Tales from Section 131
by Jonathan Brown
Mr. Brown’s Class took a little field trip to Madison
Square garden for the Supershow this past Monday. Boy! What a Supershow it was.
The major difference between watching a live show versus a television broadcast
is the atmosphere. Unless you are living in a music center, it is unlikely that
you turn the radio up to feel the music as the wrestlers enter the ring. Feeling
the throbbing baselines, closing my ears as Lillian hit the high notes, and
having beer spilled on me made the night a fantastic one. For those of you in
the Class, welcome to the field trip.
Section 131 had good seats. Dead center with the entrance
way entitles the viewer to see everything that is happening both in the ring and
behind the scenes. Before he night began, the camera was loaded, the lizard was
drained and the wife was pacified as we got into the building. The best thing
about watching wrestling live is you get to see people in a way that you
otherwise would not see them. So many world heavyweight champions were walking
around the gleam of their belts was blinding. Masked men, expert posers, Bret
Hart chants and of course the toothless fans were running amuck in a way that
only a wrestling event could permit. To my right was a couple similar to my wife
and I but to their right were the three amigos. Guy number wore a Beckham
jersey, guy number two wore a Stone Cold long sleeve T and guy number three wore
a shirt that would be too tight to squeeze around my infant son. You see, these
three were special.
Not since Kindergarten have I seen a group of guys follow
each other so much! For those of you that have never seen me I’m 6’5″, 250lbs.
There is not much room in the seats for starters but these three took bathroom
breaks together, food breaks together and God knows what else. While the show
was worth every dime I am not sure if my over stepped on feet would agree.
Behind me were some hicks from Pennsylvania (no
disrespect to my PA readers.) Their banter will come into play later.
Now, the show gets off to a great start as Paul London
pinned Billy Kidman in a tag team dark match that started out of nowhere. As the
toothless guy behind me said, “One month ago everyone was booing Paul London and
chanting ‘Boring.'” Paul London is freakin’ amazing. But so is Billy Kidman.
Their feud could help to reignite a waning Cruiserweight division. Even all of
the wives and girlfriends that were forced to come were into this match. Great
start, even greater follow up.
To start a show with the advertised main event is a great
way to get TV viewers to tune in and get your crowd HOT! The match between
Booker T and Big Show got the crowd very into it as we had fun cheering both
good guys. Poor Booker took a thorough ass whuppin’ from Show only to be…(There
are spoilers in here from this point forward!) disqualified along
with the Big Show. The only part of a live show that sucks is that you can not
hear the announcers. To see JBL and Angle attack these two was kind of out of
the blue.
Carlito got HUGE chants from the crowd. His promos that
shot down NYC were classic. The crowd desperately wanted to cheer for him as he
is a legend in the making, but he does what the Rock was unable to do, break the
face cheers and draw real heat. When he gets back into the ring, he will help
legitimize a weak US title division. Toothless Joe and his buddies also talked
about the fact that Orlando Jordan is a constant loser. This brings to ask my
knowledgeable readers, has OJ won a match other than his match to defeat Cena
this year?
Eddie and Rey are great. Eddie cursed the crowd by saying
he “lives, eats, and sh*** the WWE championship. His unexpected comments were a
welcome break from the p.c. world of spoken word but his heel turn feels forced
and unnecessary. The predictability of his actions ruined it for me. not because
he is a bad actor but whoever leaks bits from the locker room is too accurate
too much of the time. My wife was into it as she rarely watches anymore but…
MNM, MNM, MNM! Hot DAMN! The divas rarely do it for me.
Generally speaking they are over made up and unnatractive. But Melina‘s entrance
to the ring was, WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! If you have not seen it, head over to
www.ringbabe.net Melina has got something
that will really propel MNM to the top. Already they are what T-N-A were plus
more. The hair of Mercury and Nitro are reminiscent of the Hardys but their look
is great.
John Cena.
