WWE Hall of Fame Class 2018

Tonight the WWE will be inducting their Hall of Fame Class of 2018. There are some really good choices and one and two that seem to have come from left field. Here are the inductees.

Mark Henry
Mark Henry represented the United States in weightlifting in the 1995 Pan American Games and the 1996 Summer Olympics. His time in WWE had him as a member of the Nation of Domination and later on, as Sexual Chocolate Mark Henry. He is most recently remembered as a monstrous heel who put people in "The Hall of Fame"; and beating Randy Orton to become World Heavyweight Champion in 2011. Mark will be inducted by The Big Show.

Kid Rock
The Detroit native broke through in the 90's with songs such as "Cowboy". He went to provide songs for some of the WWE Superstars such as Undertaker and Stacy Kleiber.

Hillbilly Jim
Hillbilly Jim joined the WWE in 1984 with his unique look of dungarees and a straw hat. After retiring in the 90's, he went to manage Henry and Phineas Goodwin to a World Tag Team Championship. Fans of the Attitude Era will remember him taking in the gimmick battle royal in Wrestlemania X-7. He will be inducted by legendary manager Jimmy Hart

Jarrius "JJ" Johnson
Even though the lifelong WWE fan is only 15 years old, he has already had 2 liver transplants due to biliary atresia. His courage has led to him receiving honours from the New Orleans Saints and the NBA. He was also the winner of the Jimmy V Preservance Award at the 2017 ESPYs.

Ivory
After being part of the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling, Ivory made her WWE debut in 1999 being in the corner of Mark Henry and D'Lo Brown. In the Women's Division, in a time when it was more about bra and panties than actual wrestling, Ivory was a standout, eventually becoming Women's Champion while part of Right of Censor. Ivory went on to be a trainer on Tough Enough. she will be inducted by Molly Holly.

The Dudley Boyz
Bubba Ray and D-Von started out in ECW, winning their Tag Team Championship 8 times. Soon after joining the WWE in 1999, they developed an unhealthy obession with putting people through tables such as Mae Young and Trish Stratus. They had some amazing matches with The Hardy Boyz and Edge and Christian before continuing their success as Team 3D in TNA. They will be inducted by Edge and Christian.

Jeff Jarrett
Holy shit, I did not see this one coming. Jeff Jarrett spent time in WCW and WWE during the 90's most as a lower mid-carder. His last run in WWE ended acrimoniously in 1999 when he demanded extra money in order to drop the Intercontinental Championship to Chyna at No Mercy. He went to be the top heel in WCW during the Ruzzo Era, winning the WCW Championship 4 times in the space of a few months. Jeff went on to found TNA, in which AJ Styles, Bobby Roode and Samoa Joe had successful careers. He will be inducted by Road Dogg Jesse James.

Goldberg
Goldberg is best known for his streak of 173 matches in WCW, becoming WCW Champion and United States Champion in the process. He was a refreshing change to the fans, who were getting sick of people like Hulk Hogan. His first stint in WWE was only a year but he faced The Rock and Triple H, becoming World Heavyweight Champion. Recently, he became Universal Champion and had matches with Brock Lesnar. Goldberg will be inducted by Paul Heyman

Lo-Down Wrestling Podcast: The Streak Playlist

As you're aware, I've spent the last few weeks doing a podcast series about the Undertaker's Streak. Due to the fact that I have not published all of them on this website, I've decided to do a playlist with links to them.

Part 1

Sawyer Paul from International Object joined me as we discussed Undertaker vs Superfly Jimmy Snuka at Wrestlemania VII as well as his debut at the 1990 Survivor Series.

Part 2

Scott T Holland was the guest as we discussed Undertaker vs Jake “The Snake” Roberts at Wrestlemania VIII.

Part 3

Scott T Holland became the first return guest as we talked about Undertaker's match with Giant Gonzales at Wrestlemania IX.

Part 4

Trey Irby, who contributes to The Wrestling Blog, was with me as we discussed Undertaker vs King Kong Bundy at Wrestlemania XI.

