News and Notes

I was sorry to hear about the passing of "Dr. Death" Steve Williams, who lost a long battle to cancer (his action figure has had a place here on my desk for the past couple of months). Williams was known as one of the legit toughest men in wrestling. He was one of my favorite "good guys" when the UWF was my favorite wrestling league in the 80's. He was great as a singles wrestler and also made great tag teams with Ted DiBiase, Terry Gordy, Johnny Ace, and perhaps my favorites as partners with Kevin Sullivan, Rick Steiner, and Mike Rotunda in The Varsity Club. Here is a classic clip with Williams and Gordy vs. The Steiner Brothers:



In other news, we are only a few short days until the big Monday night wrestling showdown on January 4th. I think WWE is going to trounce TNA. Recently Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff have been making noises about concentrating on the in-ring product; if so, I'm all for that. The first two moves they need to do is get rid of writer Vince Russo and get rid of that awful name. I don't see how they are going to beat the return of Bret Hart to Raw though. I'll be switching back and forth all night... What a classy send-off for Tommy Dreamer on Tuesday night's ECW. Even I was fighting back tears when they showed Beaulah and the kids in the crowd. It would have been funny if they did a take-off of the Ric Flair retirement ceremony and brought back Paul E., Sandman, Justin Credible and the rest of the gang... I'm about half way through with the Ring of Honor year in review on HD Net. Incredible stuff. These guys always remind me why I became a wrestling fan... I can't believe they haven't pulled the Charlie Sheen/Michael Jordan ads yet. It almost feels like you're supporting domestic violence (allegedly) just for buying a pair of draws... Between that and the bomber guy, it's been a bad week for draws... I caught the season premiere of MTV's Real World: Washington D.C. last night. Decent cast. It's always funny to see the first episode with everyone getting along, just knowing it's gonna end badly. The Stephanie McMahon lookalike girl is the one to watch this season.

"This Is It" Music Video

Here is the new video for the Michael Jackson song "This Is It", directed by Spike Lee. Great stuff!:

WWE Tables, Ladders and Chairs Results

Results from tonight's WWE TLC pay-per-view show:

- Christian beat Shelton Benjamin in a Ladder Match

- Drew McIntyre beat John Morrison to win the I-C title

- Michelle McCool beat Mickie James

- Sheamus beat John Cena in a Tables Match to become the palest world champion since Bob Backland

- Undertaker beat Batista in a Chair Match to retain the Smackdown World Title

- Randy Orton beat Kofi Kingston

- DX beat Chris Jericho and The Big Show in a TLC match to win the World Tag Team Titles

(Photo from wwe.com)

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Eddie Fatu a.k.a. "Umaga", 1973-2009

Sorry to hear about the death of Eddie Fatu, better known as "Umaga" from his monster heel role the last few years in WWE, who died today at the age of 36. He came from a big wrestling family and was perhaps the best of the bunch. My condolences to his family and friends.

(Below is one of my favorite clips of Eddie Fatu, playing the role of "Jamal" of Three Minute Warning, when he interrupted the infamous wedding of Billy and Chuck and got to attack Stephanie McMahon-- go to about the 5:00 minute mark):

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