Going through old issues of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter and posting highlights in my own words. For anyone interested, I highly recommend signing up for the actual site at f4wonline and checking out the full archives.
PREVIOUSLY: The Complete Wrestling Observer Rewind 1991-2001

1-7-2002	1-14-2002	1-21-2002	★

• NJPW was thrown into chaos this week when Keiji Muto, Satoshi Kojima, and IWGP Jr. Heavyweight champion Kendo Kashin all abruptly quit the company, along with 5 of NJPW's front office employees, and are headed to AJPW. Needless to say, this immediately killed the working relationship between the two companies and NJPW is already attempting to forge a new partnership with NOAH. There's also said to be a significant power struggle within NJPW right now behind the scenes that will likely be straightened out whenever Inoki returns to Japan (he's in Los Angeles right now). Tatsumi Fujinami is NJPW president but in the wake of losing these big stars, and the disappointing TV ratings for the Jan. 4th show, it's rumored his days may be numbered. There's rumors that Inoki may take over the role for the first time since he was forced out of the position back in 1983 (long story, bunch of financial scandals, Google is your friend here). Muto is currently half of the IWGP tag team champions and they were scheduled to defend the titles next month and he volunteered to still work the show, but NJPW wasn't having that so that won't be happening now and the titles will instead be vacated, along with the Jr. title Kashin held. And of course, the IWGP title is also currently vacant due to Fujita's injury, so all of NJPW's top titles are vacant right now (the only other active title is the Jr. tag belts, held by Gedo and Jado).
  
• Lots of rumors floating around about how this happened, but the gist appears to be that Hiroshi Hase was the architect (no Seth) behind this whole thing. Reportedly, Muto (and maybe some of the other people who left) may be purchasing a stake of AJPW from Motoko Baba so he'll have some ownership say. The long-term idea is that Mrs. Baba will step down in a few years and Muto, who by then should be ready to retire (lol) will take over the role as AJPW president. Of course, that was the original plan for Misawa after Giant Baba died, but he and Motoko Baba couldn't get along and Misawa eventually left and formed NOAH instead. It's also worth noting that Kashin in particular wasn't thrilled about doing shoot fights while working in NJPW, but felt pressured to by Inoki and he reportedly wanted out of the company even if the AJPW thing hadn't been an option. As for Kojima, he and Tenzan have been the best tag team pro wrestling has seen in years and from an in-ring perspective, may have been the best pure worker in NJPW so his loss is going to hurt a lot too. The office workers who left are mostly accounting and merchandising people who will be doing the same jobs for AJPW.
  
• One bummer of a note here is that, before this, Muto had talked of putting together a dream match against Misawa. But as long as Motoko Baba is breathing air, an AJPW star isn't going to work with Misawa, so that's probably a dead issue (yeah, sadly we never did get that match).
  
• One final note: Muto also tried to recruit NJPW rising star Hiroshi Tanahashi, who most believe has the most potential of anyone in the entire company, to jump ship with him but Tanahashi decided to stay (oh man, can you imagine how different things would be if he had gone).
  
• On Raw this week, Vince McMahon teased the impending arrival of Hall, Nash, and Hogan, saying he's going to do something soon that even he will regret. Vince has reportedly caved on most of Nash's demands, including the reduced schedule. Hall will be making less money than Nash and will be given an even lighter schedule, because he's a single parent with custody of his children (and Dave questions how fucked up Dana Hall must be if SCOTT is the one who has custody). And of course, you gotta figure Hogan ain't working a full schedule, since he hasn't done that in a decade and probably ain't gonna start now. Of course, this puts WWF in the same position WCW was in a few years ago: having all the top stars working TV and not appearing on house shows, which is something WWF used to openly mock WCW for. Now they'll be doing the same thing, with the same guys. It's something that killed WCW's house show business long before the TV ratings started going down. There's also the issue of how they'll get along backstage, since many of the agents (Dave says Gerald Brisco in particular) were very vocally against bringing these guys back. And then there's John Laurinaitis, who has a lot of power backstage now and he and Nash used to butt heads constantly in WCW. So things are gonna be interesting.
  
• In a bit of a surprise, Vince has also agreed to let them use the NWO name and gimmick, and that reveal was made later in the week on Smackdown when Vince talked about killing the WWF with the help of the NWO. As of now, there's no plans for Triple H to join the group. X-Pac will probably find his way into it, given his relationship and history with the group. Nash is reportedly pushing for Shawn Michaels to be involved, but Dave has heard that's unlikely because there's still some fences that need to be mended there between Shawn and some in the company. But then again, Nash has gotten his way on everything else he's asked Vince for so far, so who knows? Anyway, Hall and Nash have officially signed, but Hogan still hasn't finalized his deal as of press time, but the office has been told it's inevitable and to start making plans as if he's signed. It's expected all 3 men will probably debut at the No Way Out PPV next month.
  

WATCH: Vince McMahon announces the arrival of the NWO

• The Royal Rumble is in the books and was a huge success. Critically, it was an excellent show, nothing MOTY-worthy or anything, but nothing bad at all and was a legit sellout. Coming out of the show, it appears Chris Jericho will be defending the WWF title against Triple H at Wrestlemania, though that can still change. Triple H winning the Rumble was expected but made the most sense. The Rumble match lasted just over 69 minutes (nice), surpassing the 1993 Rumble and, as far as Dave is aware, making it the longest mach in WWF history (a famous Pedro Morales vs. Bruno Sammartino match in 1972 was reported in all the newspapers as lasting 75 minutes, but it was actually only 65 so don't come at Dave with no "well actually..." bullshit)
  
• The return of Mr. Perfect and him being put over like a major star (he lasted until the final 4) proves that WWF has no intention of letting any other competitor get off the ground and will nip that in the bud before it ever happens. Hennig has been available for more that a year (WCW released him before they folded) and WWF never seemed interested, but as soon as XWF came along and made him their featured star (with plans to make him the face of the company), suddenly WWF swooped him up. Hennig's appearance was meant to be a one-off but it was known they were likely going to offer him a deal if he was impressive, and they have. It may not be a huge get for WWF, but it's a massive loss for XWF and pretty much renders their entire first set of TV tapings meaningless now, and Dave says that was precisely the point. Vince left the door open for competition once before and it nearly killed him. He won't make that mistake again (not until 2019 anyway). Dave says to let this be a lesson to any new promotion trying to start up: make sure you have people signed.
  
• Other notes from Royal Rumble: Goldust, who was also a one-off for the match, is expected to sign a full-time deal as well. FlaiVince street fight was way better than it had any right to be considering it was between two guys over 50, one of whom isn't even a trained wrestler and the other hasn't wrestled in nearly a year since the final Nitro. Jericho retained the title over Rock in an excellent match and Dave notes that no one in the history of wrestling with the kind of main event star power Rock possesses has ever done as many jobs as him. Maven dropkicking Undertaker out of the Rumble match was the biggest pop of the entire show. But then Undertaker spent the next several minutes beating poor Maven nearly to death, lest anyone think Undertaker was actually trying to get this kid over or anything. Overall, Dave thinks it was the best Rumble match in several years.
  

WATCH: Maven eliminates Undertaker from the 2002 Royal Rumble

• The tradition of Memphis wrestling on WMC-TV has been revived! Sorta. The show, dating back to the 70s, has been off the air since last spring when the TV station refused to allow them to tape shows in their studio anymore. For the next few months, they aired a bunch of "Best of" shows but those eventually stopped in December and they've been airing infomercials in that time slot ever since. But this week, a show featuring Jerry Lawler and Brian Christopher in the main event, taped at a nearby casino in Tunica, MS aired on the channel in the usual Saturday morning time slot. Dave says the production quality was garbage and there was no local publicity for it, so it probably did a terrible rating, but it's something (pretty much just one last dying gasp, this doesn't lead to anything).
  
• Carlos Colon said he's going to cut back on being an active wrestler because he wants to spend more time with his kids. Dave points out that most of his kids are wrestlers in his company, so maybe he's actually trying to get away from them.
  
• NJPW star Minoru Tanaka announced his engagement to former women's wrestler Yumi Fukawa, who retired last year (did some research and they're still married to this day. Tanaka still wrestles in NOAH and Fukawa is an actress in Japan).
  
• Atsushi Onita, who has been issuing grandstand challenges to Antonio Inoki for months with no response, has now challenged Naoya Ogawa for a match and wants it to be a benefit show in Afghanistan for the kids there. Dave says don't hold your breath for that one either. Onita says if he beats Ogawa, he wants the match with Inoki. Again, none of this is happening, just Onita trying to work his own angle. Neither Inoki nor Ogawa want anything to do with him.
  
• Goldberg participated in a charity golf tournament this week and while there, he made some comments about going to the WWF. "I personally believe that everything I've stood for when I got into the ring would be compromised and succumbed to the circus-like atmosphere that's out there, and that's putting it mildly. I would be an imbecile if I gave up half my money to work for a company I didn't respect." Dave wonders if his tune will change when that WCW contract money dries up (yup). Also, at the same tournament, they did a funny little angle with Goldberg throwing his caddie into a lake.
  

WATCH: Goldberg torpedoes his caddie into the lake

• Superstar Billy Graham has reportedly lost nearly 60 pounds in just 3 weeks, most of it water weight due to edema he's suffering from and all the other liver issues he's currently dealing with.
  
