Ric Flair: The End of An Era

Last night on RAW, it was the Ric Flair show. Just an incredible, classy night from an industry where the word "class" generally is never associated with it.

They teased the Ric Flair farewell address all show. Even had a pre-tape with Dusty Rhodes who talked about what it was like to be Flair's most famous rival and whatnot. Big Dust even dropped the jive accent he's been using on us for years. Well done.

The Nature Boy came out to a standing ovation and a chant of "Thank you, Ric" from the crowd. He strutted as he walked down the aisle. Once in the ring, he let out a "Woooo!" and said, "Last night, I wrestled my last match at Wrestlemania. I will never wrestle another match in this ring again. I'm not sad about not wrestling. You shouldn't be sad about the fact that you're not going to see me out here. You should rejoice in the fact that I have had the greatest career in the history of pro wrestling. And last night, even though I lost, I lost to a great, great, great wrestler and a better man."

He was surprisingly composed considering how he emotional this angle has been and let's face it, Ric is an emotional guy. He has emotional kids, too. They cried at the Hall of Fame ceremony and during Wrestlemania. So even though Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler speculated on what The Man was going to say, Flair pretty much came out and admitted that he had been crying all day and that he was out of tears. He thanked the crowd and was, of course, failingly polite in doing so.

Then, HHH's music hit. That brought the water works. Trust me, I am guessing that everything after this moment was not planned--or, at least, Flair didn't know about it--because he was breaking down the whole time. It was just a super-amazing thing.

So, Trips comes out and Flair begins to cry knowing that his buddy is going to pay homage to him. Hunter says, "From the bottom of my heart, I love you, man. Thank you. Thank you." Hunter teared up and got down on his knees bowing and Flair looked so embarrassed and asked him to get up. HHH is saying how Flair is busy thanking the fans and everyone else but that he is here to thank the man who did so much for the industry. Then he leans in toward Ric and says that he had talked to some other guys and ever since, his hand had been cramping up holds up four fingers to Flair's face. I FREAKING STOOD UP AND POPPED AT THIS POINT. KEEP IN MIND I AM WATCHING THIS AT 4 IN THE MORNING ON TIVO! The Horsemen music hits and the tears stream down The Nature Boy's face. HHH announces Tully Blanchard, Arn Anderson, JJ Dillon, and Barry Windham to a huge ovation. I mean, this was just off-the-charts unbelievable. Flair, Windham, and Arn work for Vince now but you could see that Ric was really surprised to see Tully and JJ there. Outstanding.

The next guy announced is Batista. He gets a great pop from the crowd and give Flair the biggest bearhug I've ever seen since Ken Patera was around.

Then begins a parade of former opponents. Harley Race. Greg Valentine. Rick Steamboat. "Another Horseman, Dean Malenko". Finally, Ric's family came out and were introduced one by one by Hunter. Simply amazing class here. The camera pulled tight as Flair hugged and kissed all of his kids and his wife.

Cena came out too. He wasn't booed. He saluted Flair and joined the crowd. HBK's music played and he walked out with his head down and his cowboy hat pulled tight over his face. Once he made it to the ring, he smiled and they hugged, but the camera inexplicably missed it! They exchanged words and hugged again as Flair thanked Michaels. Hunter stepped in and made mention of the matching Rolex watches Flair and Shawn were wearing that HBK gave to Flair to mark the final match in The Nature Boy's illustrious career.

Finally, HHH asked anyone in the back to come out if they wanted to pay respects to Flair and the locker room emptied out. Eventually the whole roster is out there clapping and chanting "Thank you, Ric".

It was truly the end of an era. The whole spectacle has changed so much over the post-Nitro era and the sport has watched fans of our age group leave and move on to something else. Well, after last night's RAW, I can say that for me, the end has come. The one guy I followed as a little kid and through my adulthood is gone and in many ways, the last link to the old school has retired. It was time, for sure, but after seeing the Wrestlemania match, I can say for sure that The Man went out in style (would there be another way for Flair to go out?) and he proved that even at age 59, when he needed to, he still could put on one hellof a match and give his fans that last goosebump moment in a career filled with them.

The Nature Boy: An Appreciation

There are going to be lots and lots of bloggers and writers who feel the need to tell everyone they can about Ric Flair and what the Nature Boy has meant to them. So, yeah. I feel like I can write an appreciation for Ric Flair too.

Wrestling began for me during the WWF and MTV era. I first got a kick out of Hulkamania (there, I said it) but that quickly faded and I wanted more than anything for Roddy Piper to beat Hulk Hogan badly and put the end to ludicrous Rock-n-Wrestling Connection. (Like we were supposed to believe in that!)

But that faded quickly too. It all changed in late 1984 when I saw Ric Flair on the Superstation.

