Author: M. Swift

The Spear is one of the most basic of wrestling moves. A carry-over from football, every version of the Spear—regardless of who delivers it—would be illegal in rugby and Australian rules football. Well, all versions except for our first and third entry as we look at the three most dangerous versions of the Spear in WWE history. Rhino/Rhyno: The Gore At the top of this list is the Gore, used by Rhino since the late-90s, this was a tackle in the purest sense. Rhino—who was built like his namesake—delivered the most legal tackle on the list but also the most…

Well, here’s a tough one. Even though Impact Wrestling had control of the NWA World Heavyweight Championship for almost five years, listing the five best champions during that period is proving difficult. This is because two of the champs on this list held the title multiple times with several of those reigns being most of the year and one reign stopping eighteen days short of a year. Let’s dive in and find out who were the top five NWA World Heavyweight Champions of the TNA Years. A.J Styles (3x NWA World Heavyweight Champion) Of course, Styles would sit at the…

Remember when former WWE Champion, TNA World Champion, IWGP Heavyweight Champion, and World Heavyweight Champion Kurt Angle won two Olympic gold medals in 1996? He did it with a broken freakin’ neck, folks. Conor McGregor Is Mocked For Early Match Injury Angle recently reminded us of this feat while mocking former UFC Lightweight and Featherweight Champion Conor McGregor. In the possible final match of the McGregor-Poirier thrillogy, The Notorious suffered a broken lower tibia. In layman’s terms: he ended up with a broken ankle. The injury occurred in the first round, thus ending the extremely hyped, heavily promoted main event of UFC 264 on something of an…

Seriously, what was this championship? The TNA Television title—called that because its other names just made no sense—was a championship that was around between 2008 and 2016 in Impact Wrestling. For a title with such an odd history, eight years is a long time for a championship to be active. This wasn’t the Hardcore championship in WWE and WCW, this was treated as a mid-tier title in the company but presented differently depending on the champion. We’re ranking the TNA Television Champion’s eras from best to worst! TNA Television Championship Era After defeating Rob Terry for the title in July 2010, A.J…

On the February 9, 1998, episode of WCW Monday Nitro, we got a match that was often described as “controversial” and “awful” in Goldberg vs. Steven Regal. Having watched that match at the time, I didn’t think much of it. I didn’t think it was awful or good, it was just a longer than usual Goldberg match. In the end, he still won but I’d stopped caring about the streak much earlier than others. It did pique my interest as it was lengthy for Goldberg but short for Regal. Years later and I dig this ugly match-up. It’s not flashy…

With no national competition and MMA becoming popular, the attention towards WWE and wrestling, in general, began to cool in the early 2000s. Of course, there was still an attempt to capitalize on wrestling’s popularity: Nikki on the WB. The wheels should be turning because this show aired during a period when the WB was really throwing anything at the wall show-wise while being carried by Buffy the Vampire Slayer, 7th Heaven, Pokemon, Charmed, Angel, and The Steve Harvey Show. C’mon, You Remember Nikki Hey, stick with me here, now. Airing in late 2000, Nikki popped after the tables had turned on WCW and Raw was busy clapping Nitro’s cheeks weekly. The show was…

Two very similar factions running an anti-American gimmick formed in TNA and WWE respectively. First was The World Elite in 2009 followed by WWE’s League of Nations in 2015. Which faction was the better faction between the two? The World Elite I couldn’t place whether The World Elite was a major faction or a mid-rank one. It featured a greater amount of former and future World champions than League of Nations. It also had too many members at any given time. One pro for the faction was that it was around a little longer and was actually involved in the midst of…

The WWE has a number of television shows that were canceled for a variety of reasons. Let’s look at five WWE shows that were that you’ll probably remember. WWE Saturday Morning Slam I always felt the Saturday morning block was perfect for wrestling but WWE took the “cater to kids” approach and ran with it. Rated TV-G, WWE Slam removed strikes and drops to the head and neck. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbWFYJcCSKg The result was a very bland, unexciting product and a show that wasn’t even around for a while year. Apparently, WWE and Saban—yes, Power Rangers-Saban—couldn’t agree on the creative direction of the show. Where could they have gone with WWE…

Hulk Hogan joined the company of athletes and entertainers who fumbled their reputations as fond parts of 80s and 90s kids’ childhoods. You know, it’s that level of fumbling where some folks don’t care about a strong body of work in their craft anymore. That said, Hogan produced a lot of memorable wrestling moments and had a massive hand in shaping the landscape of wrestling going from the mid-80s onward. We even got some legendary matches out of his career. Could you imagine the audacity to say something trash while being a trash wrestler with no noteworthy matches or contributions? One contribution by Hulk Hogan came…

Best known in WWE as Wade Barrett, Stu Bennett began his wrestling career on the UK indy scene in the summer of 2004 after an extremely eventful bare-knuckle boxing career. Like many wrestlers from the UK, a match that inspired him to enter wrestling was the SummerSlam 1992 Intercontinental title match from Wembley Stadium. We’re back with the 3-Count Spotlight where we put the spotlight on a superstar’s three bright points and see if it was enough for them to go beyond being a “superstar”. Mic Check Passed On the mic, Wade Barrett is damn good. Before that, he has always had the natural charisma and mic know-how but he wasn’t given good material…