2005 Year End Awards and more!

Well, it's a little late but I've finally got the yearend awards ready to post, had to finish counting the ballots. Anyways, as is a 'Cheap Heat' tradition the couple of times a year that David Burcham updates 'Rants & Raves' I give my response be it positive or negative. Well this time is no different and I will be posting a few things after the awards in response such as the number 12 quote from Eddie Guerrero when he got to heaven that Burcham failed to mention. As well as my own "Top 11 Reasons David Burcham should lay off of Samoa Joe." But first, the all important 'Cheap Heat YearEnd Awards.'
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The Serious Awards

2005 Wrestler of the Year- Shawn Michaels
(Michaels showed why he is the "showstopper" once again this year stealing the show at both of the year's big PPV event's, first at Wrestlemania in a true classic with Kurt Angle, and then carrying the poor old Hulkster through a Main Event match at SummerSlam. He also showed that the 'HBK' of old is still around with his pre and post SummerSlam promos on Hogan. Hopefully the old Shawn will be back on tv for good someday)

2005 Tag Team of the Year- America's Most Wanted
(With WWE only having one team that survived all year long (MNM), AMW have been establishing themselves as the top team in TNA since the early days of the promotion. There recent heel turn went well and they seem to have a secure place on the roster and have done well in their battles with 'Team 3-D'.)


2005 Match of the Year- A.J. Styles vs. Christopher Daniels vs. Samoa Joe- X Division Title Match- TNA Sacrifice PPV
(I'm generally not a fan of triangle matches and while this one sort of fell apart towards the end, it more than made up for it in the beginning and middle. This match defines everything positive that TNA has going for it, while Jarrett defines the other end of the spectrum.


2005 Feud of the Year- Johnny Jeter vs. Matt Cappotelli- Ohio Valley Wrestling
(Although I'm sure many people reading this haven't seen a lot of OVW, Paul Heyman took an unfortunatlely timed injury to Cappotelli and turned it into their biggest angle of the year. Making Jeter a heel champion with a TON of heat and people chomping at the bit to see Matt return to get revenge on his former friend and partner. The match finally happened and was incredibly booked with a wall of refs to keep them seperated(which was awesome, I hate when a "grudge match" is built for months only to have these "hated rivals" now suddenly circle each other in the ring and slowly lock up) If you get a chance you really should try to get some tapes of OVW, they have some great things going on there.

2005 PPV of the Year- WWE SummerSlam 2005
(With Wrestlemania really only having one real money match, Angle vs. HBK. Sorry JBL vs Cena and HHH vs. Batista just didn't do anything for me. The big event of the year was SummerSlam. Now even though it may not have delivered with all it could have, you still had to wonder going in, "Will Hardy and Edge be able to make this look like a real fight?" "Will Hogan actually do the job for HBK, Will it be Montreal revisited for the 500th time?" "Will Eddie Guerrero get custody of Rey Mysterio's son????" Ok maybe not the last one, but everyone had to wonder who was gonna do the job when two of the biggest egos in wrestling clashed, and I must say I was sorta shocked at the result.

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The Less Serious Awards (Yet Prestigious Nonetheless)

Douchebag of the Year- David Andrews

Barbara Walters' Interviewer of the Year- Axeman
(It's funny, it doesn't matter if Axeman interviewed the Rock, the 2nd question would be "What do you think of Neil Taylor and Leslie Jones?" the third question would be "Do you think the IWF 'made you'?"

Best Quarterly Wrestling Column- David Burcham

Virgil Runnels' Booker of the Year Award- J.D. McKay

Dave Meltzer Insider Column of the Year- J.D. McKay

Most Likely to get caught spanking it to a AJ Styles video- David Andrews

Larry the Cable Guy "Harder to understand than a hairlip ordering biggie frys"- Cannon's Fire

Quote of the Year- (KoKo B. Ware to David Burcham at the show in Okolona in December) "Why didn't you get up in the ring with us and dance, we could have got you laid tonight."

Virgil Runnels Midnight Rider "'Day'll never know babee" Masked Gimmick of the Year- Death Wish