Growing up, there were two distinct camps of wrestling fans. You were either a Flair guy or a Hogan guy. It was like Yankees-Red Sox and Islanders-Rangers, 100%. I, obviously, was a Flair fan and a big mark for the Horsemen. Still am. The difference between Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair has never been about the WWF vs. the NWA or any of that crap. It's always been about believability--or, as Jim Ross says, the sizzle versus the steak. Hulk Hogan was all sizzle. The WWF had the market cornered on sizzle. Ric Flair had a fair amount of sizzle too, but he also had the ability to make you care and make you think what you were seeing was real. He gave the wrestling business an air of legitimacy because he projected an image that he really mattered. Nobody could dream of "24 inch pythons" and being big and thick like Hogan was...but you still could dream of being the coolest guy in the neighborhood who ran around with the tough dudes like Arn Anderson and kissed all the women and made them cry. It was just more realistic. You could almost see yourself custom made from head to toe in that suit from "Michaels of Kansas City". Hell, I wore a suit to school every day and hated it. This guy loved it. Changed my opinion about the dress code immediately. Probably walked a little taller that Monday when I went back to school, too. My tie was much tighter around my neck and my shoes were polished, for sure. That much I remember.

If Hulk Hogan allowed the fan to make the leap from comic books to wrestling, then Ric Flair facilitated the jump from real sports to wrestling. Again, he looked the part of what a champion should look like. A "real" champion wouldn't hesitate to tell you how good he was and a real champion simply wouldn't walk around town in a ripped up red t-shirt with his name on it and a stupid brown leather weight belt. He'd style and profile from city to city as a jet-flying, limousine-riding, kiss-stealing son of a gun.

Hulk Hogan just dusted off monster opponents left and right and the whole match was just getting in the way of the presentation and the pose-down. You knew that was how everything was going to end. With Ric Flair, the gimmick was often turned on it's side. You never really knew--even if you thought you knew--whether he was going to escape with that belt or not. He made a star out of the opponent and believers of the audience and raised the whole thing to a higher plane of performance. While Hogan sold t-shirts, Ric Flair sold legitimacy. We cared because he made us care about the gold around his waist. It was all out there on TV or in the ring or in the bar after the matches. Ric Flair lived his gimmick because he was his gimmick...and in the semi-serious performance art that is professional wrestling, the legitimacy holds sway over the audience who wants to suspend their disbelief.

Everyone has their stories about meeting people they admire and I am no different. I've never been one to get starstruck or too interested in saying I have seen or met famous people, but there's always an exception.

In 1989, Flair had wrestled Terry Funk all over the New Haven Coliseum and afterward, we went to a bar across the street where a lot of the wrestlers went after the matches. The whole scene was really strange with the wrestlers on one side and the majority of the fans on the other side acting like too-shy teenagers at their first school dance. I was sitting chatting with Jim Cornette and Rick Steiner (Steiner mostly grunted) when The Nature Boy walked into the bar. It sounds almost like a cliché to say that the bar went quiet, but it did, until Terry Funk yelled out to Flair that he didn't want to be in the same bar with "no banana-nose puke who made me bleed in this God-forsaken shit-hole". Flair laughed it off and stopped in front of us. He leaned over and said something to Cornette about "staying off the hard stuff" (Cornette was drinking Sprite) and I introduced myself by saying it was a pleasure to meet the greatest wrestler of all-time. Flair smiled and said that the pleasure was all his. He asked me how I enjoyed the show and we ended up making small talk about The Great Muta while he waited for his drink. He got his drink, shook my hand again, and excused himself because he had business to talk over with Gary Hart. Smooth as hell and total class. Guy even called me "Sir". I was barely out of my teens!

I guess the highest compliment you can give someone in the public eye is that when you've met them, the person you looked up to wasn't a total jerk and made the whole thing worthwhile. I don't think any fan who has interacted with Ric Flair has felt disappointed. He is, as Gordon Solie used to say, "the personification of class".

So, it feels kind of strange writing an appreciation for a pro wrestler; but Ric Flair wasn't (isn't) just a pro wrestler. He has, through all of the ups and downs of his career, been a constant in the lives of many of us who feel that we grew up with Ric Flair as a hero; someone to emulate. His matches with Ricky Steamboat and Terry Funk and Dusty Rhodes still hold up today as well as any emotional movies or stories or plays that have endured through time. Yes, I mean Shakespeare and I mean Hitchcock and I mean whomever you want to throw in there. They are timeless classics that were able to control and manipulate the emotions of the people who watched them even though we all were in on the big secret. Doing it without the modern nod-and-a-wink obliterization of kayfabe made it all the more better. It's what's missing today in the WWE, people.

The career indignities of the nineties humanized The Nature Boy for us, somewhat painfully. And a lot of his WWE tenure was akin to giving a teenager the keys to a classic Oldsmobile, only to restrict the kid to only driving to the grocery store and other crappy trips around town. But it doesn't matter. No matter how many times they tried, it was true. Management couldn't kill Ric Flair. Again, that was because we cared.

With Ric Flair's expected retirement this Sunday after his match with Shawn Michaels, the last link to the wrestling I enjoyed growing up will be gone. And with it, my interest in the mat game itself. To that end, I thank Ric Flair for the many, many years of vicarious enjoyment and fun. Many people are going to say you hung on too long but you know what? You deserve to go out on your own terms when you're ready. You've earned it. Thank you, sir.

Panthers 4, Islanders 2

The lineup was depleted but our boys put up a fight last night. Still came up short, though, 4-2. The Islanders were missing a total of ten regulars from their lineup due to injuries and sickness so the Isles had to dip into the system and dress defenseman Matthew Spiller and forwards Steve Regier and Tim Jackman. The Islanders were without Ruslan Fedotenko (sprained knee suffered against Tampa), Brendan Witt (sprained MCL) and Andy Hilbert. Good news is that Bruno Gervais might be ready to go for Saturday's game in Montreal at the Bell Centre. We really need some help here as the Isles ride out the season.