• Bruno Sammartino did an interview talking about the role he has in a new low-budget movie called Saloonatics where he plays a mob guy with cancer. Sammartino talked about how uncomfortable he was with all the profanity his character had to say but he eventually got more comfortable with it and was able to put aside his personal feelings and eventually was okay with it. (No idea where the full movie is, but here's a trailer and yeah this shit is LOOOOOOOW budget).
  

WATCH: Saloonatics trailer

• Former WCW announcer Mark Madden is in some controversy in Pittsburgh, where he hosts a daily sports talk show on the local ESPN radio station there. A few weeks back, the sports media in the city was swirling with rumors about NFL star Kordell Stewart's sexuality. Madden went on his radio show and criticized people who were spreading those rumors. A writer who works at the radio station then went on the air and accused Madden of being one of the main people who fueled those rumors and claimed Madden had said things in the past on his show implying that Stewart is gay. Madden denied ever saying that, demanded the guy find the tapes to prove he ever said it, and basically felt like the guy ambushed him live on the air with the accusations. The radio station apparently agreed because the writer was fired when he refused to apologize (for what it's worth, several people have made accusations about Stewart being gay over the years and he's always denied them, and even successfully sued someone a few years ago for claiming he had a relationship with him. Who knows and who cares? Not anybody's business anyway).
  
• Jake Roberts was on a radio talk show in England recently and said some interesting stuff. Said he plans to stay in the UK for the next 2 years. Said he could walk back into the WWF and have a writing job tomorrow if he wanted it. Dave scoffs at that and says I guess he prefers wrestling in front of empty indie show crowds in England instead of earning a steady paycheck. Jake also talked about the scene in Beyond The Mat where the movie alleges that Roberts asked an indie promoter for crack cocaine as his payoff for working the show. Roberts denied it happened and said he doesn't trust a promoter with anything, so he wouldn't trust one to get him crack. Well okay then. Claimed he left the WWF last time because he wasn't comfortable with the angle he was doing with Jerry Lawler, feeling like they were exploiting his sobriety. Dave pretty much rolls his eyes at all this, because Jake was actually fired for going on a bender and no-showing a bunch of events (I'm glad we all love Jake now, but he was still 1000% full of shit and off the deep end during this period).
  
• Iron Shiek missed an appearance on the Opie & Anthony radio show this week because he was detained for several hours at the airport. Turns out he wore his curly toed wrestling boots on the plane and because this is 4 months after 9/11 and only 1 month after the attempted shoe-bomber, and let's be honest, simply because Iron Shiek is Middle Eastern, people freaked out. And when they wanted to examine his boots, he initially refused to let them and, well, you can imagine how well that went over with airport security.
  
• If WWA's PPV in Las Vegas happens next month, Bret Hart has agreed to reprise his role as the on-screen commissioner. As best Dave can tell, no one else has really been signed on for the show and the MGM Grand doesn't know anything about this alleged plan to hold the event in their arena and in fact, WWA hasn't even applied with the Nevada commission to get a license to run a show anywhere in the state and it's almost certainly too late to get one by the scheduled date. So Dave is skeptical that this even happens, and if it does, he can't see it being in Las Vegas. (Surprisingly, it does happen and it is in Vegas, but we'll get there.)
  
• Speaking of the Nevada athletic commission, XWF brought a bunch of wrestlers and a wrestling ring to the National Association of Television Program Executives conference in Vegas, with hopes of putting on a live show and impressing all the TV execs and trying to secure a TV deal. But the XWF didn't get permission from the Nevada commission, so they weren't allowed to use the ring and do a show. Whoops.
  
• Speaking of XWF, morale is in the dumps in that company right now. Losing both Hulk Hogan and Curt Hennig (neither of whom were signed but had been working with them) as well as Sting reportedly not being interested has killed a lot of the excitement about the promotion for people within it.
  
• Notes from Raw: Flair cut an emotional promo about his history in wrestling and how he was on the road so much and put wrestling ahead of his family and not seeing his kids and all that stuff. During the promo, Lawler made a sarcastic joke about Flair needing to have his priorities in order, which Dave thinks is pretty rich coming from Lawler, who lived the exact same life and wasn't much of a father to his kids either (which Lawler has admitted, to be fair). They're continuing to tease a Triple H/Stephanie split, with him being annoyed at her nagging. Speaking of Triple H, Dave thinks he needs to lose at least 15 pounds because he's totally slow and lumbering since he came back.
  
• Notes from Smackdown: AJ Styles worked a dark match, losing to Rico Constantino, but apparently he looked awesome in the match (yeah he hits an awesome shooting star to the floor late in the match). And the show ended with McMahon doing the big NWO reveal on the back of his chair during his promo.
  

WATCH: AJ Styles vs. Rico Constantino dark match - 2002

• Regarding Triple H's match on Smackdown last week, where they gave away his return match on free TV 3 days before the Rumble. Remember how Dave was flabbergasted that they would be so short-sighted? Turns out Triple H felt the same way and fought hard against it, but Vince wouldn't budge.
  
• Chris Benoit is telling people he expects to be back in the ring around June (yup).
  
• Jim Ross answered some questions at a press thing last week and had lots of interesting stuff to say. He said the criticism WWF was receiving for bringing in Hall, Nash, and Hogan hurts, but they have to do what's best for the company and Vince feels this is it. Doesn't sound like JR loves the idea too much either. They've had no talks with Scott Steiner. When told of Goldberg's recent comments (mentioned above), he said he wanted to believe Goldberg hadn't really said that and thought it was a shame. Said there's heat on Jeff Jarrett for how he left the WWF last time so he probably won't be welcomed back anytime soon. JR also hinted that the brand split will come after Wrestlemania and implied that they will be reviving the cruiserweight division. Dave says he's convinced that Vince will never get behind pushing cruiserweights as major stars so he's not holding out hope for that. Said they may bring in Rey Mysterio if they decided to launch a cruiserweight division. Said they'd love to have Eddie Guerrero back but he has to get his personal issues straightened out first. Same with Shawn Michaels, plus they don't know if he could physically do it.
  
• ESPN's Bill Simmons wrote an article reviewing Royal Rumble 2002 and Dave thinks it was great. In one piece, Simmons managed to pretty much sum up all of WWF's recent problems while still acknowledging that the show was entertaining. And the link Dave posted for it in 2002 still works!
  

WATCH: Bill Simmons reviews the 2002 Royal Rumble

• Unless things change, Chris Jericho is gonna be in an awkward situation next week. Jericho is scheduled to play in a celebrity hockey game as part of NHL All Star Weekend. Who will his celebrity coach be, you ask? Goldberg. As of press time, most people in WWF don't seem to be aware of it and Dave wouldn't be surprised if Jericho gets pulled from it.
  
• Booker T was on the Howard Stern show (after his comments last week saying he wasn't a fan of Stern, go figure) and talked about his time in prison and his plans to write a book. He also said he hopes to retire in 2 years which Dave ain't buying (yeah, still about 10 years away from that). He also said someone is suing him over the term "Spinaroonie" because apparently someone else thinks they own the rights to that name. Booker also mentioned that he's dating former Nitro Girl Sharmell Sullivan. Dave notes that they've been dating since WCW and Booker is the one who helped her get hired by WWF, where she's currently in developmental.
  
• DDP has also said he plans to retire in 2 years, to become a motivational speaker. This one actually almost happened. He left WWF just 3 months after this and didn't wrestle at all for several years. Then he had a brief run in TNA but he's been mostly retired other than some one-offs ever since.
  
• Randy Orton is moving up to the main roster. In his final OVW match, Orton lost clean to Prototype and Dave says it's clear they're grooming Prototype to be the next OVW champion.
  

WATCH: Randy Orton vs. Prototype - OVW 2002
WEDNESDAY: More on the impending arrival of the NWO, more on the upcoming brand split, cruiserweight division, and more...