Part 5

Don Owens from the podcast Am I On The Air? joined me as we discussed Undertaker's match with Diesel at Wrestlemania XII

Part 6

Rich Thomas, who co-hosts the International Object podcast with Sawyer Paul, was the guest and we talked about Undertaker challenging Sycho Sid for the WWF Championship at Wrestlemania 13.

Part 7

Joe Drilling from the podcast What a Maneveur and I discussed Undertaker's match against Kane at Wrestlemania 14.

Part 8

Trey Ibry returned to the podcast and we discussed the Hell in a Cell match involving Undertaker and The Big Boss Man at Wrestlemania XV.

Part 9

Tom Holzerman from the Wrestling Blog was the guest as we talked about Undertaker's first match against Triple H at Wrestlemania X-7.

Part 10

Sawyer Paul returned to the podcast and we discussed Undertaker vs Ric Flair at Wrestlemania XVIII.

Part 11

Nick Gator joined me and we talked Undertaker taking on Big Show and A-Train, with a little (illegal) help from Nathan Jones, at Wrestlemania XIX.

Part 12

Corey Santiago was the guest and we discussed Undertaker against Kane at Wrestlemania XX, in which we saw the return of the dead man gimmick.

Part 13

Kevin Mahon, co-host of the Attitude Era Podcast, joined me as Undertaker faced Randy Orton at Wrestlemania 21.

Part 14

Bill Bicknell was the guest as we talked the casket match between Undertaker and Mark Henry at Wrestlemania 22.

Part 15

Bill Bicknell returned to the podcast and we discussed Undertaker challenging Batista for the World Heavyweight Championship at Wrestlemania 23

Part 16

Sawyer Paul was back on the podcast and we talked about the World Heavyweight Championship match between Undertaker and Edge at Wrestlemania XXIV

Part 17
Corey Santiago returned to the podcast as we talked about Undertaker facing Shawn Michaels at Wrestlemania 25.

Part 18
Joe Drilling returned and we talked about the Wrestlemania XXVI match between Undertaker and Shawn Michaels

Part 19
Kevin Mahon was back on the podcast as we discussed Undertaker vs Triple H at Wrestlemania XXVII

Part 20
Don Owens, who was there live, and I talked about the "End of an Era" Hell in a Cell match between Undertaker and Triple H at Wrestlemania XXVIII with Shawn Michaels, for some reason that is never explained, the special guest referee.

Part 21
Tom Holzerman was the guest for Undertaker's final Wrestlemania victory as he took on CM Punk at Wrestlemania XXIX.

As you're now aware, the Streak has ended with Brock Lesnar defeating Undertaker this year. I will be doing a podcast about it but you have to wait til just before Wrestlemania 31. Until then, I hope you enjoy listening to these podcasts and there will be more published over the year.

Royal Rumble 2012 Predictions

It’s time for the first WWE Pay-Per-View of the year as the Road to Wrestlemania begins with the Royal Rumble. After getting only one match wrong at TLC, I’m quite confident about how I will do on my predictions. Let’s look at the card.

The World Heavyweight Championship is on the line as Daniel Bryan defends his title against Big Show and Mark Henry in a steel cage. Bryan has been doing everything that he can to keep his title and it may look like that Bryan is screwed as he is confined into fighting the two biggest athletes in the WWE in a steel cage. However, one thing I like about Bryan is that he’s a very clever heel and I think that he will some way to win and retain the title.

Predicted Winner: Daniel Bryan

John Cena takes on Kane in what could be a very interesting match. We all know what Cena will be doing at Wrestlemania so the feud will not last that long. Plus, if Cena wants his match against The Rock to be for the WWE Championship, he needs one opportunity to do that, probably at Elimination Chamber.  I can see this continuing past the Rumble and I can probably see Cena winning this one. The question is, will Cena embrace the hate in the process?

