OldStingberg

It's not so much that. There will always be contenders. It's more of how there's seemingly no weaknesses. How do you beat Jones? Elite muay thai couldn't come close, elite MMA boxing was never a threat, elite karate managed all of a couple good punches before getting dropped and choked out. In my opinion, he's like GSP. His wrestling is good enough to determine where he wants the fight to take place, and while there may be fighters out there better than him in either striking or jiu-jitsu, there's no one out there that's better in both. If Rashad's wrestling isn't good enough to keep him out of that conundrum, who else would, could, have more than a puncher's chance? Jones will just take down any striker and stand and trade with any grappler. Just like the only fighter blueprint to beat GSP is to essentially be a better GSP, that's where it looks like Jones is heading, if he's not already there. So yeah, I think Jones is like GSP, except Jones has more power and better chokes. That's pretty scary.

Jones's reach is all fine and dandy for his striking, but how about for his chokes? This is the third time he's put someone away with one of those freaky power guillotines of his: O'Brien, Bader, and Machida. I think Jones is probably the #1 P4P fighter in the world right now. If he cruises through Rashad, there will be no doubt in my mind. And the dude is only 24 years old. Incredible. His legacy in this sport will be as big as he wants it to be.

What do you mean by this?

That Pujols contract is crazy. $25+ million per year for 10 years to a guy who's going to be 32 in a couple months and who's numbers have already been declining the last two years. There's a serious argument that he's already overpaid at that price all things considered. How long until it's not even an argument anymore? A-Rod was a similar age when he got his recent huge deal but he didn't have any signs of his numbers dropping, and he got all of two good years out of the ten before the Yankees and their fans started going, "Um...this isn't good."

The comparison between House and Raw is a bit crazy. House, for the most part, has been one of the most well-written, well-acted dramas of the past decade, a drama that's stood head-and-shoulders above hundreds of other shows during that time. Raw has had the wrestling stage to itself for pretty much the past 15 years, so as long as they deliver a product that entertains just enough people, they don't really have to worry about delivering a product that is that much better than their competitors, because they have no real competitors. Of course the quality of House is going to be much higher. In primetime drama land, it's survival of the fittest, and only the fittest survive. That's not the case for wrestling right now, which is one reason why many believe wrestling is so creatively weak at the moment. But even despite the fact that by almost all objective reasoning, House is a better program than Raw, fans of House still bitch about what happens. Sure, they probably bitch less, but that's because shows like House tend to have great actors acting in thought-out and reasonably well-written stories that are planned and shot months in advance as part of a larger, more cohesive picture. I remember a time like that, too. Then me and my friends grew up. I don't mean to say that adults can't be entertained by the WWE today, just that the standards for entertainment are different for 15-year-olds with no responsibility beyond an hour's worth of homework and 30-year-olds with full-time jobs, families, etc. Then add in the fact that there's many, many more options for entertainment on TV now than there were 15 years ago, not even including what's available on the internet, with video games, etc., and it means that the WWE has to step their game up if they want to retain their fans. And they have, to some extent. They've done good work making the characters more interesting and relatable. But they need to improve on their storytelling, and the consistency and cohesiveness of it, if they want more kids to remain fans well into adulthood even when their standards for entertainment go up by necessity.

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="The Final Countdown" data-cite="The Final Countdown" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="25169" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>When he won the Rumble in 2008, he used his title shot at No Way Out instead of Wrestlemania. They could have him say he'll do the same if he wins the Rumble again, as he wants to win the title so it can be on the line in his match with Rock.</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> I think that'd be a really good idea, especially if the Rock got involved and cost Cena the match. That'd be a great PPV main event, really ratchet up the Rock/Cena heat, and allow a relatively long build for Punk's WM opponent without having them touch each other at the PPV before WM, really building the anticipation. Plus, if they really plan on playing up Cena's mixed reactions leading up to his match against the Rock, putting him in a match against Punk on the PPV before WM would really push that angle.</p>

Bryan was awesome last night. I really hope they play out a story where he gets increasingly frustrated about not being able to win the title before finally snapping and cashing in on whichever unsuspecting face takes the belt from Henry. I think Bryan as an intense, bad ass heel would be amazing. I'm much more interested in Bryan turning heel than Cena at this point.

<p>I must say, I've really been enjoying the WWE lately. It seems crazy that the company of the last few weeks is the same company of the last few months.</p><p> </p><p> Survivor Series was good. I thought it could have been great if they would have done more with Zack Ryder and more with the main event, but still, it was good, and it was easily the best PPV since MitB.</p><p> </p><p> And the shows since then have been very good. Guys like Ryder, Barrett, Ziggler, Rhodes, and Bryan are getting smart pushes, Punk is doing great cutting promos against actual heels, all of the angles are simple yet effective, and they've been showcasing quality wrestling in the ring. I can't really ask for more. I hope this pays off for the WWE in the short term in terms of ratings, merch sales, and whatnot, because I'd like to see them continue in this direction.</p>

Seems like you've got a much better chance of winning tonight if you're not a reigning champion.