(NB: for those who think ‘spoiler’ doesn’t go far enough - this post contains a theory about the role of an actor listed in the final 2 episodes on imdb - based only on his character name, previous roles & real-life physical appearance. In other words - ***IMDB Spoiler***)
Will Purcell is found dead, placed in the pose of his communion photo (taken by a Priest from St Michael’s Church of the Ozarks), and with straw dolls found leading to the scene (made by Patty Faber of the same church). Patty says that she sold these dolls to a black man with a filmy eye, these dolls were given to the children by two ghosts at Halloween, and the Priest says Julie was excited about seeing her Aunt (she has none).
​
The children had been lying to their parents about a secret playspot where they played Dungeons & Dragons, & had been given a bunch of new-ass toys - some of which had a third party's fingerprints on. Several statements place a white woman, a black man with a filmy eye/scarring, and an ‘upscale’ brown Sedan near to the playspot, murder scene & devil’s den in the months leading to and night of the murder.
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Sam Whitehead says many black men sustained injuries whilst working on the chicken line. Lucy Purcell worked on the chicken line for Hoyt - who’s daughter (let's call her Heiress Hoyt) lost her child. This black man - let’s call him Junius (similar to the Latin 'juvenis', meaning 'young'/'children') - and let's say he looks exactly like this (actor Steven Williams, decent body of work, listed by imdb as cast as Junius for the final two episodes https://www.reddit.com/TrueDetective/comments/al6hkc/this_who_we_lookin_for_ppl/) could have sustained a facial & optical injury working on the chicken line, but his attitude/behaviour in his dealings with Hoyt in subsequent compensation conversations impressed the Hoyts, & maybe he ends up getting a much better job within the organisation, as an aide to Heiress Hoyt, say. Maybe he's romantically intertwined with the Heiress, I dunno. He buys himself a fancy brown Sedan once he's in his new role. Anyway, he's her right hand man, & following the loss of her child, Junius is directed to begin scouting children that the Heiress can Angelina Jolie (adopt/give a better life) to replace the one she lost.
Junius knows Lucy from the chicken line, her lifestyle & negative feelings towards her marriage and motherhood. He also suspects abuse within the home, given the way she talks (perhaps he even witnesses her beating her kids after work sometime). He works Lucy Purcell, & he is the conduit putting her & the Heiress in contact with eachother. He could have gotten photos for the Heiress of Julie & Will (communion photo) either from Lucy or from the Church that he bought the straw dolls, whilst scouting for new children (he bought lots of dolls 'for his nieces and nephews', says Patty Faber).
Lucy arranges meetings between the children & the Heiress with Junius supervising. Lucy tells the children not to tell their father about the meets. The Heiress falls in love with Julie. Sure, she could go down the adoption route for any child she liked. But this is the child that she wants. And the heady combo of being a millionaire spoilt brat who never hears the word 'No', & the mental health issues that come with losing a child & wanting *THIS* child to replace the one she lost is too great. Those around her have to make it work. She runs her plan past her father, Hoyt Sr, and he is livid. He pours cold water on it right away. Terrible idea. Warns her not to entertain it. But the Heiress doesn't care. She's got her heart set on Julie now. The Heiress directs Junius to arrange for Lucy to part with Julie for a fee (this cannot be done legally because Tom would not agree to it) and to set up Julie with a new identity. She waits for Hoyt Sr to be out of the country, on safari in Africa, before she snaps her plan into action.
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Lucy is drawn in by the money, being able offload the motherhood responsibilities she never really wanted, and is comforted by the knowledge that Julie will go on to lead a better life (“children shud laugh”). Julie wasn't planned, she never wanted more kids, & at least now Julie can go on & experience tons of shit that she never would have growing up at Shoepick Lane (Shoepick?/Choupique? Choupique is caviar, right? The valuable offspring of mudfish/swamp trout? Damn, I need to crack a window up in here..). It's for the best. She gets paid, and Julie gets better. And fuck Tom, he, in all likelihood, isn't Julie's baby Daddy anyway (the Purcell grandparents allude to as much at the funeral, saying Tom was welding offshore in Texas when Julie was conceived). That's how Lucy feels about it. Maybe she says as much to the Heiress. Maybe not. But when the Heiress learns this, she begins to tell Julie that her parents aren't her parents, that SHE in actual fact is her real parent, and that Julie will be going somewhere not only better, but her TRUE home. Julie is now onboard. She's an aristocrat, and going home! The Heiress' mental health continues to decline. In her trauma, her lost daughter and Julie are now beginning to merge into one in her mind. She's losing the ability to distinguish between the two.
​
The children did not know that Nov 7th, 1980 would be their last day together, that their mother has sold one of them, as they cycle off to the meet spot. Maybe Will wasn't even supposed to go this time, but he goes out of protective instinct for his sister. When they realise what’s happening, they reject it. Will defends his sister, and distracts the adults, telling his sister to scatter & hide - he’ll find her later using his scouting ability (Hays in 1980 "you can imagine that little boy looking out for his sister. He was trying to defend her. That's what happened to him"). She flees on her bike. Will breaks free and cycles off in the opposite direction, forcing Hoyt & Junius to chase one or the other. They ignore Will, and pursue Julie. She's the target (West in 1980 - "they never wanted the boy"). After some time, thinking the danger has passed, Will tries to find his sister, asking Freddie Burns at Devil’s Den if he’s seen her. But Freddie chases him off. He runs back into the woods and back into Junius & the Heiress, who have found Julie and are taking her away. He tries to stop them taking her, and gives them little choice if they want their plan to succeed. During the struggle he is killed. To placate Julie, they place him in the cave in his communion pose (this is the Heiress' crazy way of trying to suppress Julie's screams & also convince her that her new Mom is compassionate, everything'll be okay) before marking the spot with straw dolls from his bag and leaving with Julie. They drive off, away from Devil's Den, in Junius' fancy brown Sedan.
​
On the way out of Arkansas, Junius contacts his cop on the Hoyt payroll and tells him to get on-scene to make sure he's in a position to tamper with any canvassing of neighbours or potential witnesses in the area. He’ll get a great job out of this off the Hoyts in the private sector, he’ll make sure if that. Sure enough, all mentions of a brown Sedan driving around, away from Devil’s Den, a black man with a filmy eye/scarring, by several neighbours are not included in field reports. The farmer was also interviewed by a white man with a badge immediately after the abduction, but this was not submitted either. The Hoyt Cop does his job well, & Hoyt’s Ozark Children's Outreach Centre charity disrupts the investigation with the reward, flooding the task force with bogus tips (Hoyt Sr knows nothing of this in Africa - he's left his corporation in the trusty stewardship of the Heiress, who makes the most of his resources while he’s gone). Finally, Junius completes the picture by passing evidence to the Hoyt Cop to plant on the Wrongfully Convicted Man - closing the case in 1980. Shortly after, the Hoyt Cop leaves the force & begins his six-figure salary job.
​
When Lucy realises what's happened to Will, that something terrible and unplanned has happened, she loses it. Her initial reaction is to blame & hit Tom ("All you had to do was watch HIM"). Although Will's death was unplanned, Lucy knows she's out of options. She has no choice. She has to stay silent. Telling the truth would result in either her murder or her imprisonment for child trafficking. After all, she played a part in this too. Junius calls her to underscore this warning. Later, seeing Tom's anguish, Lucy sends a ham-fisted note to her own home to inform the task force & her husband that Julie has not been harmed. The FBI agent even says ”the envelope’s handwritten, this isn’t a brainiac”. Lucy stays silent, and descends into alcoholism & despair. Out of guilt, she later commits suicide in Vegas, where she spends the last of the money the Heiress gave her (Sharon Stone in Casino-style). Prior to her death, hearing of her addiction (or that she was throwing around a lot of loose cash), her cousin, Dan O'Brien, visits her under pretence of caring for her welfare. Lucy tells Dan what she did before offing herself. Or maybe she didn't off herself. Maybe Dan's just a greedy fuck who sees the money Lucy's carrying, how she's suicidal, and sees the win-win. He spikes her needle with a hot shot, takes the money, & goes to find Junius to extort the Heiress for more. He's just as stupid & greedy as Lucy was. Junius brutally silences him, dumping his body, broken in a hundred places, in a quarry in Missouri.
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Julie never accepts her new family after witnessing Will's death, and as soon as she is able, she flees, seeing her only choice as living as a homeless kid on the street (in 2015, Hays foggily recollects “in 90 I found the video footage, we learned about Julie Purcell, that group of street kids”). Approaching the authorities is not an option for her, as they would simply return her to the family she believes beat & sold her (she doesn’t yet know her mother is dead, believes Tom isn't her birth Daddy; & the peephole wasn’t a peephole, the children would pass messages to one another when Lucy would beat them). The Heiress despatches Junius & his mercenaries to hunt Julie down in 1990. Junius knows they can’t convince Julie to return to her new home - they just have to silence her. Hays was right, the clock is ticking - they need to find her first. And they don't.
​
In Episode 2, a website Elisa Montgomery shows Hays in 2015 is titled ‘The Purcell Murders’ - plural. Sadly, I think the Heiress' people get to Julie first. Her murder in 1990 causes her father, Tom, to commit suicide, devastating West. Or maybe the task force does find Julie, and returns her to Tom. Maybe Roland is real happy with himself, & promises Tom 'everything's gonna be OK from now on, buddy'. But right before she has a chance to settle in, be rehabilitated, & talk to the police about what happened to her & Will, Junius finds her & kills her. Either way, the end result is Julie is dead, & Tom takes his own life - and Roland is crushed with anguish. The Heiress' mental health completely implodes. West & Hays are pressured to withhold any evidence that does not support the conviction of the Wrongfully Convicted Man, and Hays, insisting they pursue the 'black man with scarring & white woman' is forced out for his insubordination. West knows Hays is right, but goes about things differently. He's a more sophisticated political beast, and doesn't have quite as big a mouth. He knows they'd need police resources to solve this case. So he bites his tongue, plays along with the Attorney General's request, and watches as his buddy gets canned. The case is closed, and it would appear that up to 2015, the Heiress' conspiracy to abduct Julie, which resulted in the murders of both Will & Julie, has not yet been publicly exposed.
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My theory is that Hays continues to pursue the case in 90. Off the force, he will need all the investigatory help that he can get from Roland & Amelia to go rogue as a true detective and solve the case - just like Rust needed Marty. West is a careerist, but privately devastated at what happened to Tom Purcell, a man he steered from suicidal depression back to functioning sobriety only to lose him because they were too slow in getting to Julie first (or failing to protect her adequately once they did). He is onboard all the way. He owes Tom for what happened to him & his kids. He, like Marty in S1, 'has a debt', and just like Marty, he will bring police resources into play on the DL to repay that debt.
​
So - what ways can they go to crack the case wide open? :
- Option 1: Find Junius. Get that list of all work-related injuries sustained at the Hoyt plant by African-Americans. Check their vehicles, fingerprint all of them by open or clandestine means, and correspond fingerprints to those found on the children’s toys (requiring West's police access). This should give them a hit on Junius, who will give them the Heiress, who will give them what happened to Julie & Will.
- Option 2: Find The Hoyt Cop. Rundown all the police who worked canvassing during the ’80 investigation. Locate all the neighbours, which ones feel their statements were either redacted or suppressed, and whose signature is on them? Where are those cops now, what did they do, who left the police during or after the investigation, and who has links to Hoyt? Who came into money during or just after 1980? Who made large purchases, home, car during or after 1980? The evidence that was planted on the Wrongfully Convicted Man - who found it? Who processed it? Whose signatures are on the scene? West can provide that information. Once you got a list, take that damn photo array to the farmer. Have him ID the cop who visited him. This should give them the hit on the Hoyt Cop, who will give them Junius & the Heiress.
