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UFC Fight Night Live & Why Brandon Vera & Rampage Jackson are Dumb

            Saturday night I watched UFC live on Spike. Usually, I don’t watch anything live because I’m a slave to my DVR, but I was at my parents house and I had no choice because they don’t have a DVR. Good job by WWE to get a commercial, in the first hour, for the Bash on Spike during the UFC event.

            The card was pretty good for a free TV show. I really enjoyed the Hermes Franca-Frankie Edgar fight. Edgar dominated most of the fight, but almost blew it when he got busted with a knee by Franca late in the third round. The Anthony Johnson-Kevin Burns fight ended with Burns winning by TKO. It should have ended with Burns getting disqualified for poking Johnson in the eyes, after being warned several times. Johnson’s offense was frustrating because he would get an awesome takedown and do nothing in Burns’ guard.

            Cain Velasquez and Jake O’Brien were in, what Joe Rogan called, “a statement fight.” Velasquez made a statement, by continually pounding the skull of O’Brien and getting the TKO win. I expected to see O’Brien have a much better showing than a first round TKO. He has a long way to go to being successful in UFC.

            Vera was talking about how tired he was because he dropped weight classes. He then went to urge the UFC fans to support Rampage Jackson. Victims in bad situations get supported. People who get dealt bad hands get supported. Idiots with no respect for human life or property should not get supported. Rampage is not a victim.

            Rampage Jackson is being charged with felony hit-and-run charges. He allegedly ran his jacked up Ford F-250 onto sidewalks in a police chase with people running for their lives after hitting and wrecking two cars.

            Rampage also blew out his left front tire driving his truck on the rim but that’s not all. Here’s the kicker, Rampage Jackson not only was driving a jacked up F-250, easy to spot and hard to forget, but also had a picture of himself on the passenger side cab of his truck. He expected to get away with a hit-and-run with a picture of himself on the side of his truck. Below is a link to a picture of his truck prior to his escapades. The picture shows he has matching pictures of himself on either side of the truck. http://www.mmapunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/quinton-rampage-truck.jpg.  

Quick Smackdown Thoughts

            Brian Kendrick still has a job and a new gimmick to boot. Kendrick is dressing like early Shawn Michaels, wrestling like HBK/Flying Brian Pillman, and has a large black body guard like early blue-blood Triple H. I hope this is beginning of a decent push instead of something they try one week and drop.

            When Triple H exposed Edge for cheating on Vickie, I don’t think I was the only one breathing a sigh of relief. Edge deserves better than kissing Vickie every week and it gave him some heat for being a sleaze. I hope this leads to Alisha being the new Lita because he is a “well-built” woman, if you understand me correctly. This is obviously leading to Vickie bringing back The Undertaker which I hope WWE doesn’t screw up with half-witted logic. Vickie is mad and wants revenge on Edge. She brings back a guy who Edge is obviously afraid of to get even with him, the end. You can take that idea WWE, you have my permission.

            I didn’t like that Kennedy got pretty much squashed. We’ve seen these two guys have decent matches, and this should have been no different. Kennedy is over with the crowd and should be getting pushed. Umaga needs to be in a similar role to that of a mini-boss in a video game. You have to beat Umaga to get to bigger and better things, in this case a champion, in a video game, the boss to beat the game.  

Great American Bash Thoughts-Get the Replay

            WWE made a good call by starting the show with the four-way tag team match. It did a good job of getting the pacing up, but I didn’t like that Miz and Morrison weren’t involved in the decision. That is the only down side of having so many people in the ring. There is so much going on and more often than not, the champs don’t even get pinned.

            The way WWE has been sneaking matches onto shows lately is kind of cool. Most of the matches they sneak on have been pretty good. Most of the matches have been two great workers or title matches. In the last two pay-per-views alone, we’ve seen Chris Jericho-Kofi Kingston and now Matt Hardy-Shelton Benjamin. Interesting to note, both of those surprise matches involved title changes. The U.S. title changing hands is a double-edge sword to me. Matt Hardy loses the belt which he helped make semi-important again with his feud with MVP, but Shelton Benjamin gets a title run. I’ve loved Shelton’s work ever since he debuted, but they need to solve the problem of the promo with him. I think WWE will go with Hardy-Benjamin again on Smackdown this week only to move Hardy away to a different, higher profile feud, similar to what they did with Chris Jericho.