Predicted Winner: John Cena

The WWE Championship is on the line as CM Punk defends his title against Dolph Ziggler with John Laurinaitis (did you know that he’s the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations and the interim RAW GM?) as the special guest referee. I’ve enjoyed the feud between Laurinaitis and Punk over the last few weeks and Laurinaitis admitting to Mick Foley that he intends to screw Punk over has made it interesting. However, Laurinaitis is going through a job review by Triple H the next day so that will be difficult. I can see Laurinaitis “inadvertently” screwing Punk over. However, I can see Punk finding some way to prevail.

Predicted Winner: CM Punk

Now it comes to the Royal Rumble match. I think that it could be a very interesting Rumble. We all know that The Miz comes in at number 1 and I think he could last a while. Cena has to enter in order to try and get the WWE Championship for his match with The Rock. I was discussing this with my brother during the week and one thing I would like to see is The Rock to come in and eliminate Cena. I don’t think that it will actually happen but I will seriously mark the fuck out if it did. In terms of the winner, I think that it will be “the end of the world as we know it” and Chris Jericho will win and go on to challenge CM Punk.

Predicted Winner: Chris Jericho

You normally get a small card for the Royal Rumble and I think that there will be another match announced, probably a Divas match. Also, we get to see the Wrestlemania XXVIII logo in the rafters for the first time and I wonder how many times a wrestler will point to it. In terms of the event, this is a good time for the WWE to set a high standard for the year, especially as we get on the road to Wrestlemania.

Daniel Bryan: Hypocrite or Opportunist?

Bryan with the MITB Briefcase

Daniel Bryan surprised a lot of people by winning the Smackdown Money in the Bank match. The following Smackdown, Bryan announced to Michael Cole, who has always been critical of him, that he would be cashing it in at Wrestlemania, making him the first person since Rob Van Dam to actually cash it in for a match.

However, since then Bryan seemed to go on a losing streak. He lost to Wade Barrett at Summerslam and wasn’t featured on PPV, only wrestling in the dark matches beforehand. It seemed that his decision to cash in his contract at Wrestlemania was coming back to haunt him.

Show persuading Bryan to cash it in his MITB contract on an unconscious Mark  Henry

Opportunities in which to cash in the contract came when The Big Show started feuding with Mark Henry over the World Heavyweight Championship. Show tried to get Bryan to cash it in after he had laid Henry out on Smackdown at the beginning of November, only for Henry to take out Bryan with a World’s Strongest Slam before he had a chance. After Bryan cashed it in two weeks later and won, it was overturned by General Manager Teddy Long, and it looked like it was increasingly unlikely that Bryan would keep his promise to cash it in at Wrestlemania.

At TLC last Sunday, The Big Show finally defeated Mark Henry in a chairs match to become the World Heavyweight Champion. Henry, understandably, did not take that too well and DDT’ed Show onto a chair. Bryan, after reading Edge’s manual: “How to be the Ultimate Opportunist”, could not resist and cashed in his contract to become the new World Heavyweight Champion to raucous cheers from the Baltimore crowd.

In your face Cole!!

Michael Cole has said since that Bryan is a hypocrite and, although he’s saying that because he doesn’t like Bryan, he does have a point. Bryan had promised that he would cash in his contract at Wrestlemania and not do what most MITB winners have done and take advantage of the champion being attacked by someone else. Bryan was, in effect, going to give the champion a chance to fairly defend his title.

However, to be fair to Bryan, if he did cash in his contract at Wrestlemania, he would be facing either The Big Show or Mark Henry. Both of those guys are over 400 lbs and are twice Bryan’s weight. Bryan is one of the most technically gifted wrestlers that I have ever seen but it would be no contest in terms of strength and he will be easily overpowered by either one of them. Bryan probably realised that he might struggle to defeat them and knew that, in order to become World Heavyweight Champion, he would have to seize the next available opportunity. If the Big Show is unhappy about what happened to him, he only has himself to blame. He was the one who effectively planted the seed in Bryan’s head about cashing in his contract early.

