Hive

I jest.

Maybe Vince will buy TNA and do an invasion storyline properly this time.

Exactly. Much more elequently put than my own ramblings. Thumbs up.

Well said, good sir.

No but if you have a habbit of punching random people on the street, you have no right bitching when someone decides to do it to you. Karma and all. Oh my effing God... are you seriously going there? When on earth did I EVER hint a love for Hogan? On the contrary, I stated that I do not particularly like the guy. But apparantly, that didn't go through. So I'll try again: I do NOT like Hulk Hogan. I think he's a selfish egomaniac who throughout his career has done a lot of stuff that was hurtful to other wrestlers' careers and to the business as a whole (like refusing to job to Bret Hart). I do NOT like Hogan. I respect his achievements, just like I respect HBK's achievements, but that doesn't mean I have to like either. But... and I repeat this, because either it doesn't go through to people or they instead just disagree and thinks it's perfectly okay to flip the paying fans the bird: I just don't see that it in any way makes it okay for Michaels to act up and try to ruin the match for paying fans who expected a serious bout. And it doesn't matter how much crap Hogan has pulled backstage throughout the years, even if he may have pulled more than HBK (which depends on how you look at it, I guess): it still is NEVER okay to let your ego triumph over the fans. If I want to watch a comedy match, I'll watch Chikara and not WWE. Was the match good? For a lot of people, yes. But I'll still claim that it could have been a lot better, had Michaels acted like a professional. But yes, I have a strong dislike for HBK as a person (and for Hogan as a person as well). But I respect HBK as a performer, and usually enjoy his matches. That is, when he doesn't decide to ruin them with clown antics.

Okay... after reading this, I must conclude one of the following: 1) You are blinded by your love for Michaels. or 2) You are blinded by your hatred for Hogan. or 3) You apparantly watched a whole different match than I did. I've seen that, yes. I had forgotten about it though. He made the Chokeslam look like crap, and it pissed me off when watching it. But I'm not sure whether he did it on purpose or whether he just messed up. If he did do it on purpose though, it is indeed unprofessional and bad taste both towards the fans but also towards The Undertaker. I'd like to point out though that I'm no Hogan fan but I just I don't see how Hogan acting up is a carte blanche for HBK doing so as well. It cannot be justified towards the paying fans. I did not watch WWE back then and have no idea how much he was featured leading up to the match. I only saw a few clips pre-match, like the one where Orton RKO'ed him on a car. But I fail to see how Hogan not being a lot on RAW for a storyline says anything about his professionalism. Blame Vince for not booking him for those shows. I will say though that I agree Orton should have gone over, it could have been a giant boost to him at that time (though it can be argued that he probably wasn't read for it, but that's another issue). But again: that's something he did backstage, not in the ring where all the fans can see it.

Who are you to be able to dismiss it all as "fantasy" talk? Do you know stuff the rest of us don't? The rest of us base our statements and opinions on what we read and/or see, like the video of The Undertaker saying that HBK didn't want to do the Austin job untill he "encouraged" him. Are you saying he's a liar? Are you saying you know better than him?

Thanks guys, I'll watch them in a bit.

I don't think anyone claimed that he was faking his injury. And whether or not HBK was unable to see the match outcome coming is not for me to know, but if Undertaker says that HBK didn't want to lose to Austin, then I have no hard time believing that. Oh... so if you're self-concious about being a jerk, it doesn't count? Gotcha. Anyway, I'll buy that as the reason for being a prick in build up promos selling the match (like the one where he dressed up as Hogan and mocked him on a near-shoot level). But it still doesn't explain his promo from the RAW after the match, where the storyline was over and Hogan had left, and where HBK was supposed to be babyface. I'm fairly sure that they could have had an entertaining match without HBK selling like it was clown school.

Undertaker confirmed it himself? Well there we have it. But... what exactly is "Off The Record"?

Right, so you believe that WWF told him to ruin the match by overselling Hogan's offenses, become a babyface right after the match, proceed to cut a shoot heel promo on the next RAW and then go babyface again the week after? Besides, noone said the above was "proof" of anything. But some people, including me, see it as an example - together with a bunch of other stuff - of HBK not being as saved and improved as a person as he wants people to believe. Again you seem to base everything on what we see on RAW. The story about WM14 is that he initially refused to job to Austin, with some versions of the story saying that The Undertaker had to subtely threaten HBK in order to have him comply.* Indeed, there were/are tons of egoistical people in wrestling. But most of them kept the backstage politics from ruining the fans' experiences. *The story I read says that the top dogs were in a creative meeting when HBK jobbing to Austin was being discussed. HBK refused, however. After a while, The Undertaker got tired of HBK's attitude and began taping his fists - advicing HBK to have agreed to do the job by the time he was finished taping his fists, or else he would make him do it. I don't know if it's a true story, but it's entertaining nonetheless.

RAW may not have broken the ratings dominance by Nitro in that case. At least not on the following RAW, as they did.

Yeah Michaels is indeed a real man who would never dream of going behind someone's back himself. He would never dream of backstabbing someone, burying someone, lying to someone... he's a true hero. All hail Michaels, who may or may not be Jesus in disguise.

It doesn't really matter what happened backstage, what matters is what happens in the ring. And in the ring, Michaels pretty much flipped all the fans the bird.

I can imagine.

Is that how it went? Not the story I heard, but doesn't really change my opinion on Michaels' behaviour one bit. I have never seen the interview you mention however, how did it go down?

The original plan was for Hogan to win a match against Michaels and then Michaels winning a rematch. But Hogan said his bad knee could only handle one match, which made little miss Michaels grumpy, feeling that Hogan just didn't want to lose to him. Oh right. So because he feels that Hogan is unprofessional BACKSTAGE, it's a totally acceptable response to be even more unprofessional IN THE RING, in front of millions of paying fans? Hogan has a rumor for being quite the jerk backstage, and I believe pretty much every word of it. But I cannot recall ever having seen him behave unprofessionally in front of the fans. Besides, as the story goes, Hogan did not actually say that he would not lose a match against Michaels - he just said that his knee could not handle more than one match, the first match, which was booked as a Hogan victory. Maybe Hogan did have issues losing to Michaels and just made up a story about his knee losing it's smile, or maybe it's actually true. Either way, how professional and mature is Michaels when he goes on a hissy fit because he cannot stand the thought of losing against the biggest wrestling icon EVER if he cannot get a victory out of it as well? Michaels has always been a primadonna imo, and he has done nothing to prove differently in my eyes. He couldn't even be a man and appologize properly to Bret Hart last year, but instead made it look as though he was the wronged part, having Hart be the one to reach out his hand in "friendship" to bury the hatchet with Michaels apparantly really having to think hard about it.

Right. So because you have childish issues with your opponent, it's okay to ruin the match for all the fans who paid good money to enter the arena or watch the match on PPV? I can in no way respect such an attitude, and it's because of stuff like that I have always had a hard time liking Michaels - in spite of his undeniable talent.

Dunno about that. Just 5 years ago, his behaviour in the SummerSlam match against Hogan didn't exactly scream out "I have matured".

Thanks for posting it, when I tried the link earlier it said the website had too much traffic. So I hadn't read it. Good stuff.

How can you be so sure about that?

Hearing Punk say "sports entertainment" instead of "wrestling" again has now ruined this storyline for me.

Yeah it's pretty awesome, as a whole week without Superman as champion was beginning to make my skin crawl. Good call by WWE.

That's a pretty cool clip. I really like Morrison, and would like to see him get a main event push. Here's another fine Morrison clip:

I like Orton better than Michaels. There, I said it.