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Hey everybody and welcome back to another edition of Zach's How To Guide. We're at Chapter 14, and I'm will later talk about how to build to a Chris Jericho – Mickey Rourke Wrestlemania match, but first, we have some unfinished business from last week…
First let me say wow, I was overwhelmed by the amount of responses I got to the finisher/tag team naming challenge. Major props to everyone who took the time to send something in. Some of the responses I got are hundreds of times better than ideas which WWE creative have given us recently.
Obviously I can't attempt to publish all the responses, cause I want to get to the Jericho-Rourke part before this column reaches levels of Bill Simmons length, but here is what I think the best response was for each. And stay tuned for the end of the column, this idea worked so well I want to try another tag team name.
1. Dibiase/Rhodes elevated DDT – "The Generation Gap" (from Chris)
2. Jack Swaggers Gutwrench Powerbomb – "The All-American Bomb" (from Charles)
3. DJ Gabriels second rope uppercut – "The Last Dance" (from Cody)
4. Santino's finisher/name – "The Maserati Clutch" (from Michael)
5. R-Truth's Axe Kick – "Truth Hurts" (from Rob)
6. Ezekial Jackson's Uranage – "The Zeke" (from Graham)
7. The Miz and John Morrison team name – "The A-Listers" (from Andrew)
8. Matt Morgan and Abyss team name – "Monster DNA" (from Charles)
9. Vladimir Kozlov's finisher – "From Russia With Love" (from James)
10. John Cena's FU…sorry, Attitude Adjustment – "The Salute" (from Graham)
Anyways great job to all, and lets get started with the rest of the column…..
Several years ago, Eddie Murphy was nominated for an Academy Award in Dreamgirls. Many thought he was a lock to win, until he released the movie Norbit later that year. Norbit just might be one of the worst movies in history, and I think that because of the movie, it lost Murphy the Oscar. Using him as a metaphor, Rourke = Murphy, Norbit = Wrestlemania.
I obviously don't want to compare a crap movie to wrestling's best PPV, but in the mind of old Oscar voters who don't know better, the two are unfortunately one in the same.
Now personally, I think the wrestling buzz was getting to Mickey and he wanted to keep his head clear before the big show. The Oscars are Feb 22. Wrestlemania is April 5. I think Rourke will be at Wrestlemania fighting, but we will not know about it until after the awards because he wants to keep his chances up for winning.
Now out of all possible opponents, I think that Jericho was the best possible choice. He's too big to be in Money in the Bank, and there really were no other feuds for him on the big show for him to play out.
So…how do we get this going? Let's go on a week by week basis shall we?
No Way Out [2/15] – Playing off their recent RAW encounter, Jericho eliminates Kofi Kingston in the Chamber by using the figure four leglock. He proceeds to strut…right into an Attitude Adjustment from Cena.
Raw [2/16] – Ricky Steamboat gets inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. He comes out to the stage to wave to the crowd, only to be attacked by Jericho. He throws him into the ring and locks on the Walls of Jericho.
Raw [2/23] – Jericho comes to the ring and bashes Steamboat, saying he wouldn't stand up to wrestlers today. He then lays down the challenge to Steamboat's old rival Ric Flair to fight him at Wrestlemania. He tells Flair that he has one week to answer his challenge, or he'll come find him.
Raw [3/2] – Jericho marches to the ring and demands his answer from Flair. Naitch appears on the big screen and tells Jericho that he is retired and won't wrestle at Mania. Just when Jericho says Flair is a coward, Flair says he will be there, but as a manager. Jericho asks for who, Flair says look behind you, and Mickey Rourke is in the ring, decking Jericho with a stiff punch.
Raw [3/9] – Video of the punch is played over and over, and then we see clips of Rourke training with Flair and Piper. Jericho obliterates Goldust in a match and cuts a promo on Rourke, saying he made a huge mistake and that this match will be contested as a street fight.
Raw [3/16] – Rourke and Jericho have their contract signing in the ring. Promos are heard from each man and Rourke tells Jericho that he'll see him in Houston.
Raw [3/23] – At this point, all three shows usually blend into one to hype Mania, so I think we get a match between Jericho and R-Truth, as Truth was one of the only current WWE stars to be in the movie. Jericho wins and puts a beatdown on R-Truth post-match, screaming at him to pass this along to Mickey.
Raw [3/30] – Rourke gets on the big screen and thanks the fans for their support, urging them to buy the show and watch Jericho get his ass kicked. We pan back to the locker room and see Jericho outside a door, telling Mickey that he'll see him at Mania. The camera goes inside and we see a beaten Ric Flair lying on the floor, with Jericho having a smug look on his face.
Wrestlemania – We get a hard fought match between the two. Weapons are used, they go backstage, through the crowd, etc. Being a street fight, I see Flair coming down to the ring and lowblowing Jericho. He locks on the figure four, as Rourke goes to the top and hits Jericho with his patented RamJam, getting the win.
Alright phew, hope you enjoyed that brief glimpse into what could be for Mania. I personally hope this does go down, as Rourke would make a great Mania celeb…well better than Snoop or Donald Trump anyhow.
For a new segment, I'd like to challenge readers to send in ideas for names for certain tag teams. Challenge 1 – One of my favorite tag teams of the 21st Century [Sorry Miz+Morrison] was Paul London and Brian Kendrick. Can we get these men a name please???
Send all feedback, questions, comments to zachlevine86@gmail.com.
Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for next week's column…How To Continue The Tommy Dreamer Storyline