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="ampulator" data-cite="ampulator" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="26660" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>That's a good explanation, actually, but you still haven't address Daffanka's points.</div></blockquote><p> I spent seven paragraphs addressing his points. All he did was restate them. I'm not going to spend another seven paragraphs restating what I said.</p><p> </p><p> </p><blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="ampulator" data-cite="ampulator" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="26660" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>But more on point, I think there's another reason-Dana White is beginning to feel the "heat". GSP is definitely a sell out in Canada, but how much longer can GSP keep doing these decisions? He was gunshy on a one-eyed Koscheck. He decisioned Shields, while he got KOed by Ellenberger. He's gunshy.</div></blockquote><p> GSP landed 4.4 significant strikes per minute in the Koscheck fight. Forrest Griffin is 10th overall in UFC history with 4.49 significant strikes per minute. 4.4 significant strikes per minute against a top five fighter? That can't seriously be considered gunshy. </p><p> </p><p> And you know who else failed to knock out Jake Shields? 30 of his other 32 opponents, including Robbie Lawler, Carlos Condit, Paul Daley, Martin Kampmann, and <em>Dan Henderson</em>. I'm not sure there's much shame in not knocking out Jake Shields, especially when you're only working with one eye for half the fight.</p>

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="BHK1978" data-cite="BHK1978" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="26724" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>Not sure why the Cardinals would bother with Francona after what has come out about the Red Sox clubhouse. </div></blockquote><p> </p><p> The two World Series would probably be a good reason.</p><p> </p><p> Keep in mind, all this stuff about the clubhouse didn't seem to be a big deal when the Red Sox were one of the best teams in the league every year. It didn't seem to be a big deal when the Red Sox were one of the best teams in the league for the first 80% of this season.</p><p> </p><p> Most people can't help but justify their existences. Give a soccer ref and a flag and a job to call offsides, and he'll call more offsides than he should in order to justify his existence. For sportswriters, that justification comes from creating narratives from circumstances that are often random. The Red Sox weren't the first team, nor will they be the last, to have a really bad stretch of games. But because of the timing, some sportswriters have created a narrative to explain it, despite the fact that the narrative makes little sense when you really think about it.</p>

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="ampulator" data-cite="ampulator" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="26660" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>Why do you think Dana White has decided to put Frankie Edgar above GSP?</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> Because GSP already sells fights, and Frankie Edgar doesn't. That is literally the only reason.</p>

That's so incredibly ridiculous. Since winning the title, GSP has had eight 10-8 rounds, and that doesn't include the BJ Penn fight since I didn't see the scoring for that fight on Wikipedia. And that's even with the absurdity that all the judges scored the Koscheck fight 50-45. That's a serious chance GSP has had the most 10-8 rounds in the UFC in the last three years. And hell, that's not even the easiest thing to dispute. His offensive output is meager? Do I seriously need to post the pics of Fitch, Alves, or Koscheck after those fights? Or remind you that he made one of the best fighters ever, BJ Penn, quit on his stool? I'm guessing GSP bored him into wanting out of that fight, even after BJ said he'd fight to the death against a quitter like GSP? I figured the answer to my question would be the more ambiguous, bullshity "he fights safe" thing with maybe a reference to the Hardy fight. In the fights where he's stood up with guys recently, he's physically destroyed them. He didn't finish most of them, granted, but he tore them all up with the exception of Shields, who GSP could barely see thanks to Shields throwing every punch with his hands open (and even that fight saw GSP throw roughly three dozen overhand rights looking for the KO). Those destructions just can't be disputed, and it's a pretty laughable amount of biased revisionism to try and say otherwise. The reason I asked the question because I wanted to make this point about the Hardy and Alves fights, GSP's most "boring, lay-and-pray" fights. Watch those fights again, seriously, and count how many times GSP gives up position going for a sub. When GSP injured his groin against Alves, it was immediately after giving up full mount and going for an arm bar. And not in a dumb "there's five seconds left, I'll go for a flying guillotine" sort of way. And when he didn't get the arm bar, he wound up underneath Alves and tore his groin getting free. Against Hardy, it was seriously almost insulting how often he gave up position going for subs. He didn't score 11 takedowns and 26 passes in that fight because he was sitting in Hardy's guard holding him down. He'd take Hardy down, pass to side control or mount, dive for arm bars or kimuras, fail to get them and lose position often ending up on the bottom, and then getting free and repeating the whole process. There's serious, legitimate criticisms to be leveled against GSP. He doesn't have high-end power on his strikes. He's also not great at finishing subs. Those two things, combined with his level of competition and the fact that guys get more leeway in title fights, are the reasons he doesn't finish guys as much anymore. But this idea that he's a blanket that squeaks out decisions is just absurd. And the thing that drives me nuts about it is it's almost always from those elitist internet fans that look down on the live crowds that boo when there's not enough action on the ground.

Not at all. I'm very interested in an answer.