Islanders goals were scored by captain Bill Guerin and Blake Comeau. Comeau also had a chance to tie the game late but his shot went just over the net. Florida added an empty-netter by Brett McLean shortly thereafter.

How'd you like to work in the front office of the Islanders last night? Think about this one. Because of injuries and illness, the Islanders called up Matthew Spiller, Steve Regier, and Tim Jackman. Ben Walter had gone up Tuesday and scored against the Lightning. They sent Jeremy Colliton back to Bridgeport but he didn't arrive in time for the Sound Tigers game last night so they had to scramble to field a team last night. The Tigers called up Jeff Dwyer and Olivier Labelle from Utah and signed two players from outside the system to pro tryout contracts just to field enough players to lose to Binghamton 6-3. Not a great night all around for the Islander organization.

I got a bit of an interesting question this morning from a friend who is a regular reader. He asked me what I am going to write about now that the Islanders are just about eliminated from the playoffs. Well, I guess I'll be writing about the Islanders for the most part. I'll still be here to talk about my feelings on the playoffs. I just don't stop watching hockey because my team is out of it. My fandom is not as (shall we say) fervent, but I am along for the ride just the same.

We also have the big Ric Flair retirement parade pulling into Florida this month. I'm guessing that I will have something on that. So far, from what I have seen, this whole "riding into the sunset" angle has been butchered and not given the treatment many think it should have. I am sure that Flair's match at Wrestlemania against Shawn Michaels is going to be the most memorable and emotional ride of both men's careers. I won't be seeing it live because I am just morally against shelling out $54.95 to see one match.

We also will have a series of columns about hockey cards that my wife has been after me to write for years. Look for that sometime in April.

Live Blog Time Machine: Clash of the Champions 1988

Welcome to another trip into the nyiforlife time machine. Today's live blog is of the very first Clash of the Champions special on TBS by Jim Crockett Promotions from March 27, 1988.

If you don't know, here is some quick history: Vince created the Royal Rumble for the USA Network to compete up against the NWA's first foray into pay-per-view, the Bunkhouse Stampede, in January of 1988. Ted Turner and Jim Crockett then created this special, called Clash of the Champions, as a free-TV alternative to Wrestlemania IV. While universally hailed as a better show, the Clash caused some very real heat between the cable companies and Turner Broadcasting who thought that the free wrestling negatively impacted the PPV offering from the WWF. It probably did.

Now, thanks to the WWE 24/7, we have a special 20th anniversary package for the first Clash of the Champions. Interviews with WWE employees who were then part of Jim Crockett Promotions are interspersed throughout the show to offer perspective on the original event. I'm not going to comment much on that stuff because a lot of it is dumbed-down company-speak. Let's go to the videotape!

Our first match pits Jimmy Garvin against the NWA TV Champion, Mike Rotunda. Rotunda is managed by the Gamesmaster Kevin Sullivan and the match is under the one-count rule for victory because Rotunda is doing the Varsity Club gimmick. I just thought the Varsity Club was a great gimmick for colorless guys like Rotunda, Dr. Death, and Rick Steiner at the time. Why the evil devil-worshipping Kevin Sullivan had to act as their coach was beyond me at the time and comes off as a little ridiculous in the rear view mirror. Sullivan was sort of feuding with Jimmy Garvin over Garvin's wife, Precious, and this match was more of a backdrop for that feud. Rotunda wins and keeps the title after rolling up Garvin for a one-count while Garvin was jawing with Sullivan. This leads to the beat-down of Garvin afterward when Steiner comes in. Precious ends up making the save and choking Sullivan with a coat-hanger. Yes, a wire hanger. Not sure how that got in there. TBS complained about Funk using a plastic bag on Flair a year later but let this coat hanger thing go out over the air? Weird.

Next up we have a US Tag Title match with the Fantastics trying to dethrone the Midnight Express.

Everyone who knows me knows that I love the whole MX & Jim Cornette thing. And I wasn't alone. There's ten dudes in the front row dressed up like Cornette's bodyguard, Big Bubba Rogers. (Wear a suit to the show...put on sunglasses, you're Big Bubba. Take them off, hold up four fingers, and you're custom-made like Ric Flair. Genius!)

We need to acknowledge referee Randy Anderson's poofy mullet before we start. Pee Wee really had a ledge of hair. He may be my new Hair Hero!

Great match between two great teams who could go. The finish came on a typical Dusty-booked horsebleeping fake-out where Bobby Fulton originally had pinned Bobby Eaton to win the titles but the decision was reversed because Fulton had thrown referee Randy Anderson over the top rope before the pinfall was made. Got that? Afterward, The Midnights beat down the Fantastics and they whipped Bobby Fulton with Jim Cornette's belt. There was no way to watch this and not think of David Crockett excitedly screaming, "Whip 'im! Whip 'im like a dog!" as he did two years before when Ricky Morton was using a belt on Cornette and the Midnights.

