| QUOTE (whitemilesdavis @ Feb 10 2005, 07:38 AM) |
| More money for less work. Easy decision. |
| QUOTE (Captain Ass @ Feb 16 2005, 07:56 PM) | ||
AND his body won't take a major pounding either. Get our while you're young....that's the thing to do. |
| QUOTE |
| I don't know if this is actually old news or not, but apparently the Rock's contract with WWE has expired, and no one bothered to renew it. While it might seem a bit strange that they didn't at least try to work out some sort of deal with him, what is even more bizarre is that no one from Stamford even bothered to contact him about it. Courtesy of ign.com: The Rock: "Well, contractually, my contract was up, it came and went last year, at the end of the year last year, and it was an interesting way it all came out. I wasn't contacted or notified or anything like that. It wasn't until my own team had basically congratulated me [saying], 'Oh my God, what a wonderful career you've had. Congratulations!' It's like, 'Really. It's done?' I wish it would have gone down a little bit different. For that part, I'm sad about it…" So let me see if I get this right. The Rock, who, along with Steve Austin, led the company into its glory years, years that made WWE a ton of money, years that made Vince McMahon an honest to goodness BILLIONAIRE, has his contract run out. And no one contacts him about a possible renewal or some sort of deal that would keep him off the free market. In fact, it's almost as if they simply didn't want to deal with him anymore. Hmmm. Not only that, but no one seems to know what, exactly, happened here. This isn't WCW, where guys had contracts that expired and no one knew about it (and in that case, they would simply roll over and give guys extra years of cash for doing nothing - see Sheik, Iron). Even Dave Meltzer, who knows everything about everything in this business, has no clue as to why Rock was never even contacted about some sort of renewal so they could continue to use him in some manner. Something doesn't add up. One could argue that it is more or less pointless to have Rock under a deal if he never appears, or if he can only appear once or twice a year. There is some logic to that, and it is understandable that the company wouldn't want to spend money when it is not getting something in return. That's all well and good, but considering the very positive relationship Rock and WWE have had over the years, no one even called the guy to talk to him about it? No, something doesn't add up. There is, of course, a school of thought that another WWE superstar who is out making movies no longer wishes to be compared and contrasted to Duane Johnson. This person has a great deal of power within the company, and could conceivably see to it that Rock is persona non grata in the land formerly known as Titan. That person, of course, is Triple H. Now let me state for the record that I have no idea if this rumor is true or not. It certainly seems to me to be rather far-fetched. While I can see where someone would come up with this, it seems rather petty, seeing as the long-term health of the company is crucial to his pocketbook, to be so short-sighted as to lose a property as hot as Rock. For sure I can see where someone could come to that conclusion. In fact, in recent weeks, it seems that Mr. Levesque has been on the verge of cracking right before our very eyes. You'll note that Trips is now a ten time world champion. You might also recall that Ric Flair, considered by many to be the greatest wrestler of all time, has held a world title 16 (or whatever it is) occasions. If you think for even a nano second that Hunter has any plans on retiring before he hits 17 and "surpasses" Flair, then you're absolutely nuts. (Of course, the comedy there is that Hunter's number of reigns can't even be compared to Flair's, because the business is so radically different now than it was in Flair's heyday. In the 80's and 90's, titles really meant something. Today, they mean almost nothing. Quick, name the tag champs on Smackdown. I can't. And I run a WRESTLING WEBSITE for God's sake! To me, comparing Hunter's world title wins to Flair is like comparing Jerry Lawler's USWA title reigns to Flair - it's completely invalid, because the legitimacy of Flair's titles as compared to Hunter's or Lawler's is night and day.) As if his desire to prove that he is the "greatest of all time" wasn't loony enough in that regard, consider this recent interview he did with Anthony Greff. As he is wont to do, he went totally berserk on the internet wrestling community, which he said was just a bunch of 12-year olds (meaning I should have retired 24 years ago): "The internet is a bunch of guys that want to be in our business but aren't. They never have been, never will be, don't know anybody who is, and even if they did, it's somebody that is either bitter or doesn't really have an inside track anyway." Hmmm...he seems awfully vocal against a group of people who have so little nice to say about him. He also claimed that the reason guys like RVD or Booker T weren't big stars is because they couldn't connect with the fans, and that no one could just "make stars." So sayeth the man: "Nobody in this business, Vince McMahon included, makes stars in this business except the stars themselves...Stone Cold was hugely popular before the office ever got a hold of him. It's the same thing with me and the same thing with a lot of guys. That's the way it works and anybody that says this guy holds me down or the office doesn't push me or anything, need to look in the mirror and say it's all on me." You know, I seem to recall that before Hunter "hit it big" he was a background player in DX, playing second fiddle to Shawn Michaels. I don't remember him "getting over" with anyone; I remember him being just another face in the crowd. Then he suddenly was getting new music, new entrances, a bunch of t-shirts with catchphrases. Oh yes, and wins over every single big name on the roster. Clean wins, mind you. Then he went on a tear with a seemingly endless streak of clean pins over Mick Foley, who was one of the hottest guys in the company. As you might recall, this culminated when HHH "retired" Mick Foley. Now maybe he doesn't feel this way, but I'd call that Vince McMahon "making a star." Perhaps the most telling incident was on a recent episode of The Big Idea on CNBC, host Donnie Deutsch brought up Hunter being married to Stephanie, which agitated him quite a bit. Hunter claimed, as he always does when this is brought up, that he was already a big star before they even started dating. He felt it was unfair that people always brought that up. And I think that, more than anything, is something that will drive Hunter bonkers until the end of time: no matter what he does, no matter how many great matches he has (and there have been plenty), no matter how main events he's in (tons), no matter how many world titles he holds (whatever), at the end of the day, most knowledgeable fans will always view him as second rate, and the only reason he remains a star is because he married the boss' daughter. I have to believe that drives him insane more than comparisons to The Rock ever could. |