<blockquote data-ipsquote="" class="ipsQuote" data-ipsquote-username="KingJoel" data-cite="KingJoel" data-ipsquote-contentapp="forums" data-ipsquote-contenttype="forums" data-ipsquote-contentid="26660" data-ipsquote-contentclass="forums_Topic"><div>It means he'll lay on him for five rounds and label that an ass-kicking. If this fight does go down on February 4th, it'll be on my birthday!</div></blockquote><p> </p><p> Has GSP ever laid on someone?</p>

I was initially hesitant to the idea of another wild card in each league, but I've been swayed. I like the idea of a play-in game between two wild cards. Not only because it'd add two dramatic playoff-atmosphere games, but also because it'd probably liven up the pennant races. As it is, it's not uncommon for a division leader to go on cruise control for the final month because even if they get overtaken, they're still in position to get the wild card. With a play-in game between two wild cards, though, winning the division would always be important and worth fighting for, because no one would want to play that play-in game and have a 50% chance of elimination.

That's par for the course. Even Superstars has, in many ways, been better than Raw lately. This week Superstars had Air Boom vs. JTG & Primo, Eve & Kelly Kelly vs. The Bella Twins, and Cody Rhodes vs. Ted DiBiase, with all the matches getting some decent time. Cody Rhodes even busted out a slick top-rope moonsault to a standing DiBiase.

Why would they not care about your opinion? People need to get over this whole IWC thing. It's not 1995. There's now gajillions of people online sharing their opinions with each other, and those opinions matter. A company would be absolutely foolish to totally disregard those under the mistaken impression that somehow the opinions of the people who don't go online are obviously and totally opposite.

Um, TNA isn't exactly swimming in a room full of gold coins at the moment, so implying that what they're doing is entertaining the masses is probably a bit off base.

I'll put this in white text so as to not spoil for those that don't want it spoiled (though it's probably too late for that considering some of the recent posts, yours included). Highlight between the asterisks: ************* People bitched when they didn't give the title to Roode because they senselessly wasted a couple months of surprisingly good build and undercut their first-ever Bound For Glory Series. And people are bitching now because instead of building up a proper Storm/Roode turn, they burned through the damn thing in three weeks, giving away two title changes on Impact and leaving their PPV-buying customers feeling like dolts. The Storm/Roode feud had a lot of very, very good potential. They could have played out Storm being given the title chance at the next PPV, and letting Roode stew because he was still sour about being screwed out of his chance. Then when they gave the title to Storm with a good month of build, they could then continue to have Roode simmer because he wants the title, feels he deserves the title, but can't do anything about it because his best friend has it. Then on a PPV in a couple months, Roode could finally snap and turn on Storm. They could then build to a huge Storm/Roode title match on a PPV with a few months of build. Instead, Storm won the title in one minute on Impact, Roode won a number one contender match a week later, and then Roode turned and won the title a week after that. What could have been an interesting, riveting number of months of story became three disappointing weeks. Any person with any sense of quality entertainment would bitch about that, member of the silly IWC or not. *************

Wow. I just read the spoilers for next week's Impact and yeah, they're doing the whole Storm/Roode thing terribly. There goes my brief interest in TNA. Oh well.

I don't think either will. It seemed like at one point they were going to do something, when they started the two guys feuding, but I don't think they ever had a clear idea what they were going to do. As a result, they ended that feud without any explanation and now the two are totally buddy-buddy.

Almost the entire WWE roster walked out of Raw because of their attacks. Surely it'd take more than some "troublemaking pests" for that to happen.

I thought Raw last night was solid enough. A couple nice wrestling matches, one of them was even totally new. Christian/Rhodes vs. Orton/Sheamus was to be expected, but seeing Barrett vs. Morrison was nice. I'm a big fan of seeing Santino. Johnny Ace had too much time on the mic, but at least they gave Punk the opportunity to say what we're all thinking. Punk really, really needed that. Michael Cole wasn't even that annoying, and I'm cautiously optimistic (more cautiously than optimistic) about what will happen between him and JR next week. I read a report yesterday that Vince has soured on factions in general, and that seems to be the case. It looks like they're setting up Nash vs. HHH, Punk vs. ADR, and The Rock 'n' Jorts Connection vs. Awesome Truth in lieu of a high-profile Survivor Series style match. That probably makes sense, too, because at this point in the WWE, if they load 10 of their top guys into one match, what the hell do they have left for the other two-and-a-half hours of a PPV? Ziggler wrestling three times? It does cause some problems, though. For one, I'm not sure how many people are looking forward to a HHH & Nash program. And two, I'm not really buying Awesome Truth as this monster team that needs Cena to team with The Rock to overcome them. To me, Awesome Truth is still just a silly comedy team that raps about conspiracies and Little Jimmies, they're not some menacing force. I'd be much happier if Zig Swag had gotten this big push, or, even better, if they would have partnered Ziggler with The Miz. Oh well.

I've actually been enjoying Smackdown and Superstars quite a bit recently. Both those shows have become TV that I'll watch while doing my cardio. And I'm liking them because they've largely been sticking to simple, proven wrestling formulas. What has annoyed me about the WWE has been their bigger-picture, Raw-and-PPV stuff. That's the stuff that I think is failing miserably, and the stuff that prevents me (and a lot of others) from becoming really excited about the product. Like I said, though, hopefully they turn the corner at Survivor Series.