Next we have an interview with Doctor Death Steve Williams. Doc is rocking one serious mullet. Actually, I am thinking the mullet is rocking Doc at this point. Interviews were not Doc's strong point and whoo, this one is super-bad. He wasn't in the Varsity Club yet and he totally needed someone to talk for him. He might have been a real-life ass-kicker, but unless he was paid by the "Lemme tell ya somethin's", Doc was not doing himself any favors. Really, really, really bad. Not bad in a good, "Shockmaster"-kind of way, either. Just horrid.

Goldberg Prototype Nikita Koloff is next. This was after his conversion to good guy, man with hair, and person who wanted to help kids. Hurt career, help kids. Not a fair trade in the pocketbook, I bet. Next.

In a very tame barbed wire match by ECW/Attitude standards, the LOD and Dusty beat The Powers of Pain and Ivan Koloff. This was a very heated return match off an angle where the Warlord and the Barbarian "broke" Animal's eye socket in a melee after a bench pressing contest. Therefore, it makes perfect sense that Animal is wearing a mask straight out of the Jerry Cheevers' School of Goaltending.

(Side note: man, those dudes were super-juiced. If Warlord were wrestling now, his gimmick would have to be called Red Flag. Hawk would have to be called Bullseye and the Barbarian might have had to go by People's Exhibit A. Seriously, these guys had more juice in them than a convoy of trucks pulling Florida oranges.)

Dusty bleeds (big surprise) and the whole match is less than four minutes long. Warlord was pinned after being accidentally hit with a diving headbutt from the Barbarian. I had to sit through Doctor Death choke through his interview with six cough drops in his mouth for these four freaking minutes? Add in the post-match beatdown where the heels try to get their heat back by ripping the Cheevers off of Animal, it's like seven minutes of work. Not really great work, either.

We have a segue with the latter-day Barry Windham. Wow, he looks to be in better shape than he did on the Horsemen DVD. Windham is teaming up with Lex Luger in the next match and in a shock of all shocks, he says nice things about Lex here. Rips him a new one on the DVD (he wasn't the only one) but here Barry gives him the glad-hand today. Must be because Lex is physically in a bad place right now or something.

So we have Arn and Tully facing Barry and Lex for the NWA World Tag Team Championship. The faces go over here in under ten minutes...but there was a bigger picture in this match. See, in a few weeks, Barry was going to tag with Lex and suddenly get all alligator-armed when Lex needed a tag. Then Luger would catch more beatdowns. Barry was on his way to becoming...a Horseman! They used to actually do angles to make money back in the day. Luger was thought to be the next big thing and as a face, he needed a dastardly turn from someone he had trusted to get him over even more. This was the beginning of the turn. I pray that WWE 24/7 plays that match where Barry turned his back and flashed the four fingers and devilish grin after deserting his partner. It was a great angle.

The capper of the night sees NWA World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair fight Sting to a time-limit draw in 45 minutes. Yes, this is the famous match that "made" Sting a star and it still holds up to multiple viewing even today. (It's on the Ric Flair DVD set, too.)

Let's face it, if you're my age and you were formally a big wrestling fan, this is one of "those" matches that you never forget. For instance, I remember at the time thinking that Sting was looking much better than I had ever seen him, even though I liked the gimmick. Of course, Ric Flair was Ric Flair. Everyone looked good in the ring with Flair--even Luger!

For whatever reason, the extended bit with the judges ("There MUST be a winner!") made me upset more than the clipped part on the Flair DVD set. People have been wondering for years just how a judge could actually think the match was a draw and not choose a winner? Well, Sandy Scott, what the hell? I mean, we all know that Dusty booked Flair in as weak a manner as he could at times (all the time) but this one made me angry twenty years after the fact. The Pet picks Flair and Gary Juster picks Sting and Sandy freaking Scott picks draw.

Yes, I know it's all a work. Thanks for asking. I also know that Sandy Scott becomes the booker after Dusty gets fired and is going to be the guy who brings Ricky Steamboat in the next year for those great matches with the Nature Boy. Still, it pished me off in retrospect to see a masterpiece ruined by some dork in a ten dollar Wal-Mart sports coat sitting at ringside. I'm still talking to you, Sandy Scott!

Overall, I really enjoyed the show. Sure, there was some bad booking in spots and some of it was head-scratching (Nikita Koloff and Eddie Haskell) but overall, a pretty fun look back. You had the perfect storm of unintended hilarity (Pee Wee Anderson's mullet and Doctor Death's freaky rant); great action (Midnights vs. Fantastics); a star turn for Sting; and every match on the card had an issue at stake that lead to all of the matches being interesting. Plus, you had Ric Flair. Not too shabby. I really miss the NWA.

Lastly, let me end this with some more Flair news. Although it is just a rumor at the time I write this, it has been proposed that Ric Flair will face Shawn Michaels at Wrestlemania in the Nature Boy's final match. To me, there is no one better to put him in there with. Michaels grew up idolizing Flair and he knows how important Flair is to the history of wrestling. HBK and Flair always want to put on a show to begin with and in such a big spot, both guys are going to want to ride it out for as much and for as long as they can. I hope it happens. Flair should be retired by a genuine star--someone who can make him look as good as he made countless others while NWA champ--not someone who may or may not be on the rise.

