WWE 24/7 Recap for October

Well, as we all read in a previous post, this past month was nothing to shout about with the WWE 24/7 channel. I watched zero in the Hall of Fame section because I have no desire to see old matches of The Wild Samoans. They were before my time.

The Shorties were hosted by Snitsky and right there you have two strikes against it. That man is simply disgusting. The WWE Powers That Be were trying to highlight some of the more interesting characters in wrestling history. Right here is where I kind of have an issue.

First off, Buzz Sawyer was listed and they played a match featuring him and Muta vs. Ric Flair and Arn Anderson from the Clash of the Champions. It was the same night that Sting was kicked out of the Horsemen and later he tore his knee up trying to scale the cage to get at Flair and Arn.

The match wasn't much and did very little to showcase the Buzz Sawyer character. The finish was botched and was clearly the backdrop to the angle where Sting was trying to retaliate against the Horsemen. Did I like seeing the Horsemen? Of course I did. But why claim that Buzz Sawyer is the main reason to check it out when everything he did was secondary to the angle? Why not get one of the old WCW Saturday Night matches where Buzz came out with his manager Gary Hart and started beating the hell out of jobbers to get over that he was a bit of a looney tune?

Actually, I am going to change tact halfway here. Instead of complaining about the choices, I'm going to offer some ideas to improve the product.

There's a lot I really, really like about the channel. I love the old NWA TBS shows. Watching those and seeing The Horsemen and the Midnight Express simply remind me of how much fun I had when I discovered the JCP product. I also like the simplicity of the Florida shows that are hosted by Mike Graham. I never got to see much FCW back in the day and to experience Gordon Solie as he hosts the shows are fun. The man simply was smooth and he had more credibility in his pinkie toe than some goof like Todd Grisham would have if he broke the latest scandal news out of the White House. If you're looking for flash you are simply not going to find it watching either of the shows. The stories made sense, you had a basic good versus evil in every match, and old ass-kickers like Wahoo McDaniel and Ole Anderson always will look like they can slap the taste out of the mouth of The Warlord or The Berzerker.

The Pick Your big One feature allows for some fan interaction as well. On the WWE website, the give you a list of three events (former PPVs) and majority rules as to which one will be shown during the final week of the month. Whether or not the WWE is actually truthful in this, I don't know, but it seems above board because a lot of the big shows that win are NWA or Jim Crockett-promoted WCW events.

The Big Ones folder often has WWF house shows from the late 1980s and those are hit-and-miss. They seem heavy on the Hulk Hogan Era and nothing bores me to tears faster than seeing Hogan's legdrop time after time; but I am sure there are great fans of the house shows as fans can relive arena events they attended, etc. It's just that the whole thing seems bogged down in one era right now.

The WWE also replays older PPVs and other NWA events but to be honest,there aren't a lot of them to show. That's probably your reason right there as to why the JCP tapes are so popular as PYOB options. Some of the PPVs from the mid-nineties (i.e., before the Monday Night Wars) are tough to take because the creativity of the industry was at a devastating low. There simply aren't a lot of keepers.

Dump the Tuesday Night Titans stuff. Just get rid of it. I have never understood the cult surrounding those who loved the camp nature of the show. It was crap then and it is even bigger crap now. Seriously. You're wasting our time with that stuff.

One thing I would love to see are the old Bill Watts UWF TV shows that were probably part of the sale when Vince bought the WCW tape library. (Quick note: Watts sold the UWF to Crockett and then a company called The Wrestling Network was born.) There is an untapped opportunity in those tapes to relive what was some of the most exciting episodic TV done in the industry at the time. The Freebirds were on top and many of the future stars of the business started out in the Watts territory. Who wouldn't want to see the evolution of Sting? What about the genius heat magnet that was Eddie Gilbert? The battles between Doctor Death and Terry Gordy? Heck, some of the audience who are self-hating lunatics might want to see Blade Runner Rock, the man who became The Ultimate Warrior? Why not get the UWF into the rotation?

I'm sure the old ECW tapes are popular on WWE 24/7 but as I said before, I have no desire to see that stuff again. That's just me. But to forget that Jim Cornette was promoting "wrestling as it used to be" under the auspices of Smoky Mountain Wrestling during much of the same timeframe is a bummer. WWE owns the tapes, why not show them? The culture clash between the proudly old school booking of SMW and the decidedly hardcore ECW is worth shining a light on. And again, lots of the wrestling stars of the day made their way through the Smoky Mountains. Seeing names like HBK, Mick Foley, Arn Anderson, Terry Funk, and the Undertaker all made their ways through SMW. Unless the tapes ruined, why not add an episode or two to the menu each month?

The Legends Roundtable segments are too few and far between. I'd love to see more of them. Just seeing old timers sitting around a table (duh, that's why it is called the roundtable) and telling stories about the territorial days of the business is exciting as heck. The stories are all tall tales and as long as you know what to sift out of the BS, you'll be okay. But these guys (Dusty, Jim Ross, Michael PS Hayes, Bischoff, Lawler, Pat Patterson, etc.) have all come through the business and have all been exponentially influential on wrestling as an industry. If you listen to them talk, they all invented everything. And it is totally riveting fun stuff.

This month seems to be better for the channel. It's November so there is promise of some Survivor Series stuff. Roddy Piper is highlighted in the HOF section and he is one entertaining kilt-wearing dude. The Shorties will be former football players who have transitioned into professional wrestling so right there you have Pillman, Vader, Doc, etc. There will be more TBS and MNW shows. Not too shabby.