- Option 3: ID The Sender of the Letter. Compare family handwriting samples with the envelope handwriting the letter was sent in. West would need to supply this. This would give them Lucy, but she is dead, and so can't be compelled to talk. But at least now they know that this wasn't an abduction. This was child trafficking. Which gives them Option 4.
- Option 4: Follow The Money. Investigate Lucy’s finances. Child trafficking is highly profitable. If there was a transaction, the money must be somewhere, & come from someplace. Although, it would be difficult for West to investigate this without attracting the attention & fury of his superiors.
​
The only route here that protects West while still using his police resources without his superiors noticing is for Hays & West to pursue the Hoyt Cop (probably now an ex-cop, in a better paid role - similar to Junius, thanks to the Heiress). I think they find him (this is the guy - https://www.reddit.com/TrueDetective/comments/alk2ml/theory_the_suited_manwhat_hays_left_in_the_woods/), and beat him heavily for information. The ex-cop gives them Junius - everything he did, killing Will, snatching Julie, interfering with the investigation, and having Julie killed... But he senses he won’t make it out of this interrogation.. He makes a move, & tries to grab Roland's gun. Hays draws quickly & guns him down. This wasn't part of the plan. They're murderers now. The Hoyt Cop joins the Vietcong in Hays' 2015 hallucination of all the men he has killed. But now they gotta make this look right. They bury the Hoyt Cop deep in the woods (he is who Hays' 2015 hallucination of Amelia is referring to when she taunts him about what he ‘left in the woods’) before burning their clothes (that's what he's burning in the BBQ in the 'coming soon in the weeks ahead' trailer). This changes everything. They know who they're after now. But they killed their way getting there. There's no going back.
​
They track down Junius, and Roland needs no invitation to deal with him. "You had the last one, Purple. This one's all mine..." He looks at Hays. "For Tom." Hays watches as Roland brutally beats & tortures Junius. Finally satisfied, Roland pulls out his gun and takes aim at Junius' head. But before he can execute him, a familiar hand pushes his arm down once more. "Don’t. Wait a minute. I want to know the whole story" says Hays. "Tell me why. What was all this for, a paedophile ring? A trafficking ring? Who's running the show? How many other girls are out there?" Junius says it was neither. It was all about Julie. He tells about the Heiress, her lost child, her trauma, how he tried to get her to go down the adoption route, but once she met Julie, it was all about her. And Lucy agreed to it. She got paid. It was win-win-win: a willing mother's pain soothed, an unwilling mother's burden lifted, & a better life for a little girl. Or at least, that was the plan. But Will wasn't supposed to be there. It wasn't supposed to go down like that. And once Julie fled the nest, having witnessed that, they could never let her talk. He never really had a choice. Hays is rocked. But Roland is unmoved. Still focused. "We done here, Purple?" Hays nods, and moves aside, stunned by this revelation. Roland puts a bullet in Junius' good eye. "Now they match, motherfucker." He goes to spit on Junius in his vengeful rage, but Hays pulls him off. “DNA.... DNA, man! C’mon! Get yourself together.”
​
This leaves only the Heiress. They track her down to the castle-type home drawn in Julie's pictures. But when they finally catch up to her, they look at each other, stunned. She's now almost completely vegetative in her mental collapse. Hays shakes his head. No, man. We can't do this. Let's just do this legit. Put all what we got so far on the table and send her ass to jail. Roland darkens. He can't believe what he's hearing. He shakes his head. "Im sorry partner, but u whistlin’ Dixie on this. Think. Think! Think on what she done. Will! Julie! Tom! A whole entire family. Wiped out like a turkey grease spot. Because of this person. This woman. Now, she got to pay. And even if we got all our evidence admitted in court, we'd surely go down with it....... Junius? The Hoyt Cop? We'd be in the jail cell right next to hers. Except she ain't going to jail, son. When Daddy Hoyt gets wind of this shit, he's gonna spend every last million he has getting his daughter off the hook. She's crazy, your honour. Diminished capacity. She never done nothing, your honour, she was just rambling crazy! They’ll put as much of it as they can on Junius. Best case scenario, she eats the manslaughter wrap, cushy psychiatric discharge to a mental facility. She'll live out her last days in pretty much the same way she doing now. Comfortable. Warm bed. TV. Regular nappy changes. Visits from family whenever she wants. Don't you see? Don’t you SEE? Whether she eats the conviction or not, her life won't change. It won't make a difference. She won't pay for what she done. And to let her skate, after doing what she done? No. We got no choice. We got to put her down for real. For good."
But Hays believes in a fair kill. He hunts boar because if you miss, they can kill you too. He'll only hunt deer with a bow - & never with bait or using a stand. He'll only pull the trigger when shot at. He killed the Hoyt cop because he drew him down first, and he killed in Vietnam because they were shooting at him. No. This ain’t him. They've gone all the way, done so much in this case together, but this, he can't do. The Heiress is defenceless. It’s not a fair kill. Hays puts a hand on Roland’s shoulder. “I'm sorry, partner." Hays walks away as Roland takes a deep breath, & puts his leather gloves on. He takes long, shaky, multiple swigs from his hip flask. And then he murders the Heiress.
​
The Heiress doesn't appear in Hays 2015 vision of all the people he killed, because he put it on Roland. That ends their friendship in '91. Hays can't look at him anymore - and Roland can't look at himself. Roland hits the bottle big time. He's glad he got Junius for Tom. He had to do that. But murdering a woman with your own hands? That's not him. But now, it is him. This was something he never thought would be in his life. And now he can’t shake it. There’s no one he can talk to about it. He'll never forgive Hays for putting all that weight on him. His drinking collapses his relationships. His girlfriend doesn't understand why he's lit all hours of the day, always angry, always tense, or won't talk about it. The nail in the coffin of their relationship comes when State Attorney General Kindt figures out that Roland's been pursuing a closed case.
Kindt walks into West’s office & closes the door. Roland looks weathered, still wearing his hangover, but lights up when he sees a real friend for a change. “Mornin’ Sir”... Until he sees the look on Kindt’s face. “Take a seat, West.” "You were given strict orders Lieutenant West. Your remit was to lead a task force supporting the conviction of the Wrongfully Convicted Man. The murder of Julie Purcell closed that case. Now, Hays wanted to go off all half-cocked and pursue 'a black man with scarring', was it? And start running down former cops from '80? He wanted to go off running his own detail unsupervised. So he got canned. And lookie here, in the news. A black man with scarring found shot up. And a former cop from '80 is reported missing by his family. Now, I'm not saying it's you, West, but there's no way Hays could have done this without access........ I sure liked you....... But you're done. Turn in your badge and gun by the end of the day." Kindt gets up to leave, before turning around. "But because I liked you, I'll be fair. Drop on your sword. If you resign today, and you keep your mouth shut about all of this? You can keep the pension. Your good name. Your freedom. Or we can go that other way. I'll make sure you end up in the same cell as half the men you put away. You ever hear what happens to cops in prison?...............Yeah.......... Good day to you...... Mr West.” West knows this is checkmate. He's toast. He got no moves here. He is constructively canned, and walks into his home to tell his girlfriend he just lost his job. They don't last long after that. West lives alone with his demons, bitter & haunted, into old age.
​
24 years pass.
​
By 2015, Hays has been robbed of his memory of these events by his dementia. Hays does not solve the case in 2015. He simply figures out that he already done solved it in 1990! Maybe, with his condition, this isn't the first time he's gone through this process. He's trapped in a locked room. Having the same dream. Again. And again. And again. Time is a flat circle for him now. 2015 Roland knows this. He sees his friend's condition. He just doesn't wanna go back into that head place. Maybe this is the first time Hays has approached him about this, maybe it's the 10th time. But Roland don't wanna know, don't wanna go back there. The bleakest time of his life. He smoked his own career to make that shit right. But the murders they done. Tom's suicide. Their failure to protect Julie, breaking his promises to Tom, all whilst he was steering the task force. And the murder of a woman (the Heiress) by his hand. All that pain, death & anguish. "Nah, man. I don't wanna think about that shit or eat no boar meat, man. Motherfucker. Just get me two fingers of Southern Comfort."
​
The purpose of the 2015 timeline is twofold: 1. to help Hays remember (maybe not for the first time, but for the final time) that he brought satisfactory closure to the case, and also to his life. Amelia is dead, & Roland won’t go beyond cryptic hints about what they done. But Hays’ visions of Amelia & interactions with Roland & Elisa help him finally piece together & remember what they did. He finally reads the closing chapter of his Wife’s book, which contains a warm & loving tribute to him, with hints that she knew exactly what he & West went through to bring justice to the children's killers. What it cost them. What it cost him. In their souls, their careers. Carried for life, like a weight. And that in the end, as a marriage, they did live a genuinely loving, loyal & happy life together. And now, satisfied in remembering that, Hays can take the handgun from his drawer and return peacefully to be with his wife ("I may be deciding I don't want to stay alive without your mother"), whilst also simultaneously tying up the one last loose end of the case....
The second purpose of the 2015 timeline is to blow the Hoyt corporation & the political careelegacy of State Attorney General Kindt into the ether, and overturn the conviction of the Wrongfully Convicted Man. This couldn't be done in the past, because in blowing the lid off this mess, Hays knew he would be exposing himself to a murder charge, & possible retribution from the Hoyt corporation. But in 2015, with the Hoyt family mostly deceased, and no death row awaiting him in the afterlife, Hays is comfortable blowing the lid off this godforsaken mess, giving Roland some sweet revenge on his old boss Kindt, & giving the Wrongfully Convicted Man's family the peace of mind they deserve. Because now that he has found peace of mind & closure, Hays realises that everybody deserves peace of mind & closure. And he wants to give it to them.
After Hays' funeral, his son, Henry, finds a note directing him to the dictaphone, which details from start to finish the real truth about the Heiress' child trafficking activity, Junius, the murders of Julie & Will, Lucy's complicity, the Hoyt cop, Kindt’s purposeful obstruction of justice.... and Henry gives it all to Elisa.
​
Elisa gets exactly what she wanted. True Criminal goes viral globally - Serial style - blowing the case wide open. Elisa obtains Sarah Koenig-style celebrity, but more importantly, this allows the Wrongfully Convicted Man's family to finally clear their father's name, with the reputation of the Hoyt corporation & the political career of State Attorney General Kindt blown to dust. Hays & West become folklore renegade heroes for their acts, just like Rust & Marty.
​
But Henry knows the details now shared could expose his father's old buddy Roland to a charge, despite his age. He owes that old man a visit, an explanation, maybe some modern legal advice on how to protect himself from the media & legal intrusion that's a-coming by pinning all the murders on his father, Wayne. He secretly loves that his father did that vigilante shit. He's happy for him to take the weight. Maybe Wayne already did put the weight on himself in the dictaphone message, maybe Henry taped over the bits that mentioned murder, but the media/law are still surely gonna come knocking for Roland at some point now, with questions. Cause this shit is worldwide. It's viral. Everybody’s gonna want a piece of Roland. They need to co-ordinate, he owes him that courtesy as a minimum.
​
The final shots of the season are of the family of the Wrongfully Convicted Man paying their private respects at the side-by-side graves of Wayne & Amelia Hays for salvaging their father's name (if the Wrongfully Convicted Man is Woodard, maybe it would be cool if they sung the Native American Warrior's Mourning Song with a solemn dignity, draping their father's Vietnam medals over Wayne's grave in respect https://youtu.be/uzf3bjyDNAY); and Henry Hays arriving at Roland West's home to give him the dictaphone, tell him what his Dad said, and co-ordinate.
As he arrives, Roland is hollering & hoo-eeeing with delight at his TV watching the news as the cuffs go on Gerald Kindt. They go outside & share a Soco dub on the porch in a knowing, satisfied silence. They look up, watching the big harvest moon. What it means to them. How before, it was just a reminder of the cold. Of all the pain. And now, how it floods everything with light. After some time, Roland glances at the dictaphone that Henry brought. Roland grins, looks toward the harvest moon, then, at peace with his past, finally, drawls "Y'know, sunnnn... The thing about yr Daddy.......... He always did have a big fuckin’ mouth". They laugh. Henry: "Yessir :) He sure did.. He sure did."
CREDITS.