His following is so huge that his entrance music was
inaudible under the chants and screams. Women, kids, old folks and anyone else
were LIVE for this man. The number of spinner chains, t-shirts and wrists bands
that he sold last night were second only to Hulkamania t-shirts. The man is on
fire. In thewrestlingvoice.com
forums, the idea about him changing the title is a hot topic. But one guest ,
The Mask, states that if Cena really wants to get huge, being the title chaser
and not the holder is a great way to go. After hearing the fans last night, I
respectfully disagree. Cena was so over that he could have spit on everyone
there and gotten NO heat.
Matt M-M-M-M-Morgan is a joke, plain and simple.
Heidenreich is looking to make friends and boy did he
fail. The Brookyln Brawler’s heel turn really got to the fans. When Heidenreich
finished him I doubt the reaction was for John, but more a reaction for the
demolition of the “Boston Brawler.” He has a good finisher but the fans went to
the bathroom in droves when he came to the ring.
Onto Raw. The three amigos have gotten up like 10 times
now as have 10 other fans. My feet have swollen to the size of basketballs and
the alcohol has been flowing a little too freely for the fans around me. After 2
hours of Smackdown tapings, everyone was ready for the “real show.” I hate to
say it but Raw is definitely the preferred brand of the fans; that was made very
clear, very quickly. NO signs were up for SD! but when the pyros for Raw went
off, they came out of the woodwork.
Conversations around the arena included several of the
following topics:
* Raw moving to USA
* Lillian Garcia
* The general contempt for Diva Search 2 (Most fans agree
that the eye candy is a waste of time but they are enjoyed on SD)
* Baptista (That is how his name was consistently
pronounced by the fans.)
*Puppies! The king is well loved (Yuck!)
Hot moments at Raw included Christian, Hogan, and
Viscera.
Chrisitian is finally over. When he came to the ring with
his hot music (anyone know who performs it?) the crowd woke up from the
commercial break. his teaming with Tomko works. Christian is so good on the mic
he could easily be named the best on the mic right behind Kurt Angle. When he
was in the ring, I could envision him tangling with Cena, and of course
Chrisitan mentions everyone’s favorite rapper to Vince.
The segment with Trish and Viscera was classic. Viscera
has made a name for himself and the crowd was really into his make out session
with Trish. By the way, Trish is the best performer in the WWe bar none. Her
acting ability is so convincing that even the smart fans of NYC were buying into
her apology to Ms. Sluts a lot. The chants. I have no idea how they came off on
TV but they were absolutely deafening. SLUT, SLUT, SLUT is still ringing in my
ears. Trish’s handling of the situation was remarkable. My wife wondered why
they even allowed Lita to come out to be shredded like that. NYC is the place
that determines the course of storylines. We turned Rock heel and brought Hogan
back. Lita was baby food and she was absolutely devoured.
I am not a HHH hater. I evenly criticize anyone that
deserves it. With that said the main event was horrible. No one cared. We waited
to see Batista but I feel we were let down. The three amigos seemed into it but
I should have left early to beat the traffic. What was the point? J.R. was
bloodied and Batista proved that he could get out of the pedigree. OOOOOOOOOOOK
and???
Hogan’s return was expected and still lost no momentum. I
can tell you this. Hassan made me cringe no never before. His “lynching” of HBK
was powerful in so many ways. If you are familiar with the history of the United
States you know that lynching has only been used in the most hateful of events.
To get me out of my shocked state would have taken something great, something
like Hulkamania.
My stupid camera only took 3 good pictures all night.
Check out one of them below.
Words can not express how good it felt to be within
spitting distance of this legend.
Supershow was great. The WWE live experience can not be
matched.
The best part of being at the arena is that some drunk
guy always like to pop sh**, until he realizes that beer does not make himself
as big and strong as me 🙂
While we often gripe about what is wrong with wrestling,
the one thing that is definitely right with it is the live experience. Well,
maybe the T-Shirt Guy could shoot some in my direction next time, but a great
and super show nonetheless.
If you were there, I look forward to your feedback.
