Thursday, January 28, 2016

Twitter Request Line, Vol. 150

C'mon, man
Screen Grab via HipHopWired.com
It's Twitter Request Line time, everyone! I take to Twitter to get questions about issues in wrestling, past and present, and answer them on here because 140 characters can't restrain me, fool! If you don't know already, follow me @tholzerman, and wait for the call on Wednesday to ask your questions. Hash-tag your questions #TweetBag, and look for the bag to drop Thursday afternoon (most of the time). Without further ado, here are your questions and my answers!

Protected user @bee_tee_ess asks:
What will it take to officially retire the Crying Jordan meme?
Unfortunately, the crying Jordan meme, which arose from his induction into the Basketball Hall of Fame, is not going away anytime soon on its own volition, and I'm afraid it's not going away that easily or satisfactorily. Either it will die out in slow, agonizing time, which means the world at large is stuck with it forever, or some other equally annoying meme will pop up and blow it to oblivion. Either way, it's probably going to stick around like an annoying gnat because human nature is to latch onto popular things until the life's been sucked from them. What is passe or annoying to a small crowd usually remains popular with the larger populace because that's how things work. The worst part about the Crying Jordan meme is that it came from his Hall of Fame induction. The dude is perhaps the greatest basketball player ever, and if not ever, the best of this lifetime, and he's still genuinely moved at being honored like that. And the reaction is to make fun of him. Not a good look. But whatever, I'm just a stick in the mud, I guess.

I not only think the conspiracy is afoot that Dean Ambrose is going to WrestleMania to beat Trips, I think Ambrose absolutely should be the one to do it. Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity, and yes, giving a shakily over guy like Reigns a similar coronation to his Royal Rumble '15 win, replete with The Rock being there to congratulate him (which is the current bit of scuttlebutt coming from Dave Meltzer's sources) is not going to be any more successful. The people are aching to cheer Ambrose though for something more than just an Intercontinental Championship feud or something below the main event. Ambrose makes anything entertaining, which is why I'm only gonna be mad if he's put in some chucklefucker schmozz or even ignored throughout the build to Mania. But with him as the focus of the show, WWE might have the lubrication to make RAWs going into Mania not only bearable, but entertaining as well.

Pizza AND wrestling in the same question? Someone get me Lisa Marie Varon on the phone so I can get that sweet, sweet Squared Circle endorsement cash! Anyway, without further ado...
  • The Finn Bálor - Mild, Irish white cheddar tops this pie, but a proprietary mix of pizza sauce and sriracha underneath represents The Daemon that lurks inside.
  • The Bayley - A traditional pizza topped with pineapple and pork al pastor, which is pork marinated in chiles and other spices and cooked like a shwarma or gyro cone. The pineapple represent's Bayley's sweet, childlike side, while the pork is hearty and filling and gives your stomach a hug. Together with the pizza, they combine to provide a punch that needs to be taken seriously.
  • BADA BOOM! Realest Pizza in the Room - This pie is a classic, New York pizza using imported New York City tap water in the dough for extra authenticity, and, like Carmella, it's HOT AS HELL topped with pickled habenero peppers.
  • The Perfect Ten - Like Tye Dillinger, this pizza is perfection on pie, utilizing only the best ingredients: smoked mozzarella, aged prosciutto, fresh arugula heaped on after baking, finished with black truffle oil. If you give this pizza anything less than a ten, you get your money back.
  • The Blue Pants Special - Blue Pants is one of the most wildly popular competitors at Full Sail despite being used as enhancement talent, and so the Blue Pants Special uses some common ingredients - chicken fingers, American cheese, onion straws - to make a dynamite pizza that pleases everyone from ages four to 104.
  • The Jason Jordan - Want to stay in shape but also want pizza? The Jason Jordan starts out with a gluten-free crust, is layered with sauce made from organic tomatoes, and is topped with lean chicken breast, low-fat mozzarella cheese, and roasted spinach.
If you're gonna ask a question, don't give an answer like that in the process. Anyway, the first on my list has to be Super Worker John Cena™, if only because it'd be like the guy from WWE vs. the guy from TNA's halcyon days is a match that needs to happen, right? Second is Shinsuke Nakamura, just to give WWE audiences a taste of what New Japan-style wrestling can be like outside of the trappings of that particular company. Third on the list is Kevin Owens, especially if the feud leading up to the match is framed as a custody battle over the Young Bucks. Number four would be Sami Zayn, because right now, Zayn is the best active wrestler on the roster now that Daniel Bryan may never, ever be coming back. Finally, to round out the list, Goldust just to have that "WTF?!?" match that ends up stealing the show it's on.

