______________________________________________________________________ __ __ __ __ _ ____ | | | | | \ | | | |/ _ \ | | | | | \ | | | / \ | | |/\| | | \| | | | | | | | | |\ | | | | | | /\ | | | \ | |__| |_| |__/ \__| |__| \__| [ n a i d O ' s - W r e s t l i n g - N e w s ] Edition 228 December 26, 2000 "I get the news, so you don't have to." ______________________________________________________________________ [Official newsletter & complement to:] http://www.naidOsWorld.com To subscribe: naidoswrestlingnews-subscribe@egroups.com To unsubscribe: naidoswrestlingnews-unsubscribe@egroups.com ______________________________________________________________________ [Table of contents] **Note from naidO **TOP NEWS STORY **Latest news from the WWF, WCW & ECW **[Radio Review] Tom Zenk on The Law **[Column] Rounding the Squared Circle **Parting chair shot ______________________________________________________________________ [Note from naidO] Hello to those just joining. Tell your friends about the BEST up and coming newsletter around to subscribe today! - Well, Christmas has come and gone and I'm sure you were all disappointed not to find nWN under your tree yesterday. Sorry, the Turkey dinner had me sidetracked *lol* RAW was decent last night but there's no way to gauge it appropriately as NITRO is done for the year. It was okay...I guess. News is light but Tom Zenk and Sam Jerry have picked up the slack! **Until tomorrow, enjoy this latest edition of nWN! - naidO nWN Founder - http://www.geocities.com/naidosnews ______________________________________________________________________ [TOP NEWS STORY] **Triple H has reported that his back is beginning to improve considerably and he has said he is now beginning to notice a substantial difference in his condition. Triple H has been told by doctors he can defiantly expect to be back to his best in time for the Royal Rumble, where he will have full medical backing to compete. Hunter will be back on television very shortly, but his role will be limited with his main purpose to further and develop storylines and angles via promos and interviews etc. His return to action in side the ring, however is still a few more weeks away. The WWF are adamant that the whole Austin/Triple H angle is to progress further as fan interest for this particular angle is still looking high, and the possibility is there that the pair will headline another PPV event in the not so distant future. (Wade Keller) ______________________________________________________________________ [News from the WWF] **Al Snow (real name Allan Sarven) is at home healing his wrist and is listed as day-to-day. **Matt Hardy is experiencing problems with a bruised collarbone. **Gangrel (real name David Heath) has a bulging disc in his neck. **Eddie Guerrero will not be appearing on TV to rest groin and hamstring injuries. **The WWF used to be a top ten mainstay of the Lycos 50 "Top 10 Search Terms" but last week it was not in the top 10. However, it remains in the top 20 just behind Radio Personality Rush Limbaugh. Seasonal terms that ousted the WWF include Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Election 2000. (Cred: The Law) _______________ [News from WCW] **It is expected that an annoucement of WCW's sale will be soon. (Cred: The Law) _______________ [News from ECW] **Paul Heyman denied there was extra security at the ECW Arena show or that it had anything to do with New Jack. He said that New Jack left the promotion, but it wasn't on negative terms and called the story "a total crock." (Cred: The Law) __________________ [In other news...] **There's a pretty sweet wrestling poll up at SLAM! Wrestling for the year end awards. Check it out, http://www.canoe.ca/SlamWrestlingPolls/2000poll.html (Cred: The Law) ______________________________________________________________________ [Radio Review] Tom Zenk on The Law **Tom Zenk is a former WCW and WWF wrestler and is well known as being outspoken and holding no punches. This past weekend on The Law was no exception: On the WCW sale - Is Bischoff selling the company to himself? Marek- "WCW looks like its going to end up in the control of Eric Bischoff - you've been quite outspoken on this as a huge conflict on interests." Zenk- Well of course, these are the unanswered questions and you and the other wrestling journalists should blow this thing wide open -(1) Is it OK to sell WCW at a depressed price to the guy who made WCW unprofitable in the first place? A 'firesale to the arsonist'? (2) Is there a conflict of interests between Bischoff being an employee of WCW being paid to sell the company to himself? (3) What about Time Warner's fiduciary duty to its shareholders - is the sale giving shareholders the best possible return on their investment - are the shareholders getting best possible value from the sale? (4) Has the company been undervalued by high paid workers like Hogan ($4 million a year) DDP and a host of others sitting at home, collecting mail box money, rather that working to add value to the company? Is this