Retro Live Blog: 1988 Royal Rumble

We got us a new feature on the site for you all on this All-Star weekend. WWE 24/7 recently replayed the 1988 Royal Rumble. While I remember watching it on the USA Network back in the day, I decided to give it another shot and add some perspective from twenty years later. That's right: here on nyiforlife.com we do own a time machine. Don't tell anyone!

So, like I said, the first televised "Royal Rumble" was in 1988 and it was originally called the "Rumble Royale". Seems like every time Vince or Jesse would have said "Rumble Royale" that the WWE switcho-chango machine has dubbed in the more correct "Royal Rumble". Just another way Vince is re-making history one event at a time!

First off, we have a match featuring Ravishing Rick Rude (RIP) and Ricky Steamboat. Now remember, this is January of 1988 and Steamboat had lost his Intercontinental belt to the Honky Tonk Man in the summer so that he could take some time off for the birth of his kid. I mention that to say this: I'm fairly sure this is one of his last WWF matches before he left the company and the business until reappearing on TBS in January of 1989 as Eddie Gilbert's mystery partner to start the series of legendary matches with Ric Flair.

Anyhoo, not a great match by any stretch here. It's actually worse that you'd think it should be. Finish comes when Rude pulls the referee in front of him while Steamboat jumps off the top rope. Twenty minutes of stalling and they just don't (didn't?) click. Official match rating: Enh.

The rest of the night apart from the Rumble was just filler stuff. Jumping Bomb Angels bleech and Jimmy Hart bleech. Hogan shilling for the match with Andre "coming up" on NBC (the brilliant twin referee angle) and Hogan always makes me sick. They're doing the contract signing gimmick and Andre turns the table over on Hogan while Ted DiBiase cackles his rich boy ass off; that sort of thing. One thing that jumps out is that Ted was really, really good as the Million Dollar Man. He was better than I remembered here and I always thought he was pretty good to begin with. Angle rating: Lame.

High comedy comes when the freakishly-pushed hack known as Dino Bravo is going to try to break what was called the world bench press record of over 700 pounds. Seriously, I can't do this justice. It is on a high hill of high comedy in wrestling. Suffice to say there's a lot of stalling and Jimmy Hart hyperactive silliness and that Bravo--who at this point looked like a jacked-up oversized baby rhino with a bad dye job--"beats" the record with a little help from segment host Jesse Ventura. After the record-setting lift, the angle did wonders for Dino Bravo. I made me care even less for him as a performer 20 years later. Actually, it made me recall that back in the day I was wondering about the NWA Bunkhouse Stampede show that was taking place at the Coliseum that night because the segment was just boring me to tears at the time. Angle rating: Ach! Unintended comedy rating: 4 out of ten.

So there was also another tag match on the show. The first one was that JBA crap that no one cared about and the other 2-out-of-3-falls match was Bobby Heenan's Islanders (as opposed to Terry Simpson's Islanders) beating the Young Stallions in 2 straight falls. This match actually was interrupted for an interview by Andre and DiBiase to hype the NBC match. Again, Ted was maniacal and Andre talked like he had a head full of phlegm and about eleven Tootsie Rolls in his yap. Seriously. He sounds like he could hock up something about the size of Lord Littlebrook. Yikes. No one ever confused Andre with Arn Anderson in regards to promo ability but this was not good in any way. Andre's teeth are a particular shade of manila folder here as well. Probably hard to see a dentist when you can't fit in the waiting room chairs. I give myself a three-star rating for using Lord Littlebrook in that joke because I think he's funnier than Little Beaver.

That brings us to the Rumble itself, always one of my favorite gimmick matches. You know the rules so I'll just get to the recap:

We start out with Bret Hart and "Strike Force member" Tito Santana in the ring. They picked numbers one and two and go at it pretty good until The Natural Butch Reed comes in at number 3. I had pretty much forgotten about Reed. Funny thing here is that in the age of faces vs. heels, Reed doesn't know who to go after here at first. McMahon thinks that Bret is at a distinct advantage but Reed seems a little confused. Eventually they team up on the man Ventura called Chico until Reed is dumped by Jake Roberts (#4) after about three minutes of work. Nice seeing you, Butch.

Talk about distinct advantages--here comes human fire plug Jim Neidhart at four! Between he and The Snake, that's a lotta crack! King Harley Race is next. Race is rocking a mushroom cloud honky 'fro and I don't care how much they try to put him over, Harley never struck me as a "WWF wrestler" even though they tried to push him as one at the time. Yes, we all know Harley Race and the stories of what a bad ass he was/is but back then, he just looked like some old dude with a distended belly and one hell of a weird hairstyle who seemed to wrestle in slow motion. Other than that, he rocked!

Speaking of rocked, check out this Murderer's Row: Jim Brunzell; Sam Houston; Former referee Danny Davis; and Boris Zhukov, the man who had such a big head that I am surprised that there weren't ten or twenty people holding ropes underneath him on Thanksgiving mornings. Seriously, this guy could not buy hats off the rack. I know that sounds like a line from Gorilla Monsoon--and it may be--but his head is really, really huge. I'm surprised he could balance a VW Bug on his shoulders like that!