Going through old issues of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter and posting highlights in my own words. For anyone interested, I highly recommend signing up for the actual site at f4wonline and checking out the full archives.
PREVIOUS YEARS ARCHIVE: 1991 • 1992 • 1993 • 1994 • 1995 • 1996 • 1997 • 1998

1-4-1999	1-11-1999	1-18-1999	1-25-1999
2-1-1999	2-8-1999	2-15-1999	2-22-1999
3-1-1999	3-8-1999

• Dave has officially declared the Monday night wars over. Obviously, both shows are still going on. But WWF is riding an incredible wave of success while WCW is free-falling in self-destruction and he doesn't see that changing anytime soon. Sunday Night Heat did a record 5.09 rating, followed the next night by Raw doing a monstrous 6.46. At one point, Raw was more than doubling Nitro's ratings during certain segments of the show. Add in all the mainstream publicity (Sable in Playboy, TV Guide doing another 4-part covers series but only WWF this time, etc.) and just weeks away from Wrestlemania which will undoubtedly be the biggest money event in WWF history and the biggest non-boxing event in the history of pay-per-view, and WWF is simply on fire right now.
  
• On the flip side, there's WCW. For the last several weeks, Eric Bischoff has apparently been on vacation in France (Dave gets an AWESOME line here, saying it would be more appropriate if he was in Rome playing the fiddle). That left Kevin Nash and Hulk Hogan in charge of Nitro this week and Dave says it was possibly the worst TV show put on by a major promotion in history and that Nash and Hogan used the show as a way to get themselves over and went to absurd lengths to basically bury everyone else in the company. When asked about it, Bischoff has basically said he's giving full control to Nash and giving him the chance to sink or swim on his own. Most people feel that Bischoff has pretty much given up and mentally checked out of the company and is looking for a way to get off the Titanic before it sinks. Dave thinks Nitro had to have been designed to fail this week because it takes a lot of thought to actually present a show that terrible, it couldn't have been an accident. He talks about how WCW has had a long tradition of bad booking, dating back to the mid-80s Crockett days where everyone did heel/face turns until the fans didn't care about anyone, screwjob finishes, and the booker pushing himself as the top star (Dusty) and obviously, nothing has changed in the last 10 years. Locker room morale is at rock bottom. Scott Hall is pretty much planning to sit out right now and has talked about suing WCW because it was a WCW employee who ran over his ankle a few weeks ago, injuring him. Benoit, Malenko, guys like them have been forgotten. Bret Hart's burial is complete and he's a midcard nobody now (he worked a 10+ minute match against Van Hammer this week, in case you're wondering). Arn Anderson, one of the top 3 promo guys in the biz, is being phased out. Billy Kidman, arguably the brightest new star in WCW in the last year or so, is barely on TV anymore. Same with Juventud Guerrera, who is the single best wrestler in the U.S. at the moment. Chris Jericho has potential to be the next Shawn Michaels or Ric Flair and he's booked like a nobody and is almost certainly WWF-bound when his contract ends. But we still have nonstop Scott Steiner, Buff Bagwell, Nash, and Hogan. Goldberg is still being booked strong because even WCW isn't foolish enough to totally bury him, but he's not going to be pushed above Hogan (who is turning face) and Dave wouldn't be surprised if they do something stupid like turn Goldberg heel (still a year away from that awful idea). With Ric Flair now being booked as the top heel (at 50 years old) and Hogan as the top babyface, it does nothing to dispel the notion that WCW is the elderly, out of touch company, while WWF is the hot, cool product. People who recently re-signed contracts are wishing they could get out of them and Dave expects nearly anyone who has a chance to go to WWF when their contracts expire will probably make the jump. But aside from all the comparisons of 1999 WCW to 1988 Crockett, Dave says there's one big difference. In 1988, even though morale was bad and the product was suffering, the performers didn't quit. They still tried to put on good shows. But now, in 1999, everyone from the wrestlers, to the announcers, to the front office...all of them have already mentally quit. Almost everyone is just collecting a check and phoning it in at this point and it's never been more obvious. And for that reason, Dave says the game is already over. WWF has won the war.
  
• Vader became the first wrestler in history to win both New Japan's IWGP title and AJPW's Triple Crown title after defeating Akira Taue to win the title recently vacated by Toshiaki Kawada after an injury. Dave says this puts Vader up there alongside Lou Thesz as one of the only wrestlers to hold more versions of major league championships than any other wrestler ever. Vader held the CWA title in Europe in the 80s, which was a bigger deal then than it is now. The UWA title in Mexico (back when they were the top promotion there). IWGP in Japan, 3 times, and the WCW title 3 times, among others. At one point in 1990, he was the CWA, UWA, and IWGP champ all at the same time, which probably makes him the only wrestler to ever hold 3 major world titles on 3 different continents at once.
  

WATCH: Vader vs. Akira Taue - AJPW 3/6/99

• At the latest UFC PPV, Tito Ortiz got into a confrontation with Ken Shamrock, who was cageside for the fight. After Ortiz won his fight against Shamrock's protege Guy Mezger, he flipped off the Lion's Den corner and then pulled out a t-shirt that said "GAY Mezger is my bitch." Upon seeing the shirt, Shamrock jumped up and climbed the cage and started yelling at Ortiz, saying that if he put the shirt on, he would rip his head off and chastising him for poor sportsmanship. Due to UFC being afraid of any negative publicity these days, the camera pulled away from most of it, but Ortiz had to be pulled away and Shamrock nearly climbed into the cage and had to be restrained. For what it's worth, Shamrock has talked about wanting to fight again, but of course, he's still under WWF contract. He's had discussions with Vince McMahon about allowing him to fight, perhaps sometime this year but no word if it's led anywhere. And Shamrock reportedly wants to fight for the UFC title, and doesn't necessarily have any interest in fighting Ortiz, although now there's obviously some intrigue if that fight were to ever happen. But right now, UFC doesn't have enough visibility on PPV to even be able to afford to bring in Shamrock. But there's talk that UFC is making headway with the PPV providers and they seem confident that they may be able to start getting unbanned soon.
  
