“A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.”
G. K. Chesterton (1874 – 1936)
Two six sides of steel matches. Imagine two Hell in a Cell matches in one night. Jeff Hardy vs. Raven for uhh…why are they fighting again? A.J. Styles vs. Abyss because…uhh. Yeah. NWA-TNA “Lockdown” where you would think the world champion would have no place to go and he would defend his world title in a steel cage match with NO outside interference. No? We get a 6 man match between 5 washed up wrestlers and a now heel for no reason Monty Brown. Does Dusty Rhodes know that his own world champion is washed up? Does he know what to do with talent like Petey Williams, Chris Sabin, Michael Shane, Kid Kash, Sonny Siaki and the few but talented TNA womens wrestlers? Has it always been this bad for Dusty Rhodes?
We all know Dusty Rhodes as the legend. From the Midnight Rider, to his battles with Ric Flair to even now recently wrestling at the WrestleReunion show defeating the team of Abdullah and Cm Punk. So it can be said that perhaps you take the good with the bad. From his early booking days with wCw and his questionable booking days in TNA. Well take the good with the bad…if there ever was a good.
The Dusty Finish
During his time booking for Jim Crockett promotions in the 80’s Dusty liked to shake things up. “The Dusty Finish” comes from a series of bookings that basically left the fans feeling cheated. The hope to rebuild a nice rematch only some fans didn’t want seconds. Example: babyface Ricky Steamboat goes over heel Ric Flair and wins the world title. The place is going nuts and everyone thinks that the title has changed hands…only it hasn’t. By some twist of fate whether it be a second referee sees that Steamboat could have cheated to counter Flairs’ cheating or he saw that Flair’s shouolder wasn’t all the way down for the 3 count, something would give and the decision would be reversed. The same scenario could happen where Steamboat defeat Flair and then the following weekend on TV fans would find out that for no real reason the title change “never happened”. This consistency in inconsistency left the fans feeling cheated way too many times and soon enough fans and wrestlers even were tired of “Dusty finishes”
Certainly he had some good ideas though right? When Ted Turner bought wCw and left Bischoff with ultimately running wCw to it’s peak Dusty Rhodes was in fact on the booking team. This was before Bischoff had his opportunites to raid talent from the WWE and especially ECW to start the Monday Night Wars. Dusty’s fantastic ideas included reforming the Four Horsemen with Arn Anderson, Ole Anderson, Ric Flair and Paul Roma! Paul Roma? You remember “Power and Glory” don’t you? Don’t feel left out if you don’t. This was a bad decision and was run to the ground quickly. When wCw was to break away from the NWA Barry Windham held the world title. Well Flair was booked to defeat Windham and they declared it the wCw International title. This was just confusing…Oh there’s more!
Mick Foley was powerbombed by Vader on concrete. This led to an actual amnesia angle. Now if done right, it could have worked. It wasn’t done right though. The storyline had holes and even Foley who was interviewed didn’t stick to the storyline. Poorly planned Rhodes moved on to forming Sting and the British Bulldog as “Dudes with Attitudes”…I know. These dudes feuded with the Harlem Heat and Sid Vicious. Being 3 on 2 Dusty would bring in “The Shocker!” …No that was his name, and he was Tugboat in a mask. Don’t know who Tugboat is? Look up his profile at obsessedwithwrestling.com. It was Tugboat with a mask. When he made his entrance after Sting announced him, he quickly tripped and fell flat on his face, his mask fell off, and the rest was ridiculous. To quote the Shockmaster who Dusty Rhodes built up and was banking on to be the next wCw world champion…
“They call me the Shockmaster. You’ve ruled the World long enough Sid Vicious. Get Ready… come on, you wanna piece of me??”
Shakespeare would be jealous. Rhodes did nothing with Sting, broke up the Hollywood Blondes (Steve Austin and Brian Pillman) who were VERY successful at the time, and used Ricky Steamboat for nothing but tag team wrestling. Rhodes booking decision with wCw and Eric Bischoff basically letting him do as he pleases costs wCw 23 million dollars in 1993. Has Dusty Rhodes ever booked WELL?
No. You can credit the opening match for the first Monday Nitro between Brian Pillman and Jushin Liger to him, but Kevin Sullivan, Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan had a big say in that as well. Rhodes eventually stepped off the booking team. Since then his “Action Zone Wrestling” promotion has been closed and his current Turnbuckle Wrestling promotion is not making any waves at all. Oh yeah, then there’s TNA. It’s obvious that Dusty Rhodes just needs to STOP BOOKING. He never was a great booker, and can usually get around just because he is Dusty Rhodes. The “Midnight Booker” is infact HORRIBLE. Until TNA gets rid of Dusty Rhodes, we might soon see the end to another competitor to the powerful World Wrestling Entertainment.
Comedic Relief
Is it possible that Dusty Rhodes has had these great ideas but no one has been able to understand them?
Jeff Jarrett: I reckon I’ll drop the title to Monty Brown tonight, young talent needs to run this company and I’ll put him over, sound good Dusty?
Dusty Rhodes: Aw hell Jeff, don’ let that concern you none Jet. Brown id gonna be great wid TNA. Boy I tell’ya dat, yo go head an do dat jeb fo Brown ya hear?
Jeff Jarrett: Oh, you want Brown to do the job? Ok Dusty, whatever you feel is best.
Jimmy Jarrett: Lockdown is coming up , what do you have planned?
Dusty Rhodes: Wez gonna put Je’et inna six cage sided matchum’ an dat it gon’ Je’et Styes’ Brown, Abis, gon’ set Raven an Harday, we gon don’ no Waltn’ an Outlaw. You got dat?
Jimmy Jarrett: Uhh…I think he said Jarrett, Brown and Outlaw vs. Nash, Waltman and DDP in a cage match.
Dusty Rhodes: (mouth is full of 3 slices of pizza at once)
…You get the point. Lets move on from that pointless dialogue onto THE RING OF 64!!!
EAST FINALS
4) Chris Jericho defeats 2) A.J. Styles – Jericho advances to his third straight Final Four in this tournament. I think it’s obvious who the next WWE world champion should really be. This was a close one and out of 253 votes Jericho edged Styles out by a slim 128-125 margin.
WEST FINALS
4) Kurt Angle defeats 7) Christopher Daniels – Another extremely close one. In fact it came down to ONE VOTE. I can even tell you who’s vote it was. None other than Mr. Dougie Nunny himself placed the final and winning vote in this match as Angle edged Daniels 127-126. I think even Daniels himself would be surprised at this fake run in a tournament.
SOUTH FINALS
5) Eddie Guerrero defeats 7) Jeff Hardy – This was a blowout. Enough said. Eddie advances to his second straight Final Four.
MIDWEST FINALS
11) Christian defeats 1) JBL – Can you just see Christian as world champion? Lots of fans want this as Christian blew away JBL in the voting.
FINAL FOUR!
This is it. Final Four. I’m not sure how the NCAA basketball tournament is doing the final four, I forget if they re-seed or not, but I will. Since Jericho had one more vote than Angle he will face the lowest seed left which is Christian and the other match is obvious, so, here we go…
4) Chris Jericho vs. 11) Christian
4) Kurt Angle vs. 5) Eddie Guerrero
You know the drill, votes to freetokill@hotmail.com I thank you again for voting, this wouldn’t be possible without the overwhelming votes from the fans. Next week is the ultimate Wrestlemania 21 preview which will actually be broken into two parts, because its so damn big. Until then, I’m out.
-Joseph Bachman
