Welcome to the “20th anniversary week” edition of The Wrestling List. This week is amazingly the 20th anniversary of The Wrestling List. Unreal. Just started as a fun random list of thoughts of various happenings. The List started cause people would ask my random thoughts on the happenings and I thought hey, why not just type it up and send it. It evolved into very different formats over the years. It was consistently out every week for probably twelve years. The last few years after that was trying to find the time to do it to where I got inconsistent and sent whenever I could. I have gotten back to being weekly in the last year and getting a rhythm with it again. Now up to two Lists a week covering both ends of the week of wrestling with so much going on on TV. Fun to get back to writing again. I think the plan for this week is that I am going to send some old Lists out for you to read if interested. Just want to say THANK YOU to all of you that have taken the time to read this. There has been a lot of things to cover over the years. Big stories. Fun stories. Sad stories. Tragic stories. The business has changed a lot over the years. Some things for the better and some for the worse. When this started, WWE, WCW, and ECW were all still in business. The List went out every Monday night following Raw and Nitro and stayed on Monday nights throughout unless there was more to cover later in the week. Show reviews, live event recaps of shows I attended which was always fun to give the live perspective of, DVD reviews, and a lot of nonsense on those nights where we just have to throw all logic out the door in frustration of what we are watching and just be silly and have fun with it. The peak years of the List are in the past but it has been fun to get a routine going again with it. Again, THANK YOU to anyone that has taken the time to read even one of these over the last 20 years. November 23, 1999 was the first one. The goal of it was just to have fun. Something fun we could talk about, discuss, and laugh at.
Smackdown opens up in Philadelphia this past Friday night. It opens with King Corbin being carried to the ring in Macho King Randy Savage style. Seriously, quit opening Smackdown with Corbin. It zones me out immediately for the second week in a row. Promo time with him as Ziggler and Roode are accompanying him. I quit paying attention and muted it. LOL. Next segment. Gable and Ali against Roode and Ziggler. Two spots on the line for the Smackdown Survivor Series team. Corbin was at ringside during the match causing interference. Reigns walked out during it to put a stop to it. Match continues. We get near the end and Reigns takes out Corbin on the floor. Gable sets up Ali to hit the 450 splash to get the pinfall on Ziggler. It’s Firefly Funhouse time next. During the segment, Bray does a magic trick and changes the Universal title color to blue. So, that is how they make the belt Smackdown blue apparently. The B Team and Drew Gulak talk to Braun Strowman next and he destroys all of them. Lather, rinse, repeat with that. Next is Sami and Nakamura talking to Daniel Bryan backstage where Sami makes up excuses on why he ran last week from the Bray attack on Bryan. Bryan tells him he will not be joining their group and says the perfect person would be Strowman for their group. Sami starts yelling at Bryan as Bryan walks away about how Strowman isn’t smart and is just big. Of course, Bryan set him up as Strowman is standing right there hearing all that Sami is saying. Sami backtracks and gets himself out of there. Smackdown tag team champions, The New Day are next against The Revival. Match nears the end when The Undisputed Era jumps in and attacks everyone. Another NXT invasion! They finish them off and then the Smackdown locker room empties. They take off through the crowd celebrating. The next match is a squash match for Heavy Machinery. Women’s division is up as Bayley takes on Nikki Cross. If Nikki wins, she joins Team Smackdown for Survivor Series. Shayna arrives right at the beginning of the match. She goes after Bayley who backs off. Bayley backs off into the crowd but right behind her is Team NXT who slam her back over the barrier. Sasha then shows up and nails Shayna. Team NXT starts to go after Sasha but the women’s locker room empties. A brawl in the ring. Shayna and Bayley go through the crowd. Sasha then gets on the mic and says if you want the spotlight, here it is and challenges for the four to a match against her four. So, it is Nikki, Sasha, Carmella, and Dana against Rhea, Dakota, Mia, and Tegan. How amazing is this that Mia is out here working after that ladder match???!!! Two days before this was that match. Tough. Nice exchange when Sasha and Rhea go one on one for the first time. Nikki ends up countering Dakota to the get the pinfall. NXT jumps in and pounds on Smackdown but the the rest of the Smackdown locker room empties to run off NXT. We wrap up Smackdown with Miz TV and the guest is Daniel Bryan. Miz talks about how Bryan appears mentally unstable and doesn’t even know who he is and that he thinks The Fiend sees that Bryan is washed up and wants to end him. Miz continues to jab at Bryan and Bryan snaps at him saying that he has no idea what mental instability does. He says Bray is unstable and understands Bryan’s mental state. This is interrupted by the Firefly Funhouse. Bray says maybe the Fiend just remembers what Bryan did with the reason on why The Fiend attacked him. Or maybe he just wanted to play with him. Do you want this? Bray says that if Bryan wants a shot that he only has to say his favorite word and that is yes. Bryan says no. Bryan says he isn’t coming back there and playing but that he wants to fight. He challenges Bray for the Universal title and Bray says yes adding his own yes chants. Miz announces it will be Bryan vs. The Fiend at Survivor Series for the Universal title.