• The career of Lizmark, one of Mexican wrestling's all-time legends, may have come to a sudden end due to heart problems. He'd been dealing with chest pains recently and finally checked himself into a hospital only to find out it was bad news. Doctors then told him he absolutely could never wrestle again because he would be risking his life. Dave gives a brief recap of his career, talking about him as one of the innovators of out-of-the-ring dives that have become so popular in Lucha Libre ("tope suicida!") and how his son Lizmark Jr. currently wrestles in WCW. He's 49 and had already been talking of retiring anyway but was holding out hope that he would get to wrestle his final match with his son but the WCW/CMLL deal fell through and they're in different promotions so it looks like it won't happen. In fact, Dave says Lizmark's mask is one of the most famous in Mexican wrestling history and that legacy is the reason Lizmark Jr. has repeatedly refused to lose his mask in WCW, which is why they never push him. (Turns out this wasn't the end for Lizmark. He took about 6 months off and then resumed wrestling a slightly lighter schedule but still pretty regularly for the next several years. And in even better news, he did get to wrestle with his son a bunch of times during those years. He ended up retiring in 2013 and died in 2015).
  
• There's a quiet power struggle taking place within AJPW between Mitsuharu Misawa and Motoko Baba, the widowed wife of Giant Baba. Apparently Motoko Baba wants to oversee everything Misawa does while he wants to be left alone to run the company as he sees fit. He also wants to modernize things a bit. If you're recall, Giant Baba wasn't exactly the most in-touch guy when it came to the modern day wrestling business. (This behind-the-scenes power struggle goes on for the next year or so and eventually, Misawa leaves and takes almost the entire AJPW roster and office staff with him to form Pro Wrestling Noah which damn near puts AJPW out of business overnight. But we'll get there...)
  
• For the first time in AJPW history, Stan Hansen won't be part of the upcoming Champion Carnival tournament. Dave explains how in sumo wrestling, when a grand champion can no longer compete at the highest level, they are usually forced into retirement in order to spare them the indignity of losing to low level fighters. AJPW is basically doing the same thing here. Stan Hansen is without a doubt the biggest foreign star in the history of Japanese wrestling but he's 50 years old now and he simply can't hang with the newer generation of stars. And since it wouldn't make sense to push him as a top star anymore, they don't want him in the tournament losing to midcard guys and looking bad. So to preserve his legendary status, they are simply not putting him in the tournament at all.
  
• Shinya Hashimoto was expected to return to the ring for next month's big NJPW Tokyo Dome show but he won't be ready. He had major reconstructive surgery on his nose after getting it shattered to pieces in the Jan. 4 match against Naoya Ogawa and won't be medically cleared in time for the show.
  
• Riki Choshu has announced that he plans to come out of retirement. It's got a lot of people concerned about the financial condition of NJPW because, when he retired last year, Choshu vowed he would never come back unless the company was in such bad shape that they needed him to. Soooo...now he's coming back, so obviously people are questioning things. NJPW is denying that there are any money issues and in fact, most of the wrestlers who recently re-signed were given big raises. But house show business in the last year or so has declined so who really knows. No word on who or when Choshu will wrestle again (must have been some confusion here because Choshu stayed retired for another year-plus before finally coming out of retirement in mid-2000).
  
• Kenzo Suzuki, a former collegiate rugby star, has started training at the NJPW dojo and will likely debut for the company later this year (he doesn't last long in NJPW. Spends a couple of years in WWE during the mid-00s, and then ends up back in AJPW for most of the last decade).
  
• Nobuhiko Takada is still not giving up the dream of being a real MMA fighter and will face UFC fighter Mark Coleman at the next PRIDE show (this ends up being one of the more notorious "fixed" fights in MMA history, with Coleman clearly taking a dive for Takada).
  
• Speaking of Mark Coleman, WCW offered him $50,000 to come in and work a match against Goldberg and to put him over. But Coleman's people advised him against it and then Kevin Nash also shot down the idea, saying what if Vince McMahon offered Coleman $100,000 to double-cross WCW and shoot on Goldberg live on PPV and embarrass the company? Dave says the obvious answer to that would be to tape the match in advance just in case. But either way, it's not happening now.
  
• Legendary retired sumo wrestler Akebono has been denying rumors that he plans to get into pro wrestling now that his sumo career is over (took him a few years, but yeah he eventually becomes a pro wrestler).
  
• Women's boxer Shannon Hall reportedly has an offer to sign with WWF. She's also a former American Gladiator (she does sign with WWF but never makes it out of developmental).
  
• Dave finally saw the A&E Biography episode about Andre The Giant. He says it was a very well-produced fairy tale. Definitely entertaining, but about 80% inaccurate, at least about his wrestling career. There were some good interviews with his family members and friends about his childhood and personal life but as far as his wrestling career goes, most of it was revisionist bullshit.
  
• Legendary women's wrestler Mae Young has been playing the role of Sean Stasiak's mother on Power Pro Wrestling in Memphis. She had a wrestling match with Stacy and, at 75 years old, that makes her the oldest person to have a match that Dave is aware of (Lou Thesz had one at 74 a few years back). She took a few bumps and then faked a heart attack before sneak attacking Stacy with a purse.
  

WATCH: Mae Young vs. Stacy - Power Pro Wrestling

• A 17-year-old kid named Andre Verdun made news in Ventura, CA for his backyard wrestling group where him and a bunch of other kids were having barbed wire matches and jumping off rooftops on each other through tables and whatnot. The principal at Verdun's school was furious at the newspaper that ran the story, saying all they did was give the kids more fame and notoriety by publishing it. Verdun was apparently signing autographs at school after it happened and now there's TV shows wanting to do interviews with them (I googled the guy and it looks like he did a bunch of garbage backyard death match shit for years. There's some videos on YouTube. He also played a big part in a 20/20 piece about backyard wrestling that also interviewed Mick Foley and others. Anyway, looks like this Verdun guy is all grown up and he's a lawyer now. I can't find the local news piece, but here's the 20/20 story from later in the year which features Foley).

WATCH: ABC 20/20 story on backyard wrestling

• ECW paychecks are finally starting to clear now that they got the big influx of cash, so morale is better but no one is betting on the future. Even Tommy Dreamer, thought to be the most loyal guy in the company, went on a radio show this week saying that he only has a handshake agreement with Paul Heyman, not a contract, and said that if a serious offer came along from either WWF or WCW, he would take it.
  
• ECW also lost their TV deals in several major cities due to financial issues. Boston, Chicago, Atlanta, Buffalo, and Pittsburgh TV deals were all lost. They're working on getting Boston back. They voluntarily gave up the Chicago TV deal because they were paying $3,000 a week for TV there but they've never actually run a show there so they decided it wasn't worth the cost. Same for Atlanta, although they're looking for a new TV deal there. Pittsburgh dropped them due to bounced checks.
  
• Tammy Sytch and Chris Candido still aren't being used by ECW. They have told Heyman that they are in counseling and doing an outpatient drug rehab program. Tammy's mother also went to court this week and got a restraining order against her daughter extended (she was arrested a few weeks ago for violating it).
  
• ECW TV this week kept taking pathetic shots at WCW. Once might have been okay but it went on and on throughout the whole show and came off as whiny and desperate. They talked about WCW ripping off ECW's gimmick with the "Uncensored" PPV. Talked about the three-way match between Raven, Hardcore Hak, and Bigelow saying they are using ECW wrestlers for an ECW-style match. And they knocked the Hogan/Flair barbed wire cage match, saying that the match will suck because both guys are 50 year old millionaires who won't take risks and besides, the barbed wire is fake anyway and in ECW they use real barbed wire. Then they showed the famous Terry Funk/Sabu barbed wire match (not bothering to mention that Funk is older than both Flair and Hogan) and basically just spent the whole show knocking WCW.
  
• As if this week's episode of Nitro wasn't bad enough, they also failed to sell out the show in a 12,000 seat arena. It's been a long time since Nitro failed to sell out an arena that size. A few days later, a Thunder taping only drew 4,000 fans to a 15,000-seat arena, which was disastrous (they'll be happy to draw 4,000 fans to any show a year from now). During Thunder, they aired 2 promo videos hyping next week's Nitro and both clips featured Sean Waltman, who has been gone from WCW for over a year now and is, of course, currently in WWF. The wheels are falling off this company.
  
• Also on Thunder, the crowd was chanting "steroids!" at Scott Steiner and at one point, he legit lost his cool and ran into the crowd after a fan, which they had to edited out before broadcast.
  
• In a magazine interview with Goldberg, he was asked his thoughts on WWF and said it was "shock TV" and said he would retire from wrestling tomorrow rather than ever go to work there. Sure thing, buddy.
  
• WWF injury/illness Report: Mankind is dealing with knee issues and will need time off soon. Billy Gunn missed a few shows due to fluid in his lungs and a respiratory infection. Steven Regal is still in rehab with no plans to return soon.
  
• Regarding rumors that Raw will be expanding to 3 hours, apparently it was discussed several months ago back when the ratings war with Nitro was still neck-and-neck. They didn't like that Nitro had a 1 hour head start and talked about adding a third hour to Raw. But now that Raw is dominating Nitro, they don't feel the need to do it anymore, so it won't be happening. Whew. Could you imagine?
  
• Kurt Angle will be sent to Memphis to work for Power Pro Wrestling for a bit before they put him on WWF TV.
  
