The Critic

QUOTE (Controlled Chaos @ Mar 12, 2010 -> 09:37 AM) I personally think it's a tribute and get goose bumps everytime I'm there. General Norman Schwarzkopf showed tapes of the Stadium at anthem time to his troops in the Persian Gulf. That's enough approval for me. This was a hot topic on the radio earlier this week. With a few people, taking the 'direspect' side of things. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. The majority of callers, many from military backgrounds, love it. There was a caller I heard, sounded like an older man, who found it disrespectful and said it brought him to tears. He was taught, as a marine, to not make a peep during the anthem. That's where I come from on the topic. I was always told that you stand silently during the anthem. But again, I wouldn't try to enforce that on others. That blogger was a total douche about it.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Mar 12, 2010 -> 09:09 AM) And this is coming from somewhere that throws dead fish onto the ice to celebrate...That isn't disrespectful? First of all, an octopus is a mollusk. To call it a fish is disrespectful. Second, throwing an octopus on the ice denies the octopus's family the opportunity for a proper burial, which is very disrespectful to the octopus family.

I think it's up to everyone's personal judgement if it's disrespectful or not. I don't like it, and I don't participate in it. But that's just me. People seem to love it, so who am I to say they're wrong? ...they ARE wrong about Chelsea Dagger, though...

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 10, 2010 -> 09:10 AM) I still dont understand why they are pre-taping impact. If they are going head to head with RAW, it is honestly the stupidest thing they could possibly do right now. We just read the entire show spoilers. It is going to let people decide a week ahead of time whether they want to tune in or not, and if the show is bad people wont tune in "to see what happens". Yeah, it's a lazy move that's probably going to cost them, unless they load up the pre-taped shows and the spoilers make people want to tune in. But more likely it's going to chase people away when they see a Nasty Boys match on the card, followed by another drunken appearance from The Bland, followed by 10 minutes of arguing over a Hall of Fame ring from the opposing company.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 10, 2010 -> 07:31 AM) I see what you are saying. Sadly there are still a few old tricks mixed in like I still think The Band is going to pretend feud for a while then join with Hall and Young I agree about the darkened part of your post (so stupid) and the Nasty Boys/3D feud continuing as stupid old tricks. (although they did , so THAT makes it great.) The only question is, when will Hogan and Bischoff join them and force Dixie to align herself with Jarrett, Foley, etc.? I REALLY hope they can resist the urge to re-play the nWo angle, but I doubt that they can.

I just read the spoilers for next week's Impact and I have to say, there are a couple interesting twists. Not going to reveal anything here (the spoilers are easy to find online), but there's enough there for me to definitely tune in.

FWIW, SpikeTV expects the rating to go up once the DVR ratings are accounted for. They believe a "significant portion" of the audience DVR'd the show.

QUOTE (SoxFan562004 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 06:12 PM) Meltzer has the ratings... 3.4 for Raw and a 1.0 for TNA... they did a 1.1 on their previous Thursday show I have to admit, I'm shocked at the 1.0 for Impact. Wow.

QUOTE (Brian @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 01:42 PM) Don't get the internet craze that supported this. Not that interesting. I'm with you. Sweet old lady who swears. Not that big a deal.

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 10:48 AM) Better be a pretty damn good friend. Or maybe there will be some good-looking single girls there who can see how SWEEEEEEET he was for being there.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 09:35 AM) B****ing about a sport that occurs in real time with without predetermined outcomes and b****ing about a fake wrestling show are WAY different things. I don't watch House MD and then b**** about how bad it is -- if it's that bad that I complain about it *every* week, I stop watching and find something better to do. I still enjoy a sprinkling of wrestling from time to time as long as it seems fun, WWE has a few cool things going on, so does TNA, neither are great though. I'm happy TNA moved to Monday, however, as at least it will force WWE to do some things they otherwise wouldn't bother with. I hope it sparks off a new golden era in pro wrestling. The thing is, there are enough interesting things to keep me coming back - unlike a show like Scrubs, which is dismal in every way, and I avoid it like the plague. The frustration for me is that TNA has so many guys who can be interesting characters, yet the new regime is dragging carcasses back from the 80s and 90s instead. Wrestling is different from other scripted television in the fact that its storylines are fluid and they can react to criticisms and fan reactions more quickly and more easily than other types of programs. Wrestling has a much looser logical progression than an episodic program like House. That's always been part of the draw of it for me - guys can completely change their onscreen personas in an instant, whereas Dr. House can't suddenly become a super-caring nice guy without losing the entire basic plot of the show. I'm hoping that once the Old Guy Show fails in TNA (and it will - the same basic cast of characters killed WCW) they are still around and focus on the better personnel they still have on their roster (the Motor City Machineguns, Desmond Wolfe, The Pope, AJ Styles (not Little Flair), and so on).