It will be interesting to see where they go from here. They could turn Bryan heel, which judging by the very positive crowd reaction would be insane; or turn Show heel, which might not be advisable since we already have one monster heel on Smackdown. One idea that I saw would be really good and you don’t need either of them to turn heel. The Big Show could say that he respects Bryan cashing it in but he wants a rematch to see if Bryan deserves to be the Champion. Bryan  beats Show cleanly at the Rumble and Show raises his hand as a show of respect.

In terms of Bryan being a hypocrite or an opportunist, I would say that he is both. Yes, he is a hypocrite because he didn’t cash in his contract when he said he would. However, the feud between The Big Show and Mark Henry gave him way too many opportunities to resist. Judging by the crowd reaction at TLC and the following RAW, the fans seem to be happy enough that Bryan is the Champion. For those people who are unhappy for Bryan’s hypocritical behaviour, I’m sorry but if you had the MITB contract and you could either cash it in to give the 400+lb Champion a chance in a proper wrestling match or cash it in when that guy has no chance to defend himself, what would you choose?

WWE TLC 2011 Preview

It’s the last PPV of the year and will WWE end the year on a high? Only 6 matches that have been announced, so let’s look at the card.

Randy Orton will take on Wade Barrett in a tables match and there’s a possibility that this might open the show. I know people might complain that a former World Champion shouldn’t open the PPV, but he did that with CM Punk at Extreme Rules and they both ended up winning Championships. This is quite a tough one as I can see both guys winning. However, I don’t see Orton losing two PPV matches in a row, so I think that he will win.

Predicted winner: Randy Orton

Zack Ryder, thanks to a petition and some help from John Cena, gets another chance for the United States Championship against Dolph Ziggler. If you’ve seen Ryder’s show Z! True Long Island Story, you would have seen this feud develop over the last few months. I’ve enjoyed Ziggler’s reign as US Champion; however, I think it’s time for Ryder to stop introducing himself as the Internet Champion and say “the United States Champion” instead.

Predicted winner: Zack Ryder

The Intercontinental Championship is on the line as Booker T takes on Cody Rhodes. While Booker’s commentary has been...interesting, I do prefer him as a wrestler and he might be the best person to help Rhodes push onto the main event scene. I can see this feud going past the Royal Rumble. Therefore, I think that Rhodes will retain.

Predicted winner: Cody Rhodes

In a “sledgehammer on a pole (kinda) match”, Kevin Nash will take on his former friend (and COO) Triple H. Even though, he’s one of my favourite wrestlers, I can see Triple H losing. After a bit of thought, Triple H has been out for a while thanks to Nash and I think he will get revenge at the PPV.

Predicted Winner: Triple H

Big Show vs Mark Henry III is the match for the World Heavyweight Championship. I’m not really looking forward to this one but with it being a chairs match, we are at least guaranteed a winner. I think that Henry will retain and then go on to induct a new person into the Hall of Pain.

Predicted Winner: Mark Henry

The WWE Championship is on the line in a triple threat TLC match with CM Punk defending against Alberto Del Rio and The Miz. It’s good to see The Miz back in the WWE title picture and Del Rio is always a joy to watch. However, I believe that CM Punk will remain the champion for the foreseeable future. Therefore, I’m going for Punk to win.

Predicted Winner: CM Punk

So there you have it. It’s a bit weird not having a PPV with John Cena in it so I expect that he will be involved at some point. Otherwise, it looks to be a decent show. I hope you enjoy it and a review of the show will be up during the week.

Hell in a Cell Preview

Instead of having about 3-4 weeks between Pay-Per-Views, we are only having 2 weeks between Night of Champions and Hell in a Cell. It might not have seemed it from my review but I thought Night of Champions was a decent event, I just wasn’t happy with some of the results, especially Cena winning the WWE title. Hopefully, Hell in a Cell will have more agreeable results.

Sin Cara versus Falso Cara will undoubtedly be a brilliant high flying encounter. I would like to thank Falso Cara for debuting a new costume because I’ll be damned if I can tell them apart. I don’t know about this one as I can see both winning but I’m going for Sin Cara to win this and the feud can continue from there.