• Luna Vachon was fired this week due to several separate incidents. She has had a lot of heat with Sable, Marc Mero, Jacqueline, and agent Jack Lanza. She also complained about not getting a push because she wasn't as pretty as Sable (which she also said on TV and it was more shoot than work) and she even challenged Marc Mero to a fight backstage at the St. Valentine's Day Massacre PPV. Basically, she's just been pissing off too many people and none of the other women were comfortable having her around because she's kinda wild, so they fired her. Funny enough, she was booked to face Sable at Wrestlemania and was even booked to win the title, but that's obviously off now and Sable will likely face Tori instead.
  
• WWF is considering doing their own women's wrestling show patterned after the old GLOW promotion of the 80s. They're holding a casting call in Los Angeles next week to bring in more pretty women for it (this never got off the ground but they ended up signing a few of the casting call women to developmental deals).
  
• CBS wants to do a Movie of the Week type deal with Steve Austin playing the same character he played on his recent Nash Bridges episode, since that did such a huge rating. And of course, if the movie does good, it would possibly lead to a full blown spin-off TV series. Austin's guest spot on the show opened a lot of eyes in Hollywood since it did such a big rating, more than even Hogan or Piper could have ever done on network TV.
  
• Public Enemy has a good bit of heat in WWF already, with most people feeling like they don't belong and are out of their league. They had a match against the Acolytes on Sunday Night Heat where both guys (Bradshaw especially) were stiffing the hell out of them. It was reportedly meant to be a message to PE and was approved by the office (yeah this match is BRUTAL and pretty much ended PE's run in WWF).
  

WATCH: The Acolytes beat the fuckin' brakes off Public Enemy

• Sable has been making the media rounds to promote her Playboy issue. She was on Howard Stern this week and will be filming a role for La Femme Nikita next month. She was also interviewed by the New York Daily News and had this to say in regards to WWF's product: "As a responsible parent, I choose not to let my child watch it (Raw). My child is very young. She has a bed time and she's in bed when our show comes on. To me, that's being a responsible parent. Ultimately, it's the parent's decision. If you do not wish your child to watch the WWF, change the channel. It's not our place to put on a show that's supposedly for your children. It's your place as a parent to monitor what your children watch. Are they saying it's not okay to see the characters we play beat up each other but it's okay to have your child watch a movie where a famous actor blows away 100 people with an M-16?" When asked if she felt her character is degrading to women, Sable responded, "I feel I'm being a strong, stand-up woman. People don't have to like what I do or agree with what I do because they don't have to live my life. I would much rather my daughter when she grows up, do what she wants to do because she wants to do it, not because of what someone else thinks." When asked about turning heel recently but still not getting booed, Sable pointed to her chest and said, "Why would they boo this?"
  
• The idea with Jim Ross acting like a heel lately is because they want to transition him into being Steve Williams' manager and also because they're trying to transition Michael Cole into the new main announcer for Raw. However, Ross' promos had the opposite effect and got over huge and he got big cheers. So they've dropped the heel act but the plan is still for him to do the talking for Steve Williams and there's no plans for him to replace Michael Cole anytime soon.
  
• Remember that hotel and casino that WWF bought in Las Vegas? Well, the plan is to tear it down and rebuild since the building isn't right for what they want (they want to be able to hold shows in it, but the structure isn't built for it). Anyway, whenever they do finally demolish it, there's been talk of turning it into a wrestling angle and having Austin press the button, with the storyline idea being that Austin just destroyed a multi-million dollar piece of property that Vince owns (didn't happen but that would have been awesome).
  
• Someone writes in and chastises Dave for being so mean to WCW. The guy basically says, yeah WCW sucks right now but do you have to keep ridiculing them for it? Someone else writes in and shits all over Mick Foley, saying he's a glorified stuntman and doesn't belong in a wrestling ring and he hates this new era of jumping off cages and crashing through tables and all that stuff. He wishes someone with a lot of money would come along and promote wrestling the way it used to be in the good ol' days. He signs his name "Duane Mason" but I know a Jim Cornette letter when I see one!
  

MONDAY: WCW Uncensored fallout, a look at how many world titles Ric Flair has actually held, Shane Douglas and Flair take shots at each other in interviews, and more...