At eleven we have The Rock, Don Muraco. He looks like he has spent a fortnight saying his prayers and eating his vitamins. Muraco has those freaky veins on his shoulders that I simply do not have and never will even pretend to have had at one time in my life. Behind him is #12, Nikolai Volkoff. The Russian obviously jumped his cue by coming out with Muraco and the night's best comedy comes when the refs on the floor have to pretend to hold back this angry competitor who wants to get in the ring. At least they didn't send him back to the dressing room to come out again in a minute or two later. The refs are grinning and Volkoff is obviously laughing as he pantomimes joining the Rumble before his time. McMahon and Jesse are trying to get over that Volkoff is just such a game competitor even though everyone on the floor is obviously joking around.

Jim Duggan is next at thirteen. I like his chances tonight.

Ventura puts over Bret Hart about fifty times for lasting as long as he has to this point. I think The Body may have owed Bret some money that week because he is laying it on pretty thick. Yes, Bret does last quite a while until he gets dumped by Muraco, who also tosses Harley Race and the man at number 14, Outlaw Ron Bass. Not a bad showing for a man who was Magnificent no more.

Another streak of top competitors here: B. Brian Blair; Hillbilly Jim; and Dino Bravo. All three are going to meet their fates at the hands of #19, the One Man Gang. I like the Gang's chances tonight too. I think he may make it to the end!

Number 18 is The Ultimate Warrior. He's gonna last about 4 minutes before Bravo and the Gang team up to kick him out. A year or so from now, both guys will be bumping around for The Warrior like ping pong balls but in January of 1988, we haven't been bored and confused by Jim Hellwig too much yet. No snorts. No inane interviews. No day-glo tassels around the arms. Just a few minutes of tepid work and little juice ('juice' meaning excitement) for the former Dingo Warrior.

JYD is at twenty. No truth to the rumor that he snacked on arena hotdogs while training to run this gauntlet. He'd really let himself go at this point. The only shape The Dog was in was "round". Still, at the time, I thought hed be the winner of this Rumble because he didn't look like he was going to be able to bump over the top rope without having a heart attack. And yes, I know I skipped a lot of alleged action from the match. The Rumble is just too hard to give a real good running tally as you watch it so I just go for cheap jokes. You're welcome.

Anyhoo, we come down to the last two guys: Hacksaw Duggan and the One Man Gang. I always liked the OMG. The gimmick was a winner to me because once you get a skull and crossbones tattooed on the side of your head, you've made a commitment to not wear a tie to work for the rest of your life. The Gang is a full year apart from being UWF champion for Bill Watts and a full year or so from "going back to his roots" to become Akeem the African Dream with the Reverend Slick. Again, if you have no idea what I am talking about, you may be lucky on the Akeem stuff. I was never sure if that was supposed to be funny or serious, that gimmick. It just was so wrong to do and yet, strangely hilarious at the time.

But back to the Rumble, the Gang was a house of fire! He eliminated Jake Roberts; Muraco; Blair; Hillbilly Jim; Dino Bravo; and the Warrior. The man totally earned his paycheck for less that ten minutes of work. Duggan eventually wins the match after ducking a charging One Man Gang. Gang's momentum sends him over the top rope and to the floor. I still hate Jim Duggan.

I find myself yawning again. I bet I did the same thing back in the day too. Never a big fan of Duggan's when he was in the WWF or WCW or the UWF-slash-Mid-South when Bill Watts would call him "Doogan" all the time. Another one that always looked like he was fighting underwater. Still, overall, the match was pretty cool at the time and Pat Patterson should always be proud of this baby. Now, much older and much more jaded, the first televised Royal Rumble show does not hold up for repeat viewing. There were no performances like Ric Flair's when he won the title at the Rumble in 1992 (after 2 straight years of Hogan winning the event) or the 1997 Steve Austin show where he was sitting on the turnbuckles looking at his imaginary watch after clearing the ring. But if you take the 1988 Royal Rumble as a jumping off point, you could see that the event would be a winner. It was different enough to be novel and yet simple enough to understand.

And now, because of me, you don't have to sit through it again. Just another service we have for you here at nyiforlife.com!

NHL Winter Classic

Who here didn't see any of the Winter Classic? (If anyone raises their hand, it's just shameful.)

Man, I just have to say that game was the most fun I've had watching television in a long, long time. And I swear the thing couldn't have been scripted better with Crosby winning the game in the shootout. The snow and sleet was just such a spectacle that made for great TV. I even forgot how much I hate Bob Costas during the game! That is how great it was. Just an excellent experience. Big ups to the NHL and NBC and the hearty souls of Buffalo who just proved to be about the best fans around by keeping the energy up for the whole game.

New NBC hairdo Mike Milbury said something interesting, too, so now he is beating Brett Hull 1-0 as far as NBC analysts have gone. He said that the "hockey purists" are a pretty cynical bunch but that the entire atmosphere was great for bringing the game back to it's roots. And Costas even tried to make it about him with his between periods story about "the real" Ogie Oglethorpe. Let's just say that Old Man Winter wasn't the only thing blowing around Ralph Wilson Stadium on Tuesday. Not even a power-tripping egomaniacal midget could ruin the day--a Great Day for Hockey, as Badger Bob would say.