Raw opened up tonight from Boston with Becky Lynch cutting a promo talking Survivor Series and challenging Bayley and Shayna to show their faces knowing that they had to be here with how they are jumping back and forth. Becky doesn’t get either though as the Iiconics show up. Pop here for them. After a back and forth promo, Becky challenges both of them but she is already paired up with Charlotte tonight. Charlotte shows up and says she doesn’t like teaming with Becky either but the powers apparently want them together. So, it ends up being Becky and Charlotte against Peyton and Billie. Samoa Joe arrives to do commentary. He was good on commentary tonight too! Slid right in there and has another career after wrestling for sure if he wants it. I did laugh at his line of they apparently “needed an announcer that was Brock Lesnar-proof to sit out there”. LOL. Becky and Charlotte prevail with the figure eight submission victory. Becky and Charlotte are on their way up the ramp when Shayna, Duke, and Shafir show up in the ring. Becky and Charlotte run back to the ring but the numbers game overtakes them. Shayna, Duke, and Shafir walk back out through the crowd but Becky and Charlotte go back after them. Before they can get to them, security stops them and backs them up. Silly from a storyline perspective. Shouldn’t security be, I don’t know, going after the talent that are invading the show instead of the ones that are actually supposed to be there? LOL. I know, logic. Becky lays out one of the security guys with a punch and challenges the others asking if any of them want it too. Backstage we see the AOP back on TV as they lay out Hawkins and Ryder. Looks like video package time for them is over and they are back on TV. The OC is up next. It is Anderson vs. Humberto. Humberto is outnumbered so The Street Profits make their way out to even up the odds. Humberto gets the win so they continue to try and build him. Next is Lashley vs. No Way Jose. Lana started talking divorce and I started zoning out. This just won’t stop, will it? Make it stop. If I didn’t know better, I’d be looking to see if Vince Russo had snuck into the building and booked this. Wait, did he…..have we looked around….is he? The match gets going and whew, just end this thing. Lashley won cause I heard his music playing. LOL. Hour two opens up with Rollins taking on Andrade. Rollins put his Survivor Series team spot on the line. If Andrade wins, he is in and Rollins is out. My first thought is what if Andrade wins and then this pulls Rollins down into the NXT team like what was teased initially? Zelina won’t be a factor tonight as she gets thrown out after interfering. Match goes on and then things get really random when the Lucha House Party attacks Rollins on the floor costing Andrade the match. They then attack them. Let’s go back to logic again. If you are Team Smackdown, wouldn’t you….maybe….want Seth Rollins to lose the match and get a former Universal champion out of the match? LOL. Outside, we see the train of vehicles pulling up in the same style as a couple of weeks ago as Triple H and NXT arrive. In the ring, we have Buddy Murphy against Tozawa. Murphy gets the win. After the match, Murphy goes to Aliester’s locker room as Murphy was looking for a challenge earlier. Next is Erick Rowan in a squash match. Apparently, unfortunately my hope of last week of the person that was writing the Lana/Rusev/Lashley storyline being in there and trapped away from any more bad writing of this didn’t come true. 24/7 championship crew get involved in this match before it can even get going. Rowan takes some of them out and wins the match. Big pop for Kevin Owens in Boston as takes on Drew McIntyre. The match nears the end and Triple H walks out. He talks to Kevin Owens. He offers the same pitch that he pitched to Seth Rollins. He says he has a soft spot for Rollins but that