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Total Nonstop Action is Coming to New Jersey

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Did you know that I own two wrestling websites which are operated by two magnificent webmasters with little interference by me? Creating wrestling websites is how I got my start in the online world and I’m glad that both of my current webmasters and master of the game. The other day I was browsing on one of my websites and noticed a post about Total Nonstop Action coming to New Jersey. Being a fan of the product, I had to click on it to see what was going on.

Total Nonstop Action is the alternative brand of professional wrestling to the worldwide leader, World Wrestling Entertainment. The production value isn’t as good (they tape from the same location every other week and produce two weeks’ worth of shows from one setting) and the weekly television show is sometimes burdensome to watch, but the action in the ring is amazing. They have a guy named AJ Styles who does the most ridiculous stuff that I’ve ever seen. See for yourself:

Pretty amazing stuff, huh?

TNA will be in New Jersey at Convention Hall in Asbury Park on Friday, August 8th and at the Sovereign Bank Arena in Trenton for their annual “Hard Justice” pay per view on Sunday, August 10th. Lucky me – I bought tickets for each show. 🙂

I Can’t Believe Spain Won! Euphoria!

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Apparently Spain won the Euro Cup 1-0 over Germany. Or Eurocup. Maybe it is the EuroCup. Whatever. That’s terrific. And I’m glad that the soccer people enjoyed it. I take issue, however, with the way in which the entire tournament was presented by ESPN to the American public. Prior to this year, I didn’t even know the EuroCup existed. Frankly, I’d like to keep it that way.

ESPN and ABC Sports broadcast the games and subsequently used SportsCenter to present the soccer tournament as if it was the most important thing to American sporting enthusiasts. The games didn’t even envolve America in any capacity. Yes, I know, soccer is a great game and you just have to try it and it is so fascinating and all of that shit. Great. I’m glad a small portion of people enjoyed the games, I’m sure you really went wild when that one goal was scored over 3.5 hours- but that doesn’t mean that I should have to sit and watch six minutes of highlights proceeded by 4 minutes of analysis by some British guy because ESPN wants good ratings for games that, to the vast majority of the American public, are meaningless.

The fact of the matter is, I, nor could most people name a single player that participated in the entire tournament. Is there still a Ronaldo out there? Was he in it? A word to ESPN, just because you decided to climb into bed with FIFA doesn’t mean you have to shove it down the viewing public’s throats like it was the fucking Super Bowl. Enough already.

The Giants Win SuperBowl XLII!

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Whoooo!!! Can you believe it? A team that started off the season 0 – 2 and a quarterback that many had written off as not ready for the big leagues managed to win the biggest game on the biggest stage we’ve seen in the NFL in years! Combine that with the fact that Tom Coughlin was on the chopping block before this season began and one of the best Giants players in history (I forget his name – Tiki something) openly criticized the team and Eli Manning’s leadership during the early weeks of this season and you have a story that is much better than Tom Brady winning a 4th SuperBowl or the Patriots going 19 – 0.

It’s been a long time since I jumped out of my seat while watching sports. The last time that I can remember was when my little brother played his last football game for Roxbury High School a few years ago. And the last time that I jumped out of my seat watching professional sports? Phew. Who knows? I can’t even remember, but watching this game tonight – I absolutely loved it! Put aside the fact that my team was playing in the SuperBowl; this low-scoring game had compelling stories on both sides of the field, was held in a Class A stadium, and showed that an underdog can still take down the league Goliath. It was everything that you want in a football game and so much more.

As for the “other” aspects of the game here are some comments.

I loved that Peyton Manning was just an all-American guy in the box while watching the game. The Manning family has a genuine character about them that you don’t find too often in many parts of this nation any more.

Is there any doubt about Tom Coughlin’s leadership ability now? What I love about Coughlin is that he seems to be a mean, grumpy guy who doesn’t want to hear any bitching. I love it.

Tom Brady handled himself brilliantly in the post-game press conference. He looked the part of a champion and showed that – even though most American males hate him (his life is too perfect) – he’s a classy guy. Bill “The Cheater” Belichek, on the other hand, looked and acted like a sore loser. He’s done this before after big losses, too. Very classless and not becoming of a team the stature of The Patriots.

Sean Salisbury was on ESPN after the game was over and said that no one needs to go out there and say that the Patriots beat themselves. He went on that the Giants beat The Patriots up and down the field and they were the better team – and that’s the truth. Again, that’s not because I’m a Giants fan – it’s because I watched the game and saw the Patriots not play their best game while the Giants played excellently.

Speaking of post-game commentators, someone really needs to get those former NFL guys classes in grammar. These guys sit on the daises on various channels and speak a refined form of Ebonics that is both horrifying and alarming at the same time! Quotes like, “The Patriots defense try to not let Giants score is a tough thing to accomplish this game,” scare the shit out of me! What’s even scarier is that you normally get three or four of these guys on one channel within the same time period! Damn it!

Anyway – go Giants!

Random Thoughts from the Last Week

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Since I haven’t had time to put together a coherent post in the last few days, here are some random thoughts from the last 5 – 7 days. As you’ll see, this is about as disjointed as you can get for a blog entry, but hey – if millions of other blogs can do it daily, then why can’t I do it once in a blue moon?