The Winter Classic was a Cinderella story--and it's a good lesson for the fans of other sports. Sometimes, it really just can be about the game. Yesterday wasn't about the ratings or the long stretches where the ice was being fixed. The Winter Classic was a celebration of hockey and the people who love it. It was a chance for our beloved sport to
stand up and put on one heck of a show. And I loved it.

To close this out, I just want to mention the WWE angle that they're doing with Ric Flair. If anyone missed it, Vince McMahon told Flair that the next time he loses a match, that Flair has to retire. Look--no one is a bigger Flair fan that I am but at almost 59, maybe it is time to get out of the ring.

This past Monday, in a match with Triple H, Ric Flair's career was saved by Mr. McMahon's house elf, William Regal, who came down and hit the Nature Boy with brass knux so that HHH would lose by DQ and would therefore, not qualify for the Royal Rumble.

The buildup to the match was great and a lot like the buildup to Starrcade '93 where Ric vowed to retire if he didn't beat Vader for the WCW World Title. The match itself was very old school in psychology and told a good story. In fact, it pains me to say it, but Trips needs to be praised because the man simply can pull off any style he needs to
when he wants to do it.

I'm interested in this angle enough to Tivo RAW and FF through it to see what they are doing with the Nature Boy. It's probably the last thing that Vince can do to grab my attention and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in that line of thinking.

All Over The Place

First, a Quick Giants Rant--It just dawned on me that the Giants are
playing the Bears this week. If Tom Coughlin kicks it to Devin Hester
even once he should be fired on the spot. I think I am close to
advocating blowing up the Giants Miami-style and starting over from
scratch. Just get a do-over. If there's one anything worse than being
a fan of a consistently-average team, I don't know what it is. I
suffered (and so did my friends, who showed patience listening to me,
sorry 'bout that) with some truly heinous Islanders team that were an
affront to professional sports but at the very least I could blame inept
management and coaching for the crappy teams. With the Giants, they are
always middle ground. They aren't exciting when they win and they
aren't exciting losing either. Since that Niners playoff debacle, the
Giants are a hard team to summon any emotion for. I never get too
excited or too bummed out watching them. The organization has to do
something to change the collective feeling of antipathy coming from the
fanbase.

Giants Rant, the Second--How ugly are those freaking sideline caps the
Giants wear? With that round white stripe in the middle, it looks like
a Kleenex dispenser.

WWE 24/7 Review--November was a good month. We all know I am not a huge
huge fan of the Monday Night Wars-era but the channel did give us one of
the best shows from the past, the April 21, 1997 edition of RAW. You
may know it as the one where Stone Cold went Stone Mental and attacked
Bret Hart in the ambulance after he had injured him earlier that night.
The show ended with Brian Pillman attacking his former WCW partner and
trying to break his ankle until HBK made the save.

Overall, a great show with the Bill Watts-esque storytelling playing out
through the whole show. WWE did something similar with Ric Flair's
retirement angle this past week on RAW and when they decide to get
behind something, they can really deliver. Let's see if they keep it up
until Wrestlemania, where it is speculated that the Nature Boy will
retire.

December's Hall of Famer is Jesse Ventura. Yawn.

Now, to the Islanders--Can I say it again? We need to get some goals.
Shawn Bates is expected to get some spot minutes tonight against the
Senators, but does that mean more goals? I am thinking that Bates will
instill a bit of life into the team because he is a popular player with
his teammates and with the fans who really busts his backside. Whether
this translates to the score sheet, we will have to see.

I know that the Islanders have DiPietro and Guerin on the All-Star
ballot, but don't we all have to make the case for Brendan Witt to be in
the game? Witt has been just great all season long blocking shots,
marking every team's top players, and playing big minutes. The entire
Islander defense corps has been off-the-charts so far. Radek Martinek
is playing some outstanding hockey with Witt as his partner. Andy
Sutton has found his niche on the team and knows his role well. He's
been blocking shots and clearing the crease all season long. Mad props
to the Islanders pro scouts who again came up with the right men for the
jobs this summer.

Saying that, Ricky absolutely has to make it to the All-Star game this
year. Witt deserves to go as well. And if Mike Comrie can rediscover
the game he had at the beginning of the season, he could be a candidate
too. My guess is that once he picks it back up, guys like Tank and The
Captain will be scoring more as well.

How come it is so hard to beat Ottawa? I could see the pressure for a
guy like Alexei Yashin playing against his old team with the vitriol
between player and fans and all but that should not affect the rest of
the team. Besides, Yashin is gone counting his rubles.

Hopefully tonight is the night that the PP gets fixed because we all
know what is happening tomorrow night: more Rangers.

Review: Ric Flair and The Four Horsemen DVD

Greed. The 1980s. Corporations running over the little guy. Good times.

Today, as a public service, I am going to give all of you a review of the most important DVD release in the history of WWE: Ric Flair and The Four Horsemen.

I'm not going to be another old guy who tries to school the young people about how cool wrestling was back in the day...but trust me, it was way cooler back in the day. Inside the ring, every movement meant something. Promotions spent months and years building up their feuds and they let them play out in a much more natural way. Guys didn't do silly flippy moves for the sake of getting in a silly flippy move. Nothing was so tightly scripted as the average RAW of Smackdown show is today. Guys fed off each other in and outside of the ring and worked in a kind of shorthand manner that allowed them to feed off of the crowd and what was going on that particular night and that particular group in the arena. It was more theatre and less absurdist tumbling.