Because as it turns out, being a shitty rockstar doesn't earn you enough money to buy the amount of hooch it takes Jericho to get drunk anymore, so he needs to come back to WWE to shit everything up.

In my opinion, the best way to utilize a service such as Chikaratopia isn't to go back and view everything from the beginning and go forward, but to use it as a way to inform a modern opinion on the company. In that case, you would be best suited to start either with Three-Fisted Tales, which is the 2009 finale, or the 2010 premiere, A Touch of Class. The BDK storyline informed a great deal of what would follow, which includes Chikarametrics, the Gekido, the time distortions, Chikara's closure and rebirth, and the current state of the company. One could also start at the 2011 season premiere, Chaos in the Sea of Lost Souls, and get an idea. Basically, you need to see the 2011 season from top to bottom, because it includes the best King of Trios tournament, the first Internet pay-per-view event in High Noon, JoshiMania, and the rise of Sara del Rey as badass supreme.

I am not a taco snob, and in fact, I may be called a taco gourmand because of my proclivity to eating them. However, I do feel some tacos are better than others. I prefer the Mexican street taco to anything else, which is basically a double corn tortilla heated up on the flattop griddle, filled with meat and topped with cilantro and raw onion with some kind of salsa in a souffle cup on the side. That ideal taco is filled al pastor, which, hey, is also on the Bayley pizza above. If you wanted to get on my good side, you'd bring me an order of three-to-five al pastor tacos.

WHY ISN'T ANYONE TRYING TO GET ON MY GOOD SIDE?

If I had to make a gut pick, it would be Fenix. I've seen some spoilers for future episodes, and it appears that he gets himself into a bit of adversity. But Fenix, being the literal spirit of reincarnation, thrives on that kind of adversity to fuel his narratives. I don't know how it'll happen, but he will end the season with the Championship.

Daniel Bryan, Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose, and so far Kevin Owens are showing that it's not vitally important because the fans that know the wrestler will know the wrestler no matter what name they have. The impact of a name in WWE is overblown by some folks. I mean, Dolph Ziggler didn't get derailed from the main event because of his name, which is fucking asinine, but because he kept getting hurt. That being said, New Japan Pro Wrestling's main event is about as close to World Championship Wrestling notoriety as one can get in this day and age, so someone like Styles or Shinsuke Nakamura will have a better shot of keeping his name than anyone else who has come in with sights on the RAW narrative in the past. But I doubt that Styles' probability for success or failure would have been significantly different had he been named something different.

Protected user @TheBottomLine asks:
If Samoa Joe had signed around the same time as AJ, would he have been a main roster guy instead of NXT?
I doubt it, and I have reason to believe the evidence is in the OTHER former TNA World Champion WWE signed in the last weekend. When he signed, Joe was on a similar level of cache to Austin Aries, who went straight to NXT tapings. Styles came into WWE hot hot hot, having been a multiple time IWGP World Heavyweight Champion who had just been in the second most high-profile match on the biggest show of NJPW's calendar. The levels of context between Joe and Styles were completely different upon arrival.

Wow, that question is cruel. In a perfect world, I would want to push all three and fire none of them. But fair is fair. I would push Bayley, fire Becky Lynch, and keep Sasha Banks. Bayley gets the push because she's probably the most marketable person on either the RAW or NXT rosters, period. I keep Banks around because she can be a steady source of heat for any opponent and doesn't need a push to be effective. Lynch only goes out of process of elimination. Seriously, I wouldn't want to ditch any of those three, but thus is life.
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