The Steel Cage

One of my favorites wrestling television series returns Wednesday night as MSG presents WWE's At The Garden. I'm especially psyched because tonight's installment features what I believe was the very first wrestling event I ever attended at the Garden.

Ahh, I can remember it like it was yesterday (insert harp music.)

It was July 1, 1991 and I was just 13 years old. Back then, WWE played the Garden about every other month. With WWE only offering four pay per views a year back then, the Garden shows were pretty big deals, with angles taking places, feuds being established and blown off, and, occasionally, titles changing hands.

And although I had already been a fan of wrestling for about 10 years and had attended a few shows at the Nassau Coliseum, I had never begged my dad much to take me to a Garden Show. That was until this night - because on this night The Ultimate Warrior was taking on the Undertaker in a body bag match.

Continue reading "MSG Classics Returns and My Garden Memories" »

WWE.com reported a couple of days ago that Torrie Wilson has been given her release, apparently confirming the rumors that she's been told that she shouldn't be competing in the ring anymore.

I thought I'd mark the occasion by reminiscing a bit about one of the Wrestle-crappiest storylines I was ever a part of: the Torrie-Dawn-Al debacle.

Continue reading "WWE releases Torrie Wilson" »

In his last post, Alfonso referenced that this July's Great American Bash is only the third Pay-Per-View at Nassau Coliseum in the past 20 years.

I'm not sure at all about the financials of dealing with the Coliseum; I do know that high building-rental prices are the reason why WWE runs a lot fewer shows at Madison Square Garden these days.

But there's a bigger reason why WWE doesn't do many TV tapings at Nassau Coliseum.

You.

Continue reading "Why WWE doesn't do more Pay-Per-Views at Nassau Coliseum" »

Just a reminder that tickets for the Great American Bash, taking place Sunday, July 20 at the Nassau Coliseum, go on sale tomorrow, Saturday, at 10 a.m. They range from $35 to $300. You could get your tickets through this link.
This will be WWE's first LI pay per view since 2002's awesome SummerSlam - and only third WWE PPV here in more than 20 years.
The Bash obviously doesn't mean what it used to back in the old NWA days of Ric Flair stepping off a helicopter on his way to the ring, but if you've never seen a WWE PPV in person in your hometown, this is your chance.

Just watched the stream on TMZ, and wow, what an emotional day in court.

Nick Bollea was sentenced to eight months in jail and five years' probation for the car accident last August that caused severe injuries to John Graziano.

Nick was taken into custody immediately following his sentencing.

He was also sentenced to 500 hours of community service and had his license suspended for three years.

Nick has 30 days to appeal.

It seemed a lot of you really enjoyed my story from last week about the night I went home from Madison Square Garden with the World Heavyweight Championship. So I thought you might also enjoy this story about Brock Lesnar and the WWE Championship belt.

Continue reading "A quick funny story about Brock Lesnar and the WWE Championship" »

So Long Island native Ashley Massaro claims Rolling Stone's article connecting her to a prostitution ring is wrong, and the magazine stands by its claims.

This is the wrestling business. Does it really matter if it's true or not?

It's out there. People are talking about it. Which in America in 2008 means people are going to believe it no matter what.

So it's time to take what wrestling does best and exploit a painful reality.

Continue reading "True or not, WWE needs to capitalize on Ashley Massaro allegations" »

Ring of Honor makes its debut in New York City's Hammerstein Ballroom this Saturday for what is being talked about as one of the biggest shows in the six year history of the promotion.

Every match on the card has the potential to be something special. I'm especially looking forward to seeing Bryan Danielson vs. Naomichi Marufuji and Austin Aries & Jay Briscoe vs. The Age of the Fall for the ROH tag titles. The Briscoes-AOTF match at Final Battle 2007 was one of the best I saw all year. You can find out more information by visiting ROH's official web site.

In the main event, ROH champion Nigel McGuinness is defending his title against the popular Swiss heavyweight Claudio Castagnoli. For those of you who've never seen Castagnoli in action, you are really missing something special. At 6'3" and weighing more than 230 pounds, Castagnoli certainly has the look to be a star in most any promotion. In fact, about a year and a half ago, WWE signed him to a contract, but then dropped him before he wrestled his first match. WWE's loss was certainly been the gain of fans in ROH, where over the last two years Castagnoli has risen to become one of the company's top stars.

With his impressive combination of size, agility, and an innovative offense that makes use of his European wrestling roots, it would not surprise me to see Castagnoli leave the Hammerstein with the belt.I recently had the opportunity to talk to "Double C" about his big match this Saturday.

Alfonso Castillo: Is your match against Nigel McGuinness one of the bigger ones of your career?

Claudio Castagnoli: Oh, it’s the biggest. I would say it’s by far the biggest match. It’s for the ROH world title, it’s in the middle of New York City, and it’s the Hammerstein Ballroom. That’s pretty big to me.

Continue reading "ROH's Claudio Castagnoli Talks About "The Biggest Match" Of His Career This Saturday" »

So ECW is celebrating its 100th episode on the Sci Fi network tonight. Less than two years ago, ECW debuted with what many people considered the worst hour of televised wrestling in the sport's history. We all complained at the time about how the new WWE-era ECW had little resemblance to the cutting edge, exciting, and charming brand we watched a decade earlier.

Yet, compared to the 2008 version of ECW, the 2006 version was as hardcore as it came. Little by little, the new ECW has lost nearly every link to the past. Let's look at some of the extreme staples that have fallen by the wayside over the last 100 weeks of the new ECW.

1. Paul Heyman - The architect of extreme was dumped at the end of 2006, reportedly after butting heads with management over their polar opposite visions for the brand. More than anything, this was the beginning of the end of the new ECW. Even when he was offering very little creative input, Heyman's on-air role gave the product the stamp of approval that kept some fans coming back each week.

2. Rob Van Dam - Possibly the biggest lost the ECW brand has suffered to date. Let's not forget that when the ECW brand was launched in 2006, not only was Van Dam the centerpiece of the brand and its champion, but he was the WWE champion, having defeated John Cena at One Night Stand. I always thought he was a bit over rated, but he was one of the few things keeping some traditional ECW fans watching in the brand's earliest days.

3. The Sandman - Strangely, before WWE made the decision to cut the beer drinking, chain smoking, cane-swinging icon, they moved him to Raw. Having the ECW brand around, why would you move one of the most recognizable characters in ECW's history to a different brand? There was no reason to have Sandman on the pay role, if not for his history with ECW.

Continue reading "ECW: What a Difference 100 Episodes Make" »

Pro wrestling journalist Irvin Muchnick has done some really good work investigating the Chris Benoit case over the past year, and I just read this very interesting piece over at Slam Wrestling.

With the one-year anniversary of the brutal murder-suicide coming up next month, you'll be hearing more about the case once again. I'm actually reading an advance copy of Scott Keith's book about Benoit and the curse of the Hart Family Dungeon, and it's really sad and eye-opening. And I'm planning to post some of my own thoughts on the crime and also on working with Chris.

But for now, I'll just say that Muchnick does bring up some great points about how the investigation has been pushed aside, and how poorly WWE handled the case. I completely agree with his point about that joke of an interview on Larry King with Vince's propaganda army.

The whole thing is just still so surreal and sad. And yet I still believe that no one's learned a damn thing from what happened.