Working at a casino was not exactly #lifegoals.
But it was better, I reflected, as I glanced down at my scratchy pink poodle skirt and ankle-grinding roller skates, than being a waitress at a Fifties theme restaurant.
Anything is better than working at a theme restaurant. Believe me. If you hear ‘Fifties restaurant’ and start dreaming of Uma Thurman and John Travolta dancing with wild abandon, stop it. Tarantino lied to you. It’s just screaming children and drunk tourists, all the way down.
Which was why, when my Friday morning shift in that hell finally ended, I shrugged back into street clothes and left for my interview at the Grand Imperial Casino with a spring in my step and a smile on my face. I’d hoped that by my twenty-fourth year of life, I’d be interviewing for something a bit more ambitious than blackjack dealer at the newest addition to the Las Vegas strip, but at this point I’d take what I got.
The bus ride downtown was boring, so I’ll break here to introduce myself: my name is Mika. Well, technically, my name is Miguelita Hortensia Maria Francisca de Toledo Rosario Vasquez. But that’s too long even by Mexican standards, so go ahead and call me Mika Rosario, because that’s going to save us both a bunch of time.
Yeah, you think YOU hate going to the DMV.
Anyway, today was going to be my day. I’d traded shifts with one of the other girls who owed me a favor and put up with the desperately sad crowd that wanted to eat breakfast surrounded by bored actors dressed up like extras from Grease, because this afternoon was important. This afternoon was my ticket out of the world of waitressing, even if that ticket only took me a few blocks down the road. No more poodle skirts, no more roller skates, no more children competing to see who can snort a milkshake through their nose, no more teenage boys leering at my cleavage until their eyes fell out.
I mean, I was applying to work at a casino, so I was pretty much just trading those teenage stares in for a whole new set, courtesy of a horde of middle-aged middle-managers in from the Midwest for a convention on midsize sedans, but at least it was a change. My boobs were looking forward to the variety.
So, there I was, sitting in a massive ballroom at the Grand Imperial with about four hundred other people, waiting for my name to be called. It was a nice ballroom, if nothing else, with real white linens on the tables and carpet that didn’t look like they stole the design from a Dixie cup in 1997. It ought to be nice, though, since the newspapers claimed that this place had cost over a billion dollars just to build, never mind the cost of buying out land on the Strip.
All the more reason to get my foot in the door here. If this Robbie Mo guy that came in from Macau to set up the Grand Imperial had that kind of money to throw around, then there had to be a way for me to work my way up through the ranks to where I’d get some real cash.
And no more roller skates.
“Me-gall-nita… Rose-mario?”
The call came at last and I sprang up, smiling as broadly as I knew how and ignoring the way the guy with the list butchered my name. They could call me Mud, for all I cared, so long as they got me away from Big Donny’s Roller-Diner.
The first few rounds of the mass interview were easy, to be honest. Out of all those hundreds of people massed in the ballroom, the Grand Imperial people eliminated three hundred with a simple test as to whether or not they even knew how to play blackjack, let alone deal professionally. Most of them, apparently, couldn’t even count to twenty-one.
I breezed through that round, and the two that came after it. I’d been slinging blackjack since I was eight, when my dad first set me down and made me help him practice counting cards. Carlos Rosario was a ‘professional’ gambler. Professional, in the sense that it was the only plan he ever had to make money and support his family, and ‘professional’ in the sense that he lost more than anybody I’ve ever seen, no matter how he tried to cheat.
Anyway, dealing was easy. I threw in a few flippy bits, flicking aces from one knuckle to the other before returning them to the shuffle, and dancing the spread back and forth before snapping cards out to my nonexistent players. It was simple stuff that any idiot could learn on YouTube, but the interviewers ate it up, whispering to each other like sixth-grade girls.
It was round four when everything got weird.
My first clue that I’d merged onto the highway to the crazy zone was when a man in a black suit asked me to follow him. He was tall and blond, super hot in a ‘my sense of humor was surgically replaced with a third fist’ kind of way, and he escorted me into an elevator made of mirrors without ever saying more than three words at a time. All the previous rounds of the interview had been held in partitioned temporary rooms on one side of that huge ballroom, but apparently those of us who made it to the final round got to see a nicer bit of the Grand Imperial.
That was what I thought on the elevator ride, anyway. I had no idea exactly how nice the bit I’d be seeing was until I stepped off on the 50th floor and felt my jaw drop so far that it should’ve hit the floor.
Gold. Enough gold to make the Pope blush, enough gold to buy out the king of Spain, enough gold to...I don’t even know. There was nothing I could think of buying, nothing that I could even IMAGINE, that required that much money.
It was a lot of freaking gold.
Hot Security Guy frog-marched me through Versailles 2.0 like we were walking down a blank concrete hallway instead of something out of Liberace’s nightmares, before plopping me down opposite the final interviewer.
He was Asian, probably Chinese or Japanese extraction, middle-aged and friendly-looking, like his face naturally wanted to smile. Bit of gray at his temples, bit of extra padding at the belly, but it all seemed to suit him, like he’d been destined to be that way since he was born. Somebody’s kindly grandpa, except he wasn’t old enough yet.
He didn’t say much as I ran through my dealing routine, which didn’t exactly make me happy. A bead of sweat ran down the back of my neck the moment I picked up the deck set on the desk between us, a bead that turned into a river, that turned into Niagara Falls by the time I was done. I pulled out a few extra tricks at the end, flashy little flips that I wouldn’t usually dare try with anybody watching, even palmed a joker into the deck and spun it out face-up, but it was like trying to get blood from a stone. Friendly Grandpa’s smile never so much as twitched, for good or bad.
Finally, I couldn’t take it.
“Look, that’s what I’ve got,” I vented, cascading the deck back together and slapping it down on the desk. “If you’re looking for more...frankly, I don’t know who the hell you’re looking for. Four rounds of interviews, for a job dealing blackjack? That’s just stupid.”
Uh oh.
There it went, then. My chance to bust out of the land of pink poodle skirts and greaser jackets. Great job, Mika; all you had to do was keep your mouth shut and flip the cards, but you had to let your temper get the best of you.
Then the interviewer finally spoke.
“Do you know who I am, Miss Rosario?”
I gulped.
“My new boss?” I suggested lamely, mustering up my best plucky smile.
“My name is Mo Ka-Fai,” he informed me, as I felt my blood turn to ice. “Most people around here call me Robbie.”
Robbie...Mo...
Robbie Mo.
ROBBIE FREAKING MO.
AKA the guy who owned the casino I was sitting in, plus half of the Mirage and who knew how many more in Macau. The news hadn’t stopped talking about how stupid rich he was since they first broke ground on the Grand Imperial.
“Oh,” I squeaked. So I hadn’t just mouthed off at my interviewer and tanked my chances of getting the dealer job, I’d insulted a man who could literally blackball me from the entire city of Las Vegas if he felt like it.
That was bad.
“Sorry.”
“I didn’t tell you that to spook you, Miss Rosario,” Mo announced, a sentiment that did nothing to unfreeze my spine or untwist my stomach. “That wasn’t the point. The point was to let you know that you are dealing with the person who makes decisions. A serious person. Somebody who is not in the business of making jokes or playing pranks. Is that clear to you?”
I nodded like a bobblehead doll. He wasn’t telling me to leave, at least. That had to mean I was still in the running for the job...right?
“Good,” he continued. “Jason, bring in the kittens.”
He gestured over my shoulder towards Hot Security Guy, as I felt my brow knit in confusion. Had he just said...kittens?
What?
Lo and behold, the kittens were...actual cats. HSG disappeared behind a side door, only to reappear a moment later with a cardboard box full of mewing little fluffballs in at least a dozen colors, two or three tiny heads peeking above the lip to see what was happening. The box was deposited at my feet, whereupon two dozen curious eyes blinked up at me.
“Um,” I managed, my eyebrows raised so far I felt like they were going to get lost in my hair. “What?”
“Close your eyes and pick a kitten, please,” Mo requested.
I just stared at him.
“I am aware that it sounds absurd, Miss Rosario. But this will all make sense in a moment, if things are as I suspect.”
I stared at him for another long moment, then shrugged. I liked cats just fine, and he still seemed to be considering me for the job, so...why not?
Eyes closed tight, I leaned down and worked my hands into the pile of kittens. A few nips and playful scratches later, I managed to snag one of the fluffy little things and lift it up away from its siblings.
I opened my eyes to see a pure black fuzzball sitting in my palms, staring at me with eyes as gold as the extravagant walls. He blinked a few times, looking around to see where the rest of his family had gone, then curled up with his tail over his eyes.
Mo breathed in sharply, and whispered something in a language I didn’t know, eyes widening.
“Black,” murmured Hot Security Guy. “It’s black.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” I replied, exploring new depths of confusion. “Here, you want to hold him?”
HSG backed away like I’d offered to shoot him in the kneecap.
“N-no!” he yelped, then cleared his throat. “I mean, no thank you, Miss Rosario. Please continue the interview.”
“The straws,” hissed Mo, as I turned back to him. “Bring the straws!”
Jumping like he was scalded, HSG disappeared back into the side room and came back with a large, blue porcelain vase bristling with...were those drinking straws?
They were. Long red plastic straws, like the ones that you got at the movie theater Slushee machine, with a little spoon on the end so you could scoop up the ice bits. There were tons of them packed into the vase, so tight they barely even rustled as Hot Security Guy placed it next to the kittens.
“There are one thousand straws in that vase,” Mo told me, as if that weren’t an utterly bizarre thing to say. “Each one has a number printed on the end, one to one thousand. Do you understand?”
I nodded again, scratching the black kitten’s head absently. I was this far into what was comfortably the strangest job interview of my entire life, no point arguing over a vase full of straws.
“Good. Choose one, and read me the number, please.”
Dutifully, I shifted my new fuzzy friend into my left hand while I reached down with my right and wormed a nail into the forest of straws. It had to be some kind of eccentric rich guy thing, testing people with kittens and straws before he hired them, I decided.
“Thirteen,” I recited, reading off the tiny black number punched into the end of my straw.
Hot Security Guy literally backpedalled away from me, while Mo looked like he’d seen a ghost.
“Thirteen?” he breathed. “Are you certain? Out of one thousand straws, you picked thirteen?”
“Yep,” I confirmed, laying the straw on the table for him. “One-three. That makes thirteen to me.”
The kitten in my hand started to stretch and mew, pawing for the top of the desk and obviously yearning to explore. I lifted him up and let him clamber out of my palm, since Mo seemed more interested in staring at the little number on the straw than actually interviewing me.
The one percent is freaking weird.
“Right, Miss Rosario,” Mo finally breathed, shaking himself away from inspecting the straw and seeming to collect himself. “Right. Yes. Thank you for bearing with us. I have one more test for you.”
This time, instead of sending Hot Security Guy to fetch, he reached into the drawer of his desk and produced an finely carved set of ivory dice in a plush black velvet box.
“Roll them, please.”
I didn’t move.
“I’d rather not,” I hedged. “I deal cards. I don’t gamble.”
That was my rule. Ever since I was eleven, ever since I’d watched my father walk out of the house with all the money we’d saved for my mom’s chemo and come back with empty hands, that had been the rule.
I don’t gamble. Ever.
“I am not asking you to gamble, Miss Rosario,” Mo countered. “There is no money on the table. Just the dice. Roll them, please.”
My jaw locked up and my fingernails bit into my palm, but I forced myself to reach for the dice. There was no way I was going to avoid ever touching a set, if I intended to work in a casino. And Mo was technically right; I wasn’t betting on anything and there was no money at stake, so it wouldn’t be gambling.
Just a roll of the dice.
Breath caught in my throat, I picked up the dice, shook them once, and then dropped them like a poisonous snake.
A brief clatter, and then they came to rest, one pip glinting from each face.
One and one.
Snake eyes.
“Two,” breathed HSG. “She rolled a two. She actually rolled a-!”
“Quiet, Jason,” Mo snapped. “Again, if you please, Miss Rosario.”
He collected the dice and passed them back across the desk to me. The corner of my lip twisted in distaste, but I nevertheless accepted them, shook, and cast.
Two pips stared back at me. Snake eyes, just like before.
“Again.”
Take, shake, roll.
Two pips. Snake eyes.
“Okay, what the hell is going on?” I demanded. “First you make me go bobbing for kittens and pick out a Slushee straw, and now you’re making me roll a loaded pair of dice? Does this have anything to do with me dealing blackjack?”
“The dice are not loaded,” Mo stated, grandfatherly smile all but gone, now. “Inspect them yourself. And then roll, again.”
I retrieved the dice and rolled them through my fingers, weighing them against each other, and then froze. An electric tingle ran up my spine and down to my fingers, as I realized that Mo was on the level. I knew what trick dice felt like in my hand; my dad had made me test out the sets he carved in our garage.
These were legit.
Which meant…
I rolled the dice, flinging them hard against the table. One spun like a top, fluttering about before finally tipping over with one pip to the sky. The other skated across the desk, nearly colliding with the adventuring kitten, and flew off onto the floor.
Where it landed with one pip showing.
Snake eyes.
“Again.”
Beginning to feel extremely freaked out, I did as Mo asked, taking a new pair of dice from him and casting them across the desk.
Two pips. Snake eyes.
“Again.”
My hand shook all on its own this time, barely steady enough to hold both dice together. They toppled away from me, less a cast, and more a drop.
It didn’t matter. Twp pips glinted in the light, reflecting the golden ornamentation.
Snake eyes.
“Again.”
Again, and again, and again. Over and over, Mo made me roll the dice, and every time the result was the same: two pips. Twenty times in a row, I rolled snake eyes.
Which was, mathematically speaking, almost impossible.
“What the hell is going on?” I asked again, but this time I really, truly meant it. My voice was barely a squeak, choked by an iron bar lodged in my throat. “What does this mean?”
“It means, Miss Rosario, that you are the unluckiest person alive.”
I blinked. Even in the grip of an utter and complete confusion, I had enough of my mother’s pride left in me to be insulted.
“Excuse me?”
“Oh, I mean that very literally,” Mo said, standing up from his desk and sharply correcting his suit jacket. “You, Miguelita Hortensia Maria Francisca de Toledo Rosario Vasquez, are the most unlucky human being on the planet. And that makes you extremely dangerous.”
“Dangerous?” I spluttered. “What do you mean, dangerous? How am I-?”
“We do not have time for me to answer that question,” Mo interrupted, gesturing for her to stand. “Suffice it to say that there are those of us who play probability and odds like a musician plays his instrument. And we’ve been looking for you, Miss Rosario. Looking for you for quite some time.”
I opened my mouth to demand more than that, or maybe to just sputter in wild confusion, but Mo steamrolled over me.
“Jason, call ahead to the helipad and tell them to spin up the chopper,” he ordered tersely, glancing to Hot Security Guy. “I want to be wheels up in fifteen minutes. We need to go, now.”
“Go?!” I snapped, finally untangling my tongue. “Go where?”
“To meet with Lady Luck.”