Most likely to get punched in the nugget by Gene Jackson- David Andrews
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Ok, with that out of the way we move onto the latest 'Rants & Raves', you know the internet column written by an internet mark who ironically refers to other internet writers as internet marks!?!? Anywho, apparently someone at TNA has done something to piss him off as he seemingly has NOTHING good to say about them. I really don't understand why, God knows someone needs to offer an alternative to the horrible SHIT that WWE has been providing in recent years. While I admit Jeff Jarrett is nothing to write home about, you can't deny that guys like Christopher Daniels, AJ Styles, Petey Williams, Abyss, Sabu, Raven, and countless others have put on matches that put WWE to complete shame. As well as offering a place for people like Christian who WWE seemingly had not intention of ever pushing to have a place where he can show his talents outside the confines of the WWE's sitcom script writers. But besides disliking TNA in general apparently Samoa Joe kicked Burcham's dog or something. I don't understand what his beef with Samoa Joe is. I mean if he watched alot of these ROH matches that all these "internet marks" "rubs one off to" he would see the guy can actually work unlike half the guys on Raw and Smackdown. As for your "Tazz in the WWE" analogy well I guess time will tell on that one, but I don't see what your issue is with him, the only things you offered were the fact he wrestles in the X-Division and the fact you don't like his name. I'm sure he will have some wise ass retort to this about me being one of the ones who "rubs one of" I just think if your gonna trash somebody you should have a better line of reasoning. It would be like me coming on here saying, "I'm sick of everyone talking about how great Shawn Micahaels is because his ring music is gay, and I think the superkick is a lame finisher." So to that end I give you the..........

Top 11 Reasons why David Burcham should lay off Samoa Joe

11. Hey, at least he's not Heidenreich.

10. Sure, it's a dumb name but all the "cool" ones like "Olly by Golly" were already taken.

9. Hey at least he's not David Andrews

8. At least he's not another grass skirt wearin' "Wild Samoan"

7. Hey, at least he's not Chris Masters

6. He isn't a thong wearin' dancin' Samoan

5. Hey at least he's not Simon Dean (btw, great wrestler, shitty gimmick)

4. Sure he can't put on a wrestling clinic like "Trish Stratus vs. Mickie James" but hey, who can? (personally I found the 1.5 seconds of Lita's tit to be more entertaining)

3. TNA won't try to make a "movie" with him in the lead.
(TNA films presents Samoa Joe as a cop who has to go undercover and disguise himself as a drug dealer's mother in "Joe Mama".)

2. He doesn't eat worms and break clocks over his head.

And the #1 Reason David Burcham should lay off Samoa Joe

At least he's not KERWIN WHITE! (or Kevin White for that matter!)

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I want to thank David Burcham for always providing me material whenever he decides to get off his ass and write a column and before I leave, as promised the 12th thing Eddie Guerrero said when he got to heaven,

"Hey Kerry, you should hear what that asshole David Burcham said about you in his "Rants & Raves" column, Esse."

Year End Awards Coming on Tuesday

Well Axeman isn't the only writer bombarded with "fan mail". (wink, wink). Thousands upon thousands of Cheap Heat readers have sent in their votes and on Tuesday I will be posting the 'First annual Cheap Heat Year End Awards'. There will be all sorts of awards given out, so be sure to check back to see if you favorite wrestler will be bestowed the honor of an award from the the THOUSANDS of Cheap Heat readers who voted!

Catching Up....

Well I went through a laundry list of things I wanted to cover in detail but I don't know if I'll have as much time as I originally hoped but I'll try to cover everything. First off......


SGWA- You know I was gonna go on a whole big rant but you know what, fuck it. Lawler was there, they had a big house, good for them. Yeah, they shit on thier loyal guys, before (Neil and Rocker) and after (their regular workers who didn't get paid) but apparently someone clued them in that it takes workers to have a show so now they've decided to make things right. Well good for them, hope everything turns out peachy for them and maybe they can book another big name and draw another big house someday. I will commend them though on at least admitting they tried to get XOW shut down, as gutless of a pussy move as that was at least they owned up to it. Also VERY shocked to see this column is STILL linked on their site, cool with me. After this post I'm pretty much done ragging on them.


Payoffs- or as J.D. would say, "Pizzay" (it's funny before someone clued me in on the carny talk, I just thought J.D. was a closet fan of Snoop Dog or something). Anyways, this was a hot topic last week with many people chiming in, some who should and some who had no business in the matter one way or the other. Well here's my 2 cents for what it is worth. Yes, I think it is ok for guys just starting out(green guys) to not get paid for a while til they pay their dues and learn how to work (at least partially). Yes, I know there are experienced guys who are willing to work just for the "love of the business" but they shouldn't have to. Yes, I know in most cases promoters don't usually make a lot of money but these guys are still traveling to the shows, they are still getting in there and working and putting their bodies at risk and they deserve to be paid a reasonable amount. It's like that in any other BUSINESS, If McDonalds has a slow week they can't tell all their employees at the end of week, "sorry we didn't make anything this week, we'll try to get you next time". That's bullshit. Also the reason a lot of the towns don't draw anymore is because a lot of cheap ass promoters would rather use green guys who will work for free and set their ring up for them, rather than pay guys who can work. They think they are getting ahead but they just run off the good workers and kill the crowds. If you invest the money in your show to use guys who can work it will pay off in the long run. As for the amount, well that's between the promoter and the wrestler, if they can agree on an amount then that should be fine, and like J.D. said, if you don't get a guarantee and agree to work off the door then your stuck taking what they give you, get a guarantee next time or go somewhere else but don't go on the internet and bitch about it. These guys who piss and moan about "ABCD wrestling doesn't pay me" and sign it 'ABCD Worker'. You know why they don't pay you, cause you put up with it, if everyone left and their were only two or three of them left to work then I guess they'd have to start paying you, and if not go get booked on one of the 2o other wrestling shows in the area. The point is, you don't show up, drop your pants and bend over ,then cry cause you got fucked. Next topic....