Christian will take some time off from demanding “one more match” for the World Heavyweight Championship to take on Sheamus. This is quite a tough one to call as I can see both winning. I’m going to take a punt and go with Christian to win this one.

Beth Phoenix is going for third time lucky challenging Kelly Kelly for the Divas Championship. I believe that Kelly’s time as champion will end on Sunday and Beth has to win it, otherwise the Legion Divas of Doom would have been a giant waste of time. I’m going for Beth Phoenix to become Divas Champion for the first time.

Mark Henry defends his World Heavyweight Championship against Randy Orton in a hell in a cell. Mark Henry has been continually destroying people since he became champion, meaning that I believe that he will have a decent run. I can’t see the WWE giving the title back to Orton, although I wouldn’t be surprised if he regains it. Henry needs to take the momentum of being a monster heel into being a monster champion; therefore, I’m going for Mark Henry to win here.

The WWE Championship is on the line in a triple threat match with John Cena defending the title against Alberto Del Rio and CM Punk. It was weird Triple H just throwing Punk into this match but I assume it’s an attempt to prolong the feud between the two by giving Punk a title match. The way that Cena’s matches have been on PPV this year, I can’t see him losing. Therefore, John Cena will retain.

Once again, not many matches have been announced for this one. Expect a couple of bonus matches but hopefully Hell in a Cell will be a good show and I get to do well in my predictions.

Night of Champions Preview

Night of Champions will be this Sunday and like the last two Pay-Per-Views, I’m quite looking forward to it. Six (maybe seven) matches are on the card and, after Summerslam; I hope I do a lot better in my predictions. Let’s look at the card:

Kofi Kingston and Evan Bourne, also known as Air Boom, defend their Tag Team Championship against The Miz and R-Truth. I like the team of the Miz and R-Truth and, while I would love them to win it, I don’t believe that they will. Therefore, I think that Air Boom will retain their titles.

Dolph Ziggler will defend his US Title against John Morrison, Jack Swagger and Alex Riley in a four corners match. Dolph has been an enjoyable champion and I think it’s time for a new champion. While the push has been stalled slightly, I think that Alex Riley will win his first championship.

Beth Phoenix has a second chance to win the Divas Championship against Kelly Kelly. I have nothing against Kelly Kelly because I keep on predicting that she will lose and she goes on to win. However, it’s time for the Legion Divas of Doom to rule the roost and I think that Beth Phoenix will win.

Randy Orton will defend the World Heavyweight Championship against Mark Henry. I’ve been impressed with Mark Henry over the last few months and, if it wasn’t for Christian continually getting rematches, he would have probably had his chance a bit sooner. However, I don’t think that he will win and while I’m not an Orton fan, I think that he will retain although I won’t be too gutted if he loses.

John Cena will be challenging Alberto Del Rio for the WWE Championship in what will most likely be the main event. This is a tough one to call and I see Cena being WWE Champion again (yawn) but I don’t think that will happen and I’m going for Alberto Del Rio to still be the champion.

And now the match has been the main focus on RAW for the last few weeks, CM Punk vs Triple H in a no-DQ match. This is also a tough one to call. There is no doubt in my mind that Kevin Nash will be involved. However, he could go out to help Triple H or hinder him making him an X factor in this match. I’m a big fan of both these guys but I did say in an earlier article that Triple H will win and I still think that. Expect the Game to win and continue this feud for a bit longer.

While it’s been not announced when I wrote this, I think that Cody Rhodes will defend his Intercontinental Championship against Ted DiBiase. It wouldn’t be Night of Champions if all the titles were not being defended. I like DiBiase, however, his attempt to be the 21^st century version of the Million Dollar Man failed miserably when they could have done something different with it instead of rehashing the same gimmick that they did with his father. I think that it’s too soon for DiBiase to be champion so I think that Cody Rhodes will retain.

The last two WWE Pay-Per-Views have been thoroughly enjoyable and I hope that this one will continue in that vein.