The women's scene in TNA sorely misses Gail Kim, sure taylor Wilde and Awesome Kong have their moments, but the likes of Roxxi and others seem to be more brawlers than skilled fighters. This triple threat Wilde/Kong/Roxxi had its good spots, but did fall flat when Roxxie entered the fray.

If anyone deserves Mick Foley's mantle as true wrestling daredevil and the man who would lay down his life for his sport its Abyss. during the four team monsters ball match-up he took a nasty bump through a burning table and stayed on fire for a while too. This was your typical brawl and a fun addition to the card.

Booker T v Styles v Cage was good and showcased each's abilities and failings, considering his loss and status you have to wonder if Cage is soon to leave and return to the WWE as he's hinted.

Mick Foley was special enforcer for jeff jarrett's first in-ring match-up in two years and due to Kurts (scripted or otherwise) comments to the Sun he was ready to pummel Angle. JJ showed no signs of ring-rust and of course picked up the win after some brutal moves. Foley is hopefully going to hang about TNA a while now.

In a surprise Sting (the 50 year old veteran) beat champ samoa Joe to lift the world title for the third straight Bound For Glory. Not sure about this move, yes Nash helped, but giving the title to a part-time performer seems odd to me.

All in all a superb ppv that did fetaure run-ins etc, but no where near as many as normal shows have, roll on the next.

Thursday 16 October 2008

TNA/WWE Releases

It's come to my attention that TNA have agreed to release Karen Angle and Johnny Devine from their contracts.
Of course many of us already know that Kurt and Karen Angle are having marriage woes so that one is not a huge surprise.
Devine has been sued mainly as a jobber and run-in man for Team 3-D in recent months, he gets much collumn space from myself due to this, but has not really contributed much to the cause over the last year.
In a more shocking turn of events Lance Cade has been released by WWE, Cade now joins his former partner Trevor Murdoch on the indie scene I guess. Odd move that one as Cade had been riding high in the WWE as a cohort of Chris Jericho.
More on these as I get the info.

Monday 13 October 2008

TNA Impact Game Review

I've just had my review for the TNA Impact PS2 game used by www.lastbroadcast.co.uk you can read it there.

Tuesday 7 October 2008

Sandman To Retire

It seems that everyones favourite hard-drinking and hard-living wretsler the Sandman (James Fullington) has decided its time to hang up his boots and set down his singapore cane.

After a long career and some standout bouts for the original ECW Sandman of late has been a shadow of his former self, the usually boozed up grappler made a fool of himself at Lou Albano's birthday recently (which i exclusivley wrote for the Sun)by creating a scene and a scuffle that ensued and saw him arrested.

With a young child and girlfriend in tow I hope James well and pray that he unlike many other grapplers has prepared for retiremant and does stay out of the ring.

Wednesday 1 October 2008

Bret Hart In Ireland October 2008

Bret 'The Hitman' Hart is to be special guest at a series of shows by Rampage American Wrestling over the next few months.

This is a great opportunity for wrestling fans to get up close and personal with the now retired legend at an intimate and smaller scale venue than they are used to seeing him at.

The former WWE champion will join such names as Gangrel, Scotty 2 Hotty, Joey Matthews, U Gene and Tatanka, as the grapplers tour around southern Ireland, prior to tours of France, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Serbia.

Rampage American Wrestling are an International Wrestling Promotion who strive to bring the best and biggest names in the world of wrestling to fans all over the world.

Their previous tours have been very popular and featured many former WWE, ECW, TNA and independent stars.

Check out www.rampageamericanwrestling.co.uk for more details