On Monday, September 29, 2008 at 4:41 AM EST
The Wrestling Professor sent this in:
Welcome to the Armpit wrestling quiz for the week of September 29, 2008.
Last week was pretty depressing, with the further realization of the left-wing American media and the death of honest journalism. If you want unbiased, non-partisan reporting of American politics, it just doesn’t exist. And out here in the liberal Bay Area, it’s even worse. Nightly local newscasts are full of reporters making arrogant smirks and snide remarks, and one has to wonder whatever happened to the art of journalism? The good news is that more people are becoming aware of the bias and recognizing it, but what concerns me is that the folks who don’t know any better are being fed this bias and believing it.
It made me think of journalism in pro wrestling. Journalism has played a more important part in pro wrestling than it has in perhaps any other sport. After all, wrestling fans in the ‘70s relied on wrestling magazines to read what was going on in other territories. Fans in the ‘80s relied on what later became known as the “Apter mags.” In the early ‘90s, more fans discovered underground newsletters and 900 lines, which became far more popular than they were in the ‘80s. And then when the internet exploded, it changed everything. Today, the changes haven’t been as drastic. People still get the latest news from the internet, and while newsletters like the Observer and Figure 4 Weekly remain popular, their real value lies in their analysis of the news, not in their reporting on it.
In honor, or shame, of the biased reporting of news organizations like MSNBC and the New York Times, we now present this week’s quiz, “Journalism in Wrestling.”
Answers from last time:
-The first Nitro was at the Mall of America in Minnesota. They are actually planning to expand that gigantic mall, which is insane.
-X-Pac cut a promo on Hulk Hogan when he returned to the WWF in 1998. That was odd, since Hogan was a headliner with WCW at the time and still drawing big ratings, gates, and buyrates.
-Y2J’s debut promo on Raw was saved by the Rock. Now if only someone could save Jericho’s hairstyle and wardrobe. Whereas most superstars start out looking jobbers and morph into looking like stars, Jericho has done the opposite.
-Cena wrestled Kurt Angle in his WWE debut.
-Missy Hyatt filmed a Piper’s Pit-like interview segment for the WWF in 1987. It never saw the light of day. If it did, Missy would’ve undoubtedly become a much bigger star.
-When Jake Roberts debuted in WCW in 1992, he DDT’d Sting.
-Rick Rude debuted in WCW in 1991 under a mask at Halloween Havoc.
-Fake Diesel and Razor Ramon were Glen “Kane” Jacobs and Rick Bogner, respectively.
-The Undertaker debuted with the WWF at Survivor Series ’90. A year later, he pinned Hogan for the title.
-Giant Gonzales debuted with the WWF at Royal Rumble ’93.
Here are this week's questions. Remember, the new rules are that you no longer need to submit your questions, and no winners will be declared. We're just doing this for fun and to honor the forgotten world of wrestling history.
1. People who worked for the “Apter mags” hated that term. The Stanley Weston family of wrestling magazines, headed by Bill Apter, kayfabed their readers, but they almost had to in order to get any degree of cooperation from the major promotions. In their defense, those magazines have improved dramatically in recent years. In the ‘80s, Apter appeared regularly on the NWA Saturday TBS show doing what?
2. Every kid remembers the old Pro Wrestling Illustrated magazines, and we all had our favorite sections. There were the ridiculous “Press Conference” transcripts, the phony Top 10 rankings, and irresistible feature articles like, “WWF vs. NWA: Which is Better?” It was fun and goofy, but kids in those days had no other alternative, and we enjoyed them. Who was the heel columnist in PWI in the ‘80s?
3. Here’s an easy one. What is the “PWI 500?”
4. The Wrestling Observer Newsletter set the standard for journalism in pro wrestling, and really, for most other sports as well. Fans today may not comprehend just how taboo the Observer was among wrestlers; they hated it in public because it broke kayfabe, but they also read it in private. One promoter, however, embraced it. What promoter in the mid ‘80s liberally and publicly passed the Observer around the locker room, strongly encouraging his wrestlers to read it from cover to cover?
5. For years it was mentioned in the same breath as the Observer: the Pro Wrestling Torch. The Torch started in 1987, and by 1991, had grown into a respectable publication that was a solid addition to wrestling fans’ weekly reading rituals. The early Torch Talk interviews with people like Jim Cornette, Paul Heyman (pre-ECW), Bill Watts (pre-WCW), Steve Austin (pre-WWF), and Bruno Sammartino are truly fascinating reads in hindsight. But Cornette did a 180 on the Torch, quickly becoming its #1 enemy and nemesis in famous shoot interview diatribes. What story did The Torch cover in 1993 that led to the rift with Cornette?
6. The Torch deteriorated following Cornette’s feuds with Wade Keller and Bruce Mitchell. It slowly morphed into sensationalistic journalism, yet The Torch still remained successful because it aims at and draws a different audience. Columnists came and went, such as Chris Zavisa, Carlie Gill, and Eric Kroll. One columnist, however, did move on to bigger and better things. What former Torch writer became a WCW hotline reporter and color commentator?
7. Dave Meltzer got the 900 hotline bug in the early 90s. The Observer hotline was born, and in the days before the internet, it was a way to hear big news just as it was breaking. Bruce Mitchell, the fair reporter he is, wrote a critical column on Meltzer’s new venture almost before it even started. The controversy was because the person who headed up the new 900 line venture was a former WCW executive. Who was it?
8. In the late 90s, internet newsgroups were all the rage. As the internet exploded and the newsgroups became watered down with lower quality posters, the fad was over and those people moved on to monitored message boards. Back in the day, what was “RSPW?”
9. Despite the high costs of printing and postage, the major promotions put out their own magazine publications in order to increase product awareness at newsstands. Which of these promotions did NOT produce its own magazine?
a) WWF/WWE
b) WCW
c) ECW
d) TNA
Answers will be posted next time.
The Armpit
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