part of some plan? Generation Y Zenk - "Siegel would be insane to sign a non-compete clause with Bischoff. There's a whole new Generation of potential wrestling fans coming through now - Generation Y - Generation X is over. WWF captured them with D-Generation X and people cheering for heels. But there's a whole new generation now , the Millenial babies, the baby- boomers kids coming through and that the biggest new market since the baby-boomers after World War 2. And I just hope that Brad Siegel isn't so stupid that he signs a non- compete clause with Bischoff - because it's in all of our interests that TBS keeps its wrestling product. I think Fox quoted a study that showed that 40 percent of the WWF demographic was already Generation Y. I doubt if WCW even knows about Generation Y - seems to me they're still captives of the old baby-boomers and Hogan and Flairites. Let Bischoff take his old carney crew and get out of there. Let's build with the young guys. Start with the young guys who can move and can compete. Go for the Y generation - that's where the new dollars and ratings are. And not just head-to- head Monday night wars but across ALL of the new AOL- Time Warner media. Wrestling is my first love ...but what they did to Ted Turner is atrocious. He's paying them a lot of money to wrestle - not just talk about it - so go in there and show me the wrestling - put on some good matches - forget all the talk - let's wrestle - lets see what you've got. I think that's the Generation Y angle - they're savvy - they see through the BS - their angle is - "Show us the wrestling." Zenk - "How tough is it to get a 2.0 or 3.0 rating? Marek - "For wrestling, its simple, just put wrestlers in tights on TV at prime time and you've got it - it's simple." Zenk - "Thank you. So I hope Bischoff just takes his old timer crew and goes run the roller derby or Battledome - and we'll take a fresh crew of TBS guys and we'll start our own program and I bet within one year you could draw higher ratings. Siegel should NEVER NEVER sign a non-compete clause with Bischoff." On Steiner, Page - 'Pillman hated Page's guts' Zenk - "Page, you should throw yourself off a 5 story building rather than mess with Scotty Steiner. That would be the safer bet." Marek - "Most people's first response to the fight was that Page is in love with Pillman so this has to be a work." Zenk - "Page is a geek and Pillman hated his guts. Page has flown too high on borrowed wings. It's over for Page and it's over for a lot of the guys over 40. They're done. Sting never drew, Luger never drew. Flair put them all over. It's also over for Ric. He got a haircut to look like and put David over but if Ric loved the business so much, why would he put his son on TV. It's over for Hulk Hogan and all these other guys - "God love 'em BROTHER. God bless you BROTHER." It's over for Dusty Rhodes (impersonating Dusty) "Terri Runnels seems to be doing best of all the Runnels family because she learned her knowledge by penetration not deviation, if you weel." "Nash and DDP are hobbling around in knee braces - Hogan is old - bald means old, right? - and still they try to hold on to the top spots. But in this business, if you're trained right, you learn respect. So you have your time climbing the ladder and then there's the back side. So these old guys don't have respect for the business - although they hide under the ruse of "We love the business, brother" - all that old "brother brother" business- but look at DDP - he won't put over his buddy Kanyon. He got Chris Kanyon a job, Kanyon's a great worker, he takes big bumps better than DDP - but he won't put Kanyon over in a match. DDP refused to work with him. It was 'beneath' DDP - I think DDP said there was nothing in it for him. But you have to give back. Like you learn in Japan, you build yourself up and then you put other people over for the sake of the company. You can't have an ego about this - to a certain degree ego is what makes you - but when you're 50 years old you should be putting younger guys over. But Flair and Hogan just can't give it up. I mean Flair and Dusty made millions - what did they do (what makes them want to keep top spot). Did they squander their money? Nash says he's a money market millionaire. What happened to the Millionaires Club - they should all just F-off." On XFL Zenk - "The XFL is going to be Vince's new 'sweat shop' - when guys like Benoit and Saturn find out that A-Rod Alex Rodriguez signed for $252 million - will they wear that? Vince is making more money gross than any baseball team and Vince desn't have one player making anything anywhere NEAR that sort of money. Not the Rock, Undertaker or Steve. Steve is a great talent but who would want to work with him with that problem with his neck. I don't think any wrestler would want the guilt of ending Steve's career with that neck injury. He's not cutting it, from what I understand and that may be why Vince came back. But Vince has spread himself too thin and what's going to happen when the XFL players start