QUOTE (ChiSox_Sonix @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 09:01 AM) Ok so a friend of mine just invited a bunch of us to his baby shower. First off, isn't this weird? I was always under the impression this wasn't for guys. I really don't want to go to this but without a legitimate excuse not to, I kind of feel obliged. Is it socially acceptable to just send a gift with someone you know is going? The only baby shower I ever attended was the one for us expecting our baby, and the only bridal shower I ever attended was the one the families threw for us. This is not the realm of the man, unless the man is directly impacted. Stay home and send the gift. If your friend doesnt get it, that's on him/her.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 08:39 AM) have you ever actually read pale hose talk? or followed any sports team? Half the fun is dissecting the shows. Like I said in my last post, it was actually fun to watch all the mistakes TNA was making with their "big opportunity". I want them to succeed, because historically Vince McMahon only steps up his game when he has legitimate competition. There's always something good to watch on each program, but even in the down times there's fun to be had criticizing the product.

QUOTE (SoxAce @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 02:53 AM) You would have to hope Linebrink has a love for the Cubs org., Chicago, or the NL in general (that or his friendship with Peavy and others on the sox sucks now). He has a NTC in his contract FYI. So even if the sox did/wanted to, he has the final say. Funny thing is.. when they signed him, most of the posters were mad of the money he was gonna make. I was more upset of giving a reliever a NTC. Dude! EVERYONE wants to play for the Cubs, because of their tradition!! And they have the best fans in all of sports!!

QUOTE (SHIPPS @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 07:07 AM) Better strategy: Pee in large cup then throw fluids out window. Better yet: pee in used soda bottle, throw soda bottle away. No cups get soiled, no one sees pee-pee, mission accomplished.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 9, 2010 -> 06:39 AM) I dont know how this is possible. It wasnt anything but recycled WCW storylines, you said it yourself. At least WWE had something a little different moving with Orton, I liked R-Truth and Morrison popping off against ShowMiz. There really wasnt anything I liked about TNA last night, I couldnt watch it for more than a few minutes. Bubba holding Hogan back was so ridiculous I started laughing It was only better by default. Raw was unbelievably boring. The Criss Angel/Santino skit was unwatchable, they wrapped up with another SuperCena segment, FIGHTING IMPOSSIBLE ODDS. Even the Undertaker/Michaels showdown bored me. Legacy/Orton was OK. I missed the ShowMiz segment, so I can't comment on it. Impact was fun to watch for all the mistakes they made. The Sting heel turn is ridiculous. His heart's not in it, he doesn't know how to be a heel anyway, and it shows. He grabs DIxie's shoulder softly, then remembers he's supposed to be "choking" her, so he does that for a half-second. Taz and Tenay talk for what seemed like an hour about how unacceptable his actions were. They bring in RVD for a fluke win and a prolonged beatdown. They bring in Shannon Moore to deafening silence. They waste Jeff Hardy on a clusterf*** at the end. Taz was really awful on commentary. Bischoff hypes the X Division to the moon and then the least "X Division guy" in the match wins it cleanly. (I know they don't want to give a title change away on free TV, but building up Kazarian and Daniels in the promo and then having Williams go over cleanly is bad planning IMO.) Oh, and of course The Bland come out to slow things down and slur their words. I'll be interested in seeing the ratings. Hogan made sure to be on TV at the beginning, at the top of hour two and at the end. Shocking.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Mar 8, 2010 -> 10:54 PM) The end of Impact was a crap filled spot fest. My god, that was annoyingly bad. And I dont know if anyone saw what I did, but it looked like Hardy dropped Desmond Wolf on his head, and not in a good way. It looked very awkward. Im disappointed in Hardy. I thought realized which promotion could give him the most Maybe TNA is just afraid to invest too much in him until they see what happens with his trial? I thought Impact was the better show, but not because of anything they did. Raw was pretty bad from start to finish, and Impact had a few mildly interesting moments. Overall a lackluster start to the "New Wars".

QUOTE (Brian @ Mar 8, 2010 -> 09:11 PM) I really thought they were going to go with Orton vs. Legacy in a handicap match at Mania, but they did it tonight with Legacy going over clean. Not sure where they are going with that. I like Orton, but it just seems like an awkward angle to me. Yeah, it's a confusing angle right now. I kind of thought they might bring in the new guys to rescue Legacy if Orton started getting the upper hand. I am interested to see what they do with this.

And then they give their HOT NEW STAR a 10-second win and a 10-minute beatdown afterwards. Genius classic wCw booking.

QUOTE (Brian @ Mar 8, 2010 -> 08:47 PM) My gf won the KO tag titles And mine jumped up and down and (thankfully) didn't say a word.

QUOTE (PlaySumFnJurny @ Mar 8, 2010 -> 08:12 PM) Yeah, its 1985 and its pretty cool. Four future coaches and two future GMs in uniform. And another in the broadcast booth.

I saw about five guys cheering for the SHOCKING RETURN of.....Shannon Moore......yawn.

Couldn't see the Sting heel turn coming 1,000 miles away. f***in' identical to Hogan's nWo turn. Awful.

Just a heads-up: CSN Chicago is showing a Blackhawks vs North Stars playoff game from the 80's right now. 3-2 Hawks near the end of the 1st period.

So tonight the New War begins. TNA is trotting out more familiar names for us. Supposedly is going to show up tonight, and the rumored new arrivals will be . I'm really surprised 's not there yet - maybe he scratched one of Hack's cars while he was washing them. Once Hack Hogan runs out of castoffs to sign, maybe we'll finally see if they can write anything interesting for all these guys to do.