Golden Triangle Wrestling- Neil and I decided to go to the GTW show in Montpeliar(sp?) and I have to say, I had a helluva a good time. As J.D. said he was booking the show(kinda) and it was fun to sit in the dressing room and cut up with him and watch him try to book the card and then have the promoter come change it every 5 minutes. It was also fun ragging him about the fact HE was the booker and he was in the opener for the GTW title, and in the main event for the GTW Tag Titles, LOL!! I know, I know it was the promoter's idea. Still funny though. And as he mentioned, it was the grand return of Southern Destruction, not quite what we had planned it to be in the weeks leading up to the 26th, but interesting none the less. We wrestled Mitch Toretta (sp?) and David Andrews. I have to say I was skeptical going in as we were being told that Andrews was over in the babyface dressing room saying he should be the main event and should be going over, and not at all kidding by the way. (there was 50 people there, who gives a shit?) Anyways, then I was told that this Mitch kid was trained by 'Cowboy' Jim, who ain't exactly Dory Funk Jr. by any stretch of the imagination. Well we get out there and David Andrews (in his AJ Styles getup) is still the shits just like the last time I saw him during his claim to fame IWF tenure as Jason Envy. He fucked up everything Neil tried to call for him so we pretty much wrote him off about 2 minutes into it. Mitch Toretta however, albeit green, was good to work with and listened so we kept him in for most of the match, that is untill the clusterfuck of a finish where Andrews fucked up a piledriver nine ways from Sunday. Anyway, we get the pin and go in the back and later find out he was running his mouth off in the other dressing room. I swear, that little bitch better hope I never come across him somewhere at a show, which shouldn't be a problem cause anyone would be retarded to book him, he sucks ass AND he has an ego. Next topic.....


Wrestling in Okolona on December 17th- Looking forward to this show, looks like a great card at the Armory. Besides working, I'm looking foward to seeing a lot of guys that night that I haven't seen in quite some time. Should be a great show. Hope there's a good turnout.


Well that's all for now, in my next update I'll try to talk about some of the other stuff going on in wrestling. As always, thanks for reading and tell a friend.

GENE

Tons of stuff to talk about

Well a lot has gone on in the past couple of weeks and I don't have time to go into a lot of it right now but I plan to go more in depth on things this coming Monday but here's a few of things I plan to talk about on Monday.

Golden Triangle Wrestling- Even though David "Jason Envy" Andrews is the utter drizzlin' shits, I still had a lot of fun at this show. There's a lot more to say about this and I will........


SGWA- Lawler showed up, they had a big crowd,nobody got paid and then they had a revelation that they "wouldn't have a show without the workers", well no shit, good to know your appreciated huh guys? also they tried to have XOW shut down, plenty to talk about there.


Payoffs- The news that the guys didn't get paid at the big SGWA show sparked a days long debate on payoffs. This is a topic I find interesting and I have some things to say on this as well.


Wrestling in Okolona- Looking forward to this, should be a great show and a lot of fun. And knowing who is running the show, one things for sure everyone WILL get paid because he has the good sense to know going in, that a show is only as good as the workers that are on it and this one should be a good one!


All this plus more, come back and check it out on Monday!!


GENE

How to kill your town in one easy step..........

Ok, time to weigh in with my 2 cents on the SGWA/Neil Taylor/Leslie Jones/Chris Rocker controversy. Now let me preface this by saying, this is not meant as an attack on SGWA as a whole. I have a lot of people I consider to be friends that work there. This also is not directed at everyone's favorite internet target Gary Wooldridge, as he was not responsible for it. This is directed at the dumbass who took over the booking and decided what was best for him and his buddies was more important than the show and the fans, and that is what kills 90% of all wrestling promotions. After 2 monthes of building an angle building to a certain match involving certain people you can't just decide to "go another direction". The fans have invested time and money into coming to the shows leading up to this match, they have watched Neil Taylor every week calling himself "the King" all the while being promised by announcers week after week that the real "King" Jerry Lawler will be coming on November 26th to kick his ass. Whether you like Neil Taylor or not, or regardless of whether you think he "talked shit behind your back" that is what you promised the fans and that is what they expect to see. Since your obviously a mark that doesn't understand how business works, let me break it down to you where you might understand.