Which brings this old man back to 1985 and 1986 and Jim Crockett Promotions. I first discovered the NWA on Superstation TBS in my teens. Being in the northeast, we'd been fed our weekly plodding WWF program for years. I was never anything more than a casual fan until the MTV War To Settle The Score and the whole Hogan-Piper leadup to Wrestlemania I. Then, one Saturday morning, I flipped on my TV and saw the wrestler who changed the rules as far as I was concerned: Ric Flair.

Ric Flair not only talked the talk, he literally walked the effing walk. He came out on TV wearing an expensive-looking suit and sunglasses and seemed to have no problem telling the interviewer (might have been Schiavone) how great he was. It seemed to me that "in real life" a champion would look more like Ric Flair did and a lot less than the ripped shirt-wearing "say your prayers and take your vitamins" moron that ruled the WWF.

Yes, when I was a kid, there were two camps: you were either a fan of Flair's or a fan of Hogan's. There was no middle ground whatsoever because the two of them were so dissimilar.

Speaking of dissimilar, the one man Ric Flair is always going to be associated with is The American Dream, Dusty Rhodes. Rhodes was, of course, the man of the people. Flair and the Horsemen represented the new and emerging yuppie class that was all too happy to squash the little man on their way to the top. That perfect confluence of two guys who were competitive as hell with each other who represented different things to different people and who both were able to articulate their differences in ways that grabbed the viewer by the neck propelled Jim Crockett Promotions and the NWA to amazing TV and angles that hold up today in a way that two guys bumping into each other backstage and then staring at each other never will.

The Four Horsemen were born not out of a booking decision, but out of necessity. The story is told that the Andersons; Flair; and Blanchard were put together to do a quick interview about upcoming matches they were having and Arn said something to the effect of "not since the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse have you seen devastation like you see here before you." With that one ad-libbed (NOT SCRIPTED!) line, the Four Horsemen were born. And the fact that this famous (infamous?) interview was not on the set and lost to the sands of time is the major quibble of the DVD set. Whether it was recorded over (as legend goes, Crockett reused tapes in a cost-cutting move) or it was just misplaced, the failure to have this on the set is egregious.

One of the complaints I have heard from old school/kayfabe fans is that sometimes there is a lack of candor in some of the releases; like people don't want to ruffle anyone's feathers or something. Well, one thing is for sure. One Ric Flair and The Four Horsemen, that is not the case. Ric Flair seems to use this opportunity as the Teflon Legend of Wrestling to take the piss out of old foes such as Eric Bischoff and Jim Herd. When asked what he thinks of former wrestlers like Sid Vicious, Flair simply does not hold back. The man is a storyteller and truly comes off as relishing the chance to get some stuff off of his chest.

The Horseman who left the biggest impression on me after watching the DVD was Tully Blanchard. While not featured as much as Flair, Blanchard makes a point with every word he says. And although he is out of the business and a preacher these days, you can see the mischievous glint in his eye when he talks about the old days. The guys obviously had the time of their lives back then--even if you only believe half of the stories they tell. Blanchard obviously enjoyed his time as one of the elite and he should have. While Flair was the champ and was cool and Arn was the guy who you believed could really kick some ass, Tully always came off as the snot-nosed rich kid who knew he was better than you and never minded rubbing it in your face. What a great role to play.

Tully is also the guy who kind of brought manager James J. Dillon to the group. It's easy to see that in a group of great talkers that a manager could get lost in the mix. In fact, back in the day, I had no idea as to why he was there. But to a man, all of the Horsemen who were involved with the Dillon incarnation set the record straight and tell you just how important JJ was to the group. Really changed my opinion of him in a lot of ways to hear the other guys talk about him in such glowing terms.

Overall, I would rank Ric Flair and The Four Horsemen as the best of the WWE documentaries since very little of it is sugar-coated. I mean, hell, they even dug up a Botoxed Paul Roma and asked him about his time with the group. Roma, by the way, is clearly delusional when discussing himself and Ric Flair. Triple H hits it on the head when he says that everyone was expecting Tully to be returning to the group and then they brought out "the job guy from WWE". I'll never forget what a Fart in Church moment that was back in the day. The group wilted after that and every incarnation got a little bit worse. Not good times.

Glaring omission: Ole Anderson is not interviewed. The fact that he left the group and how that was handled was touched on but it would have been nice to hear from the man himself. Ole must still be harboring a grudge against Vince for the whole Black Saturday hijacking of Georgia Championship Wrestling from back in the day.

If given my druthers--and I am so not sure what 'druthers' are, anyway--the match selection would have been different. Then again, most of the great Flair matches are already on his solo DVD release. All of the key moments that I wanted to see were on there as part of the documentary, so I am not complaining.

Overall, I give it an A for the documentary and a C for match selection. It's a DVD that every old-school fan should own because we will never see anything like the Four Horsemen again. They were of a time and were unique. They were the first "faction" or gang of wrestlers who hung together like family. Those bonds extend even to this day between the wrestlers and the fans who remember what a ground-breaking act that they were.