  • You ever watch a football game and the wrong team wins? For those of you who have played football at any level – have you ever been in a game where you are obviously the better team, but you don’t win the game? I watched the Colts take on the Patriots last night and even though the Patriots had a 24 – 20 victory over the Colts, Manning and his teammates are obviously the better football team. At least in my view, that is. And I take nothing away from the Patriots (who are amazing), but after watching yesterday’s game it just seemed clear that the Colts are a better team. I could be wrong, though…
  • On the subject of sports, I’m still baffled that the baseball season is over. You know when the football season is over because there is this massive Super Bowl where over 100 million people watch. It just seems like baseball ended this year and no one took notice. How many people even know that the Red Sox won the Series? How many people even care?
  • You may recall that I went out over the summer and bought myself a Nintendo Wii. I have a lot of fun playing it, though I certainly don’t play it as much as I used to play video games when I was a little kid. But still, a quick game or two of bowling before I go to bed at night is fun. Anyway, part of the excitement of owning a cutting edge video game system is getting the new game as soon as it’s released. I really don’t have the time for that any more, but I figured what the hell and bought Guitar Hero III the other night. Wow. Talk about a fun game! You get to use this guitar controller to play all of these rock songs. It’s a lot of fun! Though I do take issue with the “Legends of Rock” subtitle…some of the folks in that game are brand new to the music industry and are by no means legends yet. Hell, some aren’t even footnotes yet!
  • Last weekend I went up to Roxbury and while I was there I tried to play his XBox 360. Lucky for me, the machine was just having all types of problems. Think about it in terms of how your computer gets all goofy on you when Windows doesn’t work correctly. We eventually got the problem handled and I played a little Halo 3 (which lasted all of 20 minutes because the guy on the screen was hard to control). I just found it funny that Microsoft has managed to not only bring a high-tech gaming system to the masses, but they brought along the bugs and bs with it!
  • I don’t know if you heard, but the Hollywood writers went on strike. I’m heartbroken…
  • There were a lot of reports this weekend of King Tut being on display to the public for the first time ever. I really don’t like this move. Besides the fact that Tut’s body is petrified at 3000+ years old, putting him on display is just inappropriate (in my view). How many of us would want our petrified, blackened bodies put out on display in the year 5007? I don’t think this is the right thing to do at all.
  • Have you guys seen the female wrestler named Awesome Kong? She’s in TNA right now and she’s a beast! And she is easily one of the best aspects of the show right now.
  • Finally, I watched the Giants and Dolphins go at it in London last weekend. I understand the NFL’s desire to spread their market and to reward those NFL fans who ARE in other countries, but I wasn’t the biggest fan of the atmosphere. Besides the rain and crappy field, the fans weren’t the typical, rowdy American football fan. All you had to do was watch the extra point and instead of fans standing up and cheering so the kicker sees them going nuts behind the goal post, you had a group of a very nice, very proper Brits sitting there awaiting the result of the kick. Very proper, indeed!

I just wanted to share those random observations and thoughts with you. Have a good one!

The Joe Torre Debacle

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Professional sports is an interesting field to watch. As most of you know by now, I think the majority of professional sports are fixed. You see it in the NFL with completely ridiculous calls, you see it in the NBA with struggling “markets” all of a sudden having tremendous teams to drive fans into the buildings (a la the NJ Nets), and you see it in baseball with the creation of drama between various teams.

Sometimes, though, the stuff that goes on “behind the scenes” is absolutely crazy. Take the Joe Torre debacle with the New York Yankees. Here is a man who would be revered in any other city in the country if he performed as well as he performed for the Yankees as manager. Yet, in New York, the Steinbrenner Machine won’t work for Torre. That’s ridiculous. They insult him with their contract offer and then they have the audacity to make comments about him over the weekend?

What are they crazy?

That punk bitch Hank Steinbrenner said the following in a recent article in the New York Post:

“Where was Joe’s career in ’95 when my dad hired him? My dad was crucified for hiring him.”

What a dumb bastard this guy is. Who in the world doesn’t know that Torre’s career was in the crapper before he came on as the Yankees’ manager? That’s like saying, “Where was the United States before the Revolution?” Any blockhead knows that we were in a bad spot.

Does his previous career make Torre’s performance over the last 12 years any less remarkable? Absolutely not. But this is the Steinbrenner way – classless and defamatory. It’s a real bummer that one of my favorite sports franchises is owned by such low-rent people. Punk Steinbrenner goes on:

“You can’t take credit for success when you’re going good, and then not take at least some of the blame when things change.”

Tell me one time when Joe Torre said that he was not to blame for the team’s inability to get out of the first round of the playoffs. Torre has stressed time and time again that it’s a team effort and that it’s not the fault of any one person in particular, but a group failing that costs the Yankees the big games. Hank is trying to say that by offering Torre incentives to win, he is making sure that Torre knows that some of the blame rests on him when they lose.

That’s the most arrogant, ignorant thing I’ve ever heard. The right thing to do here is for the Steinbrenners to eat their hats, apologize, and try their damnedest to get Torre back. Oh (and for good measure), get rid of Mattingly – he’s a curse!