Say Vince McMahon was promoting an upcoming Pay Per View and the main event was The Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels. And for 6 or 8 weeks you watched Shawn Michaels trash the Undertaker and every week they told you that the Undertaker was gonna be at the pay per view to get revenge on HBK. What do you think would happen if Vince got mad at Shawn a few days before the match and decided to "go another direction" with the main event and fired Shawn and put Undertaker in a 6 man match tagging with Heidenreich and Animal against the Mexicools? You would be pissed right, and every WWE fan who had spent the last several weeks watching the buildup to that match would feel cheated and they would shit on it!

Now I'm not just saying this because of who it is. Had you built an angle with Lawler and Ricky Flame and then suddenly pulled out Ricky at the last minute and threw Neil in with no angle I would still say it is bullshit.

But let's get down to the facts, it's all about jealousy. Your one of the pricks that REALLY DID get thrown out of the UPN dressing room that day in Memphis. You see this as your big chance to try to get yourself over and shit on some guys your jealous of(Neil/Rocker) I'm sure you hate the fact these guys get booked all over and you don't. You need to think of what's best for the show, and the other guys and not just yourself. Think back to when you were the mark in the crowd, and not the mark in the ring. If you had went week after week and saw a match built up and then you showed up and it didn't happen, would you go back? Would you feel lied to, cheated?

Now there is also one more aspect of this to consider. Jerry Lawler doesn't need the money you guys are struggling so hard to round up. What the person on the board said is true. Lawler trusts Rocker. Rockers works with him in Memphis. Lawler was very pleased with the way the angle in Selmer played out(a whole other aspect of this by the way) Lawler let Neil and Leslie get heat on him and LAWLER promised the fans he would get revenge in Booneville. What do you think he'll say when his friend Chris Rocker calls him up and tells him they've shitcanned his angle and gotten rid of him, so the booker could work with him instead. I don't think he'll come down there. Hell I wouldn't and I don't get a check from Vince McMahon every week. He will look like an asshole and it will look like he lied to his fans. So, how do you think it will look on SGWA if not only do fans not get the match they were promised, but also don't get to see Jerry Lawler as has been promised for weeks and weeks??

So to sum things up, you've made a very STUPID mistake. One that I think that will be looked back on as one of things that killed off Booneville. Hey, it's only Wednesday, it's not too late to do the right thing. Your call, bookerman.

GENE

A Royal Cheap Heat on the 26th!!

Well it's been confirmed, on November 26th I will be making my debut for SGWA in Booneville, MS and unlike the other writers on HollywoodJimmy.com who do interviews in the back then transcribe them into a column, I will be in Booneville in the middle of the ring live to interview, THE KING!! This should be the greatest Cheap Heat ever! I'm not gonna take it easy on him either, I'm gonna be asking the hard questions and getting his take on all the crap that's been going on around there and I'm sure he's gonna have plenty to say about it. I can't believe what all Neil Taylor and Leslie Jones have been up to in the past couple of monthes. Neil has certainly changed in the past few monthes since the last time I worked with him in XOW and I plan to tell him what I think of his new attitude while I'm in Booneville, not to mention Leslie E(lvis) Jones as well. But the important thing is before the challenge match takes place that was laid out in Selmer, TN. The fans will get to hear the King's take on things before he puts an end to those two once and for all. Should be one hell of a match.

Also, I will be making my wrestling return to the area on December 17th at the National Guard Armory in Fulton, MS! Don't have a lot of details on it yet but I'm looking forward to wrestling in Fulton again. Should be a lot of fun.

Well thanks for reading, be sure to come to Booneville on the 26th to see one of the biggest night of wrestling in North Mississippi in quite some time.

GENE

R.I.P. Eddie Guerrero

I was driving home from work today and decided to call my buddy Mike on my cell phone to tell him about something that's coming up. After I told him, he asked if I had been online today, I told him no that I'd been at work since 7 a.m. He told me that Eddie Guerrero had been found dead in a hotel room in Minneapolis. I couldn't believe it. It seems everytime you turn around another wrestler is dying, and the majority are from heart attacks and heart failure. It's very sad. Eddie was a tremendous wrestler who was one of the few who was equally gifted as both an entertainer as a character on the mic and as a wrestler in the ring. He will be remembered as one of the best. My heart goes out to the family he has left behind.
Much like Chris Candido, it's very sad to see what all he was able to overcome and after celebrating his fourth year of sobriety something like this happens. At least, he was able to overcome his demons and die a happy man who had came back from the lowest lows to reach the top of his chosen profession. I think everyone will always remember the scene at the end of Wrestlemania XX with Eddie and Chris Benoit in the ring celebrating their victories as World Champions after all the years they had put in to get there. God Bless"Latino Heat" and may he rest in peace.