            The ECW Championship match was pretty much what everyone expected. Mark Henry eats Tommy Dreamer. Colin Delaney turning heel was a twist that means nothing to me. Delaney is just boring now that he won a match. However, if he is going to side with Mark Henry, maybe he’ll gain some weight. Maybe by hitting the buffet with the World’s Hungriest Man, Delaney won’t look like a pasty-white nerd in wrestling tights. 

            The Chris Jericho-Shawn Michaels was the reason I wanted to get this show in the first place. I was not disappointed. Michaels bled like a stuck hog and Jericho was so evil and dastardly. The match and the psychology was good enough that I didn’t have a problem with the referee stoppage. I remember another phenomenal referee stoppage match that had the feud heat and blood like this, WrestleMania XIII- Bret Hart vs. Stone Cold. There was no double turn here, but I think we saw a turning point for both competitors. Jericho kicked it into high gear and Michaels is assuming the elder-statesman role. This is that next level heel stuff we haven’t seen from Jericho is many years. The whole detached retina promo later was dumb, but I’ll let it slide because of the great match.

            The Divas Championship match was really good. The match had that submission-counter into a submission feel to it and didn’t disappoint. However, I didn’t like that Natalya tapped out. She has been built up as such a beast, that her tapping out just deflated her. I wish they had held off on the tap out until they built the feud a little more.

            WWE had been building CM Punk as an underdog. They did the same sort of thing with John Cena and his match with Triple H at WrestleMania 22 and somewhat with Khali at One Night Stand 2007. I liked the underdog build but I would’ve like it more if Punk had actually won the match. Everyone knew Kane was getting involved, but they made Punk look weak in the process. I hope WWE does something to give Punk some kind of momentum back or else he is gonna challenge Rey Mysterio for the worst booked champ ever.

            The New York Service Area Brawl started out pretty hokey. They were supposed to fight in a circle surrounded by the Rental Car All-Stars which is really hokey. It was similar to the parking lot brawl set up in the Smackdown vs. Raw video game. Except you actually fight in a parking lot in the game. The fact that it wasn’t in an actual parking lot was dumb. JBL apparently came dressed for an appearance on FoxNews’ Bulls & Bears rather than a parking lot brawl. That being said, I really enjoyed the plunder and sick spots. I give JBL a lot of flack for being fat and out of shape, but he busted his ass tonight and so did Cena. This was far and away better than anyone expected. The car door breaking off spot was cool and I thought the finish was cool, except the part where JBL wins. With JBL winning, we get another installment of JBL-Cena. Hopefully WWE will see that this feud will draw crickets in the ring, and they’ll do a stipulation match where this thing ends.

            The main event was, of course, the WWE Championship match. Despite the fact that everyone knew WWE pulled the trigger too quickly on this one, it did not disappoint atop the card. They had a good to great match that I think got ruined by Alisha and Vickie’s catfight shenanigans. Triple H won, so what happens next? This match had another minus as well, after Edge speared Vickie, Smackdown will be forever stricken with her in a wheelchair screeching “excuse me.”

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            My column here is an extension of the topics I cover on my radio show on WEGL 91.1 FM on the campus of Auburn University in Auburn, Ala. You can listen to the show “Handoffs and Headlocks” online at www.wegl91.com by clicking streaming and selecting a media player. The show airs during the summer on Monday at 1-3 p.m., Tuesday 1-2 p.m. and Thursday 1-3 p.m. (Note: All times are Central Standard Time).

            Thank you for reading and if you would like to give feedback please send me an email at handoffsandheadlocks@gmail.com or DudleyAU@aol.com. You can also contact me on Facebook on my name in the Auburn network.  

Handoffs and Headlocks: No Hype Necessary, Just That Damn Good