taking bumps and taking Vicodin and Percodin and the bodies start piling up with Governor Ventura and Dick Ebersol looking on. There's a huge scandal waiting to break." On drug testing WWF and XFL Zenk "Vince is the same guy in the (1994 steroids) court case who said Tom Zenk was the kind of guy who would take steroids from a garbage can. Well, if that's the case, I guess Vince was the one who tripped me on the way to the garbage can. Vince was the one getting packages from Dr. Zahorian - there's no evidence that I ever got anything from Zahorian. Vince was an announcer - so what was he taking steroids for? I used them for bodybuilding and to make money off my body in wrestling when they were legal - and I took them when they were illegal to get the edge. But what was Vince self-medicating for as an announcer. I told his wife - you don't have any drug tests on me, otherwise you'd have used them in court. I'm sure one time I would have melted the cup but I guess it was OK because the Can-Am Connection was popular. Arnold Skoaland laughed and said "It's a bit gold kid, but you're OK go ahead." They all knew. Jesse, the XFL and unions? Zenk - "People in Minnesota are really on Jesse [for signing with WWF].. They ruled that Jesse isn't an employee of the State - so who employs Jesse? I don't know. Is that fuzzy maths? No, its politics. Jesse said in Playboy (the November issue,1999) that he's in favor of unionizing hookers or prostitution - whats the difference? - wrestling or prostitution? - we're just bickering over price. Ventura also went on the Larry King Live show with Bischoff after Owen died and said its time for wrestlers to unionize." Marek- "I remember Jesse saying its time for wrestlers to have a union and then Vince got to him and paid him off for the Summerslam PPV. And then Jesse was saying "You know what? No-one forced Owen to be up there." Zenk - "And Jesse - God love him, he's always been nice to me - and he's the one who gave my name to the Feds when they were investigating McMahon [for the 1994 trial]. Jesse told the Feds "Ask Tom Zenk - he knows." Well Jesse has a Screen Actors Guild card so he's a union guy - I know Jesse's like that - he knows the value of unions and being loyal to the younger blue collar vote that put him over the top. He knows the whole story and its now or never for the wrestlers. And you should spread it to your guys. If they went on strike now - I know Vince is going to take a dive when he starts the XFL. He's spread himself too thin - like when he started the bodybuilders federation - I've seen this wave come and go before." Marek - "You can see it in the WWF product right now - Vince is just so burned out by the end of the day. When he gets the script for TV on Sunday he barely has enough time to go over the entire things and says "Just do it!" Zenk - " Why don't you get Zahorian on your program - he knows the whole deal." Marek - "Give me a contact number." Tom - "He would be a great guest. I'm sure he knows all about all the tools in the tool box." The year ahead. Jeff - "I've got to wrap up but what does 2001 hold in store?" Tom - "Well I'm going to keep burning it up. Wrestling is my first love but what they've done to the busines is atrocious. 2001 in wrestling? McMahon is ripe for the picking. Come the XFL, there's a big opportunity for TBS. That's why Turner should be repositioning itself for the next big thing - the new big wave of the Y Generation. And that's why TBS should refuse to sign a non-compete clause with Bischoff and reposition their product to this new audience using all the AOL-Time Warner media !" (Wrestlingobserver.com) ______________________________________________________________________ [Column] Rounding the Squared Circle "I THINK I SHALL NEVER SEE, A RATING AS LOVELY AS A 7.3" OR "GOOD MORNING CLASS - WELCOME TO RATINGS 201" I have received several E-mails, and read Newsletter reader comments, wondering why RAW's ratings have been in the high 4's and low 5's of late, as compared to what they were a while back. I had thought this subject was pretty well covered, but it appears that a refresher might be in order: A "Ratings Point" represents 1,000,000 homes watching a given TV program. That means a rating of 2.4 equates to 2,400,000 homes tuned to that program. The data is collected from a scientifically selected sample universe that takes in all income levels, located throughout the country. The homes in the universe are constantly checked and adjustments made as warranted. They also use something called a "Share," which tells you what percentage of those homes watching TV at that particular time were watching that program. The "Share" number hasn't been given on a regular basis for wrestling programs and that's why we haven't been seeing it. When RAW switched to TNN, the Overlords at TNN/Viacom told the WWF the number of homes capable of receiving TNN. The WWF recognized that TNN was available to less homes than the USA Network (RAW's old Network). The USA Network, TNT and TBS are among the cable Networks available to the most homes. The WWF accepted that TNN was going to try to expand their base. It was said that the Manhattan area of New York City and places like San Francisco on the West Coast were among those that weren't getting TNN. The Overlords said they would make every effort to get these places included on the local cable systems. After RAW switched to TNN, the Ratings were lower on a consistent basis. When this didn't change much, it was discovered that TNN was available to fewer homes than they originally said. Less homes that get TNN = less homes that can watch RAW = lower ratings. At the same time that RAW moved to TNN, TNN changed its name from The Nashville Network to The National Network, along with changing their programming focus from Country and Western to a more mainstream genre (at least they said they were). They may have "Pop," but they still have Rodeo and The General Lee. This may also explain why SmackDown appears to be evolving from the "B" show to the "A" show. SmackDown is on a broadcast Network (UPN), meaning it is available to a larger base. Yeah, I know calling UPN a "Network" is like calling Dirtbag Doophus Page a Rhodes Scholar. Being a broadcast Network, cable companies must carry UPN just as they carry ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX and the WB. On a side note, and also in response to something else I have seen in many places. There are some who feel that the WWF hasn't provided a "real Main Event" lately. It wasn't too long ago that there were complaints that the same four or five people were in the Main Event every show. Last week we saw The Rock and The Undertaker meeting Edge and Christian, with the Tag Team Title on the line. I would classify that as a "Main Event," and responding to the earlier complaint. It was good to see Edge and Christian afforded a chance to be in the Main Event. Last nite on RAW we saw The Rock v. The Undertaker and Stone Cold Steve Austin (SCSA) facing Kane. I have to believe these were both Main Events, that we once only saw on a PPV. On a personal note, I would like to thank all the Newsletters and Web Sites that carry my writing, and especially thank all those who take the time to read my material. Without all of you who read the Newsletters and check the Web Sites, we would all be out of business. Finally. I want to wish everyone a Happy, Healthy New Year. Visit My Home Page At: http://members.aol.com/samjerry ______________________________________________________________________ [Parting Chair Shot] Remember, tell your friends about nWN - naidO's Wrestling News today! **Missed any TV Shows? Go to the following link to read the results: http://www.naidosworld.com/tvshows.html Also, be sure to check out the NEW internet home of nWN, http://www.geocities.com/naidosnews for all your archived stats, tv shows, wrestling links, terms and PPV's, and most of all PICTURES! - naidO nWN Founder ______________________________________________________________________ [Affiliates] **http://green_mist.homestead.com **BECOME AN AFFILIATE OF nWN and make it your official newsletter!! Email naido@h... with your website's address for consideration. ______________________________________________________________________ [News gathering links] **Dave Scherer, Buck Woodward, Bob Ryder @ http://www.1wrestling.com **Dave Meltzer, Zach Arnold @ http://www.wrestlingobserver.com **Chris Clarke, Jeff Pollock @ http://www.liveaudiowrestling.com **Blake Wolfson @ http://www.ultimowrestling.com ______________________________________________________________________ [Ads] ESW - The number one E-Fed on the face of the Earth! The ESW: Extremely Suicidal Wrestling! http://www.geeksoft.net/gin/gfed2/gfed.cgi?lid=1204 ______________________________________________________________________ [nWN Staff] Founder & Editor: naidO - naido@h... Columnist: Sam Jerry - SAMJERRY@a... Columnist: The Vile - stoncold@b... Columnist: Ted Cabata - tcabata@r... ______________________________________________________________________ [Disclaimer] naidO's Wrestling News was founded on April 30, 2000 and is owned and operated by naidO. He, nor this newsletter is in no way, shape, or form affiliated with World Wrestling Federation Entertainment, Turner Broadcasting's World Championship Wrestling, Extreme Championship Wrestling, or any other wrestling organization. Nor the people (staff members), wrestlers, or any other talent in the wrestling. News is gathered from various sources around the net, including newsgroups and are believed to be of public domain and truthful (uh huh). As long as proper credit is given it exempts nWN and it's staff. I (naidO) am just promoting their organization/website. nWN is not responsible for content on affiliate websites or where they may link to including mp3's, warez, kiddie porn and/or other unlawful content. This exempts myself & this newsletter (nWN) from all legal disputes. Anything taken from this newsletter requires written consent from naidO Copyright © 2000 naidO. All Rights Reserved