Owens is a different breed of wrestler. Credited him for legitimizing NXT. Says Owens was taken from NXT instead of probably actually wanting to go. Mentions about how he has been mistreated on the main roster but that he sees what Owens has always had to offer. The Forgotten Sons are on the ramp and they are attacked by some of the Raw talent. As Triple H and Owens watch, Undisputed Era jumps in the ring and lays out Owens. Triple H watches on. More of the Raw locker room shows up and NXT is run off. Rey Mysterio interviewed next where they talk about the added stipulation of a no DQ match to him and Brock. Makes sense. Smart booking to where now it evens things up some for Rey where he can use whatever in the match and will have intent with it. Asuka vs. Natalya up next. Asuka picks up the win. Main event time with The War Raiders taking on Randy Orton and a surprise partner of his choosing. I thought this has to be Ricochet, right? So, it is indeed Ricochet, teaming up with Randy Orton. Did anybody not think it was Ricochet? Makes sense playing off of the booking of last week. As Orton goes for the RKO, Smackdown music hits and some of the Smackdown mid card runs out. The Raw team holds them off. Then, here comes NXT attacking Smackdown. NXT lays out Smackdown and faces off with Raw. More NXT runs out and it looks like the whole NXT roster is out there surrounding the ring. Raw starts fighting but they are outnumbered. Rollins music hits and here comes the top card of Raw. Triple H then appears on the screen promising that NXT is going to finish this at Survivor Series. He offers an open door for NXT this week saying he is going to leave the doors wide open this week. Looking to pop that NXT rating on Wednesday night. Could this be the week that NXT tops AEW? They look to be going for it. That main roster tease cause get it. I also thought it would happen last week where I thought NXT was going to get their first ratings win and it didn’t happen. So, the show ends in a big brawl. This is basically paint by numbers booking with what they do every year with brand battles on the go home shows before Survivor Series. Just seen it every year so just kind of there for me.
I watched the Table For Three of Shane McMahon, Bruce Pritchard, and Johnny Ace last week. Discussion mostly focuses on the final WCW Monday Nitro show in 2001. Some good back story. Some repeated stories we have heard before but there was some new stuff in there too. If you like to hear the backstory of the end of WCW, give it a watch.
New WWE Ride Along tonight on WWE Network with one pairing being Trish Stratus and Lita. The other group is Kevin Owens, Ali, and Apollo Crews.
I’ll say it. I miss my hugger. I miss the good girl. You know I love that good girl Bayley character going back to the beginning of NXT. I’m trying people. I’m trying. She’s doing good working as a heel but I miss hug life.
This Week In Wrestling History: November 18, 2001. Survivor Series 2001 takes place in Greensboro, NC wrapping up the invasion angle. Team WWF takes out Team Alliance when The Rock pins Stone Cold Steve Austin to win the five on five elimination match with the angle begin that the losing company had to disband. It is sad to realize that the whole invasion angle was booked so bad that it already wrapped up in November of that year. Very solid show and enjoyed it. The next night, we would see Ric Flair on Raw which set up the ownership partnership angle of him and Vince where Vince would have one of the best expressions of stressed panic that he ever has done. Then, we had the right thing done to where Austin was turned back babyface right after that moment. As all of you know, the heel turn didn’t work all year and then I think he just got more popular as the “what” promos had already